From the WSJ Opinion Archives
Thanksgiving
Day
Iraq synecdochically thanked America for its freedom last night. During his
State
of the Union address, President Bush introduced a couple who were sitting
with the first lady, Janet and Bill Norwood. The Norwoods' son, Marine Sgt.
Byron Norwood, was killed during the liberation of Fallujah. Said the president:
His mom, Janet, sent me a letter and told me how much Byron loved being a Marine, and how proud he was to be on the front line against terror. She wrote, "When Byron was home the last time, I said that I wanted to protect him like I had since he was born. He just hugged me and said, 'You've done your job, Mom. Now it is my turn to protect you.' " Ladies and gentlemen, with grateful hearts, we honor freedom's defenders, and our military families.
Whereupon another honored guest, Iraqi human-rights advocate Safia Taleb al-Suhail, stood, turned and embraced Mrs. Norwood, who was seated behind her. It would take a bitter cynic indeed--a man like Tom Shales--not to be moved by this.
Another powerful image was that of U.S. congressmen, led by Rep. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, holding up fingers stained purple in solidarity with the newly enfranchised Iraqis. Cox News Service gives the background:
"We all watched with joy as Iraqis dipped their fingers in ink and held them high, proudly proclaiming to the world that they had voted," recalled Jindal in a "Dear Colleagues" letter coordinating the congressional action. He provided the purple ink for both Republicans and Democrats.
"This symbolic gesture will tell Iraqis, and the world, that we believe in their cause and will stand beside them and all peoples who embrace freedom," said Jindal, the president of the House freshman class. "It's been said that partisanship stops at the water's edge. Let us again show that to be true by joining together in this symbolic gesture." . . .
But most Democrats did not dip into the inkwell.
Some other thoughts on the speech: As always, there was too much boring, small-bore domestic stuff--community colleges? the Ryan White Act?--but it was smart to tuck this into the middle of the speech. The interesting parts were, of course, the sections on Social Security reform and foreign policy. On Social Security, the president was very effective at countering the Democratic line that the problem isn't imminent so nothing should be done (sound familiar?):
I recognize that 2018 and 2042 may seem a long way off. But those dates are not so distant, as any parent will tell you. If you have a 5-year-old, you're already concerned about how you'll pay for college tuition 13 years down the road.
This puts it in terms people can easily understand. We also were amused by the scornful tone in which he said, "Social Security was a great moral success of the 20th century," which points to the reactionary nature of Democratic obstructionism.
The president began his discussion of the Iraqi election with the same anecdote we cited atop Monday's column, and we must admit we smiled and wondered if the White House speechwriting staff has been reading our stuff. Of course, the article originally appeared in the New York Times, but then so did this flapdoodle. The Times really ought to hire some editors.
We were very happy to see that Bush did not back down from the ambitious statement of principle in his second inaugural address. Indeed, he restated it and answered his critics who call it overambitious:
We've declared our own intention: America will stand with the allies of freedom to support democratic movements in the Middle East and beyond, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world. . . .
As Franklin Roosevelt once reminded Americans, "Each age is a dream that is dying, or one that is coming to birth." And we live in the country where the biggest dreams are born. The abolition of slavery was only a dream--until it was fulfilled. The liberation of Europe from fascism was only a dream--until it was achieved. The fall of imperial communism was only a dream--until, one day, it was accomplished. Our generation has dreams of its own, and we also go forward with confidence. The road of Providence is uneven and unpredictable--yet we know where it leads: It leads to freedom.
He also fleshed out some specifics. He praised reforms in Bahrain, Jordan and Morocco, called on Egypt and Saudi Arabia to embrace democracy, demanded that Syria stop supporting terror, and declared, "To the Iranian people, I say tonight: As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you."
President Bush seeks to reform dramatically America's domestic institutions and to aid the spread of freedom throughout the world. He has already had several major successes on the latter score, and in addition he has managed to reduce the opposition party to a state of incoherent rage. If he has a successful second term, he will probably rank as the most consequential president since FDR.
Why God Gave Us the 'Mute' Button
We watched last night's speech with a mostly right-leaning group of friends,
and over their objections we kept the TV on for the Democratic response, for
we were really curious as to what Barack Obama was going to say. But as it turned
out, the Democrats apparently couldn't get Obama and instead had to go with
the B team of Nancy Reid and Harry Pelosi.
Reid grew up in Searchlight, Nevada, yadda yadda yadda: That's about all we took away from their speeches, which were soon drowned out by the sound of conversation. Eventually we relented and turned the sound off. We would have read the speeches this morning, but apparently the Dems didn't think them worth publicizing; we couldn't find them anywhere on the Democratic National Committee Web site (which does, however, have the eagerly anticipated Terry McAuliffe response, though they don't know how to spell his name).
Reid and Pelosi do not, to say the least, present an attractive face to America. As our friend Rich Miniter observed, Reid looked like a doctor who refuses to administer painkillers. As for Pelosi--who is known mostly for being more charming than Barbara Boxer--she stiffly stared at the camera with a deer-in-the-headlights look.
We have to wonder what the point is of this tradition of responding to the State of the Union. We don't mean to pick only on the Democrats; recall the Republican response to the 1995 State of the Union. Even though in 1995 the GOP mattered a lot more than the Dems do today, chances are you remember nothing about their response--and that's the point: These things are never memorable, and they serve only to make the opposition party look insignificant. If the Dems are smart, they'll skip the response in 2006.
Then
Again . . .
"Bird Brains Far More Powerful Than Thought"--headline, ScienceBlog.com,
Feb. 1
The
Road to Peace Goes Through Baghdad
"Jordan and Egypt are expected to announce the return of their ambassadors
to Israel at an upcoming summit hosted by Egyptian President Husni Mubarak,
official sources in Jerusalem said Wednesday."--Ha'aretz, Feb. 3
Sunni
Chutzpah
"Leading Sunni clerics declared on Wednesday that any government emerging
from Iraq's historic election would lack legitimacy because many people had
boycotted a poll they said was tainted by a U.S.-led occupation," Reuters
reports.
So these Sunnis complain that the election is illegitimate because they boycotted it. The obvious comparison is to the child in the classic definition of chutzpah, who kills his parents and pleads for mercy because he's an orphan. But another analogy occurs to us: These Sunnis are like America's Baathist remnants, namely the Democratic left.
They spent the four years prior to the 2004 election running around the country spreading fictions about voter intimidation and suppression, sending the message to their supporters: Your votes don't count. No wonder their supporters didn't show up at the polls in numbers as great as the Republicans'. And now, predictably enough, they're complaining that the election was illegitimate.
This
Just In--I
"Al-Qaida Purportedly Calls for Holy War"--headline, Associated Press,
Feb. 2
Going
to Pot
Several readers have written us requesting an explanation for this week's subtle
shift in our stock description of John Kerry*: "served
in Vietnam" has become "delivered weapons to the Khmer Rouge."
The answer can be found--where else?--in the cornucopian transcript of Sunday's
"Meet the Press" interview.
In that interview, Tim Russert asks Kerry about his "seared" but since-refuted claim that he was in Cambodia on Christmas 1968. Kerry acknowledges that he wasn't there, though he says he was "right on the Cambodian border that night." And he says he ventured into Cambodia on a later date as part of a CIA mission. Then comes the crucial passage of the interview:
Russert: And you have a hat that the CIA agent gave you?
Kerry: I still have the hat that he gave me, and I hope the guy would come out of the woodwork and say, "I'm the guy who went up with John Kerry. We delivered weapons to the Khmer Rouge on the coastline of Cambodia." We went out of Ha Tien, which is right in Vietnam. We went north up into the border. And I have some photographs of that, and that's what we did. So, you know, the two were jumbled together, but we were on the Cambodian border on Christmas Eve, absolutely.
This is passing strange. Does Kerry not realize the Khmer Rouge was on the side of the enemy? Did the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth understate the degree to which he sided against his own country? Is this an attempt at humor? Or does he think the Khmer Rouge is popular in les états de rouge?
* The haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat, who by the way delivered weapons to the Khmer Rouge.
In
the Beginning
"How did life, in its infinite complexity, come to be?" asks Newsweek
in a subheadline. "A controversial new theory called 'intelligent design'
asserts a supernatural agent was at work."
Apparently the Old Testament isn't on Lexis-Nexis, or Newsweek's fact-checkers would have realized this isn't actually a new theory.
This
Just In--II
"Personally, I've decided to stop evolving."--Maureen Dowd, New York
Times, Feb. 3
USO
Shows Ain't What They Used to Be
"Marines Miss January Goal for Recruits"--headline, New York Times,
Feb. 3
You've
Come a Long Way, Baby
"Crimes Among Girls Show Increase in Violence"--headline, Quad-City
Times (Davenport, Iowa), Jan. 31
Is
the Pope Mormon?
"Pope Headed to Utah"--headline, ESPN Soccernet, Feb. 1
An
Offer You Can Refuse
"Take a break with a bowl of additive-free, chunky soup you can almost
eat."--Narita Airport Web site, advertising "one of Tokyo's most talked
about soup speciality [sic] restaurants, Soup Stock Tokyo"
Say
What?
"A law enforcement officer in Central Florida was jailed Tuesday on a charge
of posing as a law enforcement officer."--WKMG Web site (Orlando), Feb. 1
Higher
Than 100%?
"Study: Southern Blacks Die at Higher Rate"--headline, Associated
Press, Feb. 2
What's the Best Day?
"July 4th Is Worst Day for Fatal Car Crashes"--headline, MSNBC.com,
Feb. 2
And
You Thought They Were More Likely to Crash Cars
"Drunk Drivers More Likely to Crash Airplanes"--headline, AVweb.com,
Feb. 2
Best
of the Web Today Plays Detective
The New York Sun reports on a subway tragedy:
The woman, Jean Eng, who lived in Chinatown, was waiting for an uptown no. 6 train at the south end of the station at 23rd Street and Park Avenue, shortly after 10 a.m. yesterday.
Based on interviews with witnesses, police gave the following account.
Eng accidentally dropped her purse onto the train tracks. She lowered herself down onto the train bed near the tunnel entrance to retrieve her handbag. Upon retrieving it, however, she found herself trapped in the track bed, which is about 4 1/2 feet below the platform. Eng could not pull herself back up.
Concerned subway riders rushed to her aid, and a few may have even jumped onto the tracks to help push her back onto the platform, police said.
The bystanders' efforts proved useless. A train entered the station, and while Eng managed to avoid being struck by the first car,she was struck several times by the second and third passing cars before the train came to a halt.
The specific cause of Eng's death was not immediately determined.
We're going to go out on a limb and predict it will turn out she was run over by a train.
Civil
Rights Are for the Birds?
"Sharpton Joins With an Animal Rights Group in Calling for a Boycott of
KFC"--headline, New York Times, Feb. 2
Hillary's Husband
Yesterday we received this e-mail from reader Michael Levine (emphasis in original):
In the Best of the Web Today from Feb. 1, one item is entitled "Sexist Journalism Watch." It talks about how in an AP story about Sen. Hillary Clinton's collapse, her husband's medical history is brought up. There is a complaint saying that if it were a male senator that had collapsed, they wouldn't have mentioned his wife's medical history in an AP story. While that is probably true, if a different female senator collapsed, they probably wouldn't have mentioned her husband's medical history either.
This is a strange case. HER HUSBAND WAS THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. Did whoever compiles the "Best of the Web Today" forget that tiny tidbit of information? I'm not saying that the fact that Bill had heart surgery is newsworthy or was relevant to the story on Hillary's collapse, but I'm pretty sure its inclusion wasn't gender-related. I think it was more former-leader-of-the-free-world-related.
We looked into this, and it appears Levine may be on to something. According to the Almanac of American Politics (link for National Journal subscribers), Sen. Clinton's marital status is "married (Bill)." According to the White House Web site, there was a president of the 20th century named William J. Clinton. The White House doesn't say if he also went by "Bill," but it is a distinct possibility.
On the other hand, we went back and checked the original AP story that prompted our item, and it does not mention anything about the senator's husband having been president or even his name. You'd think if a senator married an ex-president, that would be news.
(Carol Muller helps compile Best of the Web Today. Thanks to Michael Segal, Tom Linehan, Debra Burlingame, Jim Orheim, Harold Moscowitz, Aaron Shafer, Jim Tarantino, Morris Gavant, Buddy Smith, Samuel Walker, Byron Furseth, Kevin Price, Bob Batts, Chris Nicastri, Saul Rapkin, Jeff Marti, Thomas Dillon, David Gerstman, Dan Calabrese, Marshall Sella, David Skocik, Mike Whinihan, Harold Weissler, Paul Siebenshuh, Rob Miller, Alex Wong, William Schultz, Timothy Hamilton, Peter Schumann, Steve Schildwachter, Robert Elworth, Gregg Sanderson, Peyton Randolph, Kerk Phillips, Nathan Alexander, Bill Needle, Robert Polys, Dave Hannold, C.E. Dobkin, Christopher Salogub, John Williamson, Kevin Gowen, Ruth Papazian, Julie Beck, Lydia Conrad, Brendan Schulman, Mark Harrington, Alisa Duncanson and Robert Paci. If you have a tip, write us at opinionjournal@wsj.com, and please include the URL.)
Today on OpinionJournal:
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- William Voegeli: What do Democrats stand for? The real question is, what do they stand against?
- Mark Yost: A no-holds-barred wrestling wrinklefest
