President Bush Rallies The Nation Why Did He Wait - Road to the Middle Class

In his speech to the nation on December 18, 2005, President Bush, as he has done before, laid out his policy. And as he has done before, he acknowledged that there are valid grounds for disagreements with his policy. He admitted that the war in Iraq

has caused sorrow for our whole nation -- and it has led some to ask if we are creating more problems than we’re solving.

That is an important question, and the answer depends on your view of the war on terror. If you think the terrorists would become peaceful if only America would stop provoking them, then it might make sense to leave them alone.

This was an honorable thing to do, to lay out the core of the anti-war case. Bush then continued, and laid down the facts that led him to the decision to take war to the terrorists. Finally,

My conviction comes down to this: We do not create terrorism by fighting the terrorists. We invite terrorism by ignoring them.

The advantage of this sort of talk was that it frankly admitted the difference in opinion, without demonizing the opposing point of view. Then he went on to point out that, right or wrong, we had to finish the job. For to give up now would be to invite disaster.

But why did he wait until now to make this speech? I believe there are two reasons.

First of all, he has wanted to avoid the real Vietnam syndrome, the perpetual “light at the end of the tunnel”—continually invoked and continually failing to appear as promised. If you have listened carefully over the last three years to President Bush you will know that he has been very careful about what he has said and what he has promised. So he has been prepared to put up with the hail of elite criticism until he has actually achieved the victory in battle that points to victory in the war. A national Iraqi election in which all Iraqis participate is surely as big a victory as you could wish for.

Secondly, there is Bush’s pride. I think that President Bush is too proud to rally Americans unless he has real achievement to rally us to. He just won’t give his opponents the rope to hang him with.

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Christopher Chantrill blogs at www.roadtothemiddleclass.com. His Road to the Middle Class is forthcoming.

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Faith & Purpose

“When we began first to preach these things, the people appeared as awakened from the sleep of ages—they seemed to see for the first time that they were responsible beings...”
Finke, Stark, The Churching of America, 1776-1990

Mutual Aid

In 1911... at least nine million of the 12 million covered by national insurance were already members of voluntary sick pay schemes. A similar proportion were also eligible for medical care.
Green, Reinventing Civil Society

Education

“We have met with families in which for weeks together, not an article of sustenance but potatoes had been used; yet for every child the hard-earned sum was provided to send them to school.”
E. G. West, Education and the State

Living Under Law

Law being too tenuous to rely upon in [Ulster and the Scottish borderlands], people developed patterns of settling differences by personal fighting and family feuds.
Thomas Sowell, Conquests and Cultures

German Philosophy

The primary thing to keep in mind about German and Russian thought since 1800 is that it takes for granted that the Cartesian, Lockean or Humean scientific and philosophical conception of man and nature... has been shown by indisputable evidence to be inadequate.
F.S.C. Northrop, The Meeting of East and West

Knowledge

Inquiry does not start unless there is a problem... It is the problem and its characteristics revealed by analysis which guides one first to the relevant facts and then, once the relevant facts are known, to the relevant hypotheses.
F.S.C. Northrop, The Logic of the Sciences and the Humanities

Chappies

“But I saw a man yesterday who knows a fellow who had it from a chappie that said that Urquhart had been dipping himself a bit recklessly off the deep end.” —Freddy Arbuthnot
Dorothy L. Sayers, Strong Poison

Democratic Capitalism

I mean three systems in one: a predominantly market economy; a polity respectful of the rights of the individual to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; and a system of cultural institutions moved by ideals of liberty and justice for all. In short, three dynamic and converging systems functioning as one: a democratic polity, an economy based on markets and incentives, and a moral-cultural system which is plural and, in the largest sense, liberal.
Michael Novak, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism

Action

The incentive that impels a man to act is always some uneasiness... But to make a man act [he must have] the expectation that purposeful behavior has the power to remove or at least to alleviate the felt uneasiness.
Ludwig von Mises, Human Action

Churches

[In the] higher Christian churches… they saunter through the liturgy like Mohawks along a string of scaffolding who have long since forgotten their danger. If God were to blast such a service to bits, the congregation would be, I believe, genuinely shocked. But in the low churches you expect it every minute.
Annie Dillard, Holy the Firm

Conversion

“When we received Christ,” Phil added, “all of a sudden we now had a rule book to go by, and when we had problems the preacher was right there to give us the answers.”
James M. Ault, Jr., Spirit and Flesh

Living Law

The recognition and integration of extralegal property rights [in the Homestead Act] was a key element in the United States becoming the most important market economy and producer of capital in the world.
Hernando de Soto, The Mystery of Capital

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