President Bush Says Something Good.
Today for a brief moment during his press conference, the clouds parted and President Bush said Something. The 's' is capital because for once the man gave an unscripted, cogent response to a reporter who was badgering him about why we're Over There. Here it is:
REPORTER: "Sorry. I was wondering: Have the difficulties of the last three years made the job of those reformers more difficult?"
BUSH: "Well, if the United States were to lose its nerve, it would certainly make the job of reformers more difficult. If people in Iran, for example, who desire to have an Iranian-style democracy, Iranian-style freedom, if they see us lose our nerve, it's likely to undermine their boldness and their desire.
What we're doing is difficult work. And the interesting thing that is happening is that – imagine an enemy that says: We will kill innocent people because we're trying to encourage people to be free.
What kind of mind-set is it of people who say: We must stop democracy? Democracy is based upon this kind of universal belief that people should be free.
And yet there are people willing to kill innocent life to stop it. To me, that ought to be a warning signal to people all around the world that the enemy we face is an enemy that ascribes (sic) to a vision that is dark and one that doesn't agree with the universal rights of men and women.
As a matter of fact, when given a chance to govern or to have their parasitical government represent their views, they suppressed women and children.
There was no such thing as religious freedom. There was no such thing as being able to express yourself in the public square. There was no such thing as press conferences like this.
They were totalitarian in their view. And that would be – I'm referring to the Taliban, of course.
And that's how they would like to run government. They rule by intimidation and fear, by death and destruction. And the United States of America must take this threat seriously and must not – must never forget the natural rights that formed our country.
And for people to say, well, the natural rights only, you know, exist for one group of people, I would call them, you know – I would say that they're denying the basic rights to others.
And it is hard work. And it's hard work because we're fighting tradition. We're fighting people that have said, well, wait a minute. The only way to have peace is for there to be tyranny.
We're fighting intimidation. We're fighting the fact that people will be thrown in prison if they disagree."
Now, great oratory it's not. But there are some declarative statements in there that I've never heard the man make before. Calling radical islamism what it is: totalitarianism. Explaining in plain language (Bush's trademark) that these forms of government that some would try to propagate, these forms of government have a "dark vision" of a world ruled by sharia law; a world governed by just one total idea: submission.