Friday, January 21, 2005

CRITICAL MASS. What little criticism Peggy Noonan offered of Bush's speech last night was pretty mild. Not today, though. Writing for OpinionJournal.com, Noonan reminds us that she was a speechwriter for Bush I, not Bush II. Check this out:

The inaugural address itself was startling. It left me with a bad feeling, and reluctant dislike. Rhetorically, it veered from high-class boilerplate to strong and simple sentences, but it was not pedestrian. George W. Bush's second inaugural will no doubt prove historic because it carried a punch, asserting an agenda so sweeping that an observer quipped that by the end he would not have been surprised if the president had announced we were going to colonize Mars. [Media Log aside: he actually did, just about a year ago.]

A short and self-conscious preamble led quickly to the meat of the speech: the president's evolving thoughts on freedom in the world. Those thoughts seemed marked by deep moral seriousness and no moral modesty.

Less surprising, but far more vitriolic, is Bob Herbert's column in the New York Times. The lead:

Watching the inaugural ceremonies yesterday reminded me of the scenes near the end of "The Godfather" in which a solemn occasion (a baptism in the movie) is interspersed with a series of spectacularly violent murders.

Wow! It reminds me of a great Kitty Kelley line: when she first started writing about the Bushes, she thought of them as the Cleavers - only to realize they were the Corleones.

With Dick Cheney as Tom Hagen, of course.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Posted in the Sun Chronicle Guestbook Forum
| Fri January 21, 2004 |
http://www.thesunchronicle.com/guestbook/

As I sit and watch the presidential inauguration, I ask myself why these people are wasting their time on protesting something they can't change. I saw one woman holding a sign, "My Soldier Can't Be Here So I Am." If she put as much effort into supporting her soldier as she did in protesting this event he would be one lucky man to have a woman like her.

Kerri, Fort Drum, NY Fri January 21

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Response by Guestbook Member:
"Just the facts"
truthorswear@aol.com

To: Kerri, Fort Drum, NY: What a fitting [albeit unintentional] tribute your post was being so close to Dr. King's birthday, on the subject of the futility of the protestation you witnessed: "One woman holding a sign, "My Soldier Can't Be Here So I Am."

Regarding your inference to your viewing that anguished woman's braving the inclement weather and holding a sign protesting publically "supporting her soldier" during this police-state-like atmosphere [of the presidential inauguration imbroglio...

Your revealing and presumptive post here brings to mind the affected populace of civil rights era. During that era, many 'viewers' made a similar observation… They accused these protesters of "wasting their time on protesting something they can't change," as well.

They also arrived at your post's 'This Protest is Futile!' conclusion; subsequent to viewing these minorities [from a safe distance on TV and in newspapers] being hosed by the police during the 1960's; after being hastily removed from the 'white-only' cafés solely for having the audacity to non-violently protest "futility" by asking to be served a coffee peacefully.

Your astute post is and direct evidence of the fact that you are correct about one thing [at the very least], that some things well... they simply cannot be changed.

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Note: "Just the Fact's" response sent in to the Sun Chronicle webmaster: Sat. Jan 22, 2004

[As yet, unpublished]