Aknauta
01-31-2003, 01:15 PM
wsj.com
The Right Man
State of the Union: Few sound bites, many thoughts.
Thursday, January 30, 2003 12http://gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wow.gif1 a.m. EST
You always hope a State of the Union address will be a sleek and handsome ocean liner cutting through the sea. Often they start that way and then turn, inevitably, into a greasy old barge riding low in the water, weighed down by policy cargo. It blows its horn proudly but the sound is more impressive than the ship; in fact it highlights the ship's inadequacy.
George W. Bush's State of the Union the other night flipped expectations and broke rules. It began as a barge and turned into a ship of state. Suddenly you realized its early slowness was in fact a stateliness, not a flaw but part of a design. It built. It didn't blast its horn and yet as it moved forward you couldn't stop listening.
It was the speech of a practical idealist, practical in that it dealt directly with crucial and immediate challenges and addressed them within a context of what is possible, and idealistic in that it applied the great American abstractions--freedom, justice, independence--to those challenges. The speech was held together by a theme of protectiveness. We must now more than ever, and for all the current crisis, continue as a uniquely protective people. We must protect the vulnerable and troubled--the young with parents in prison, the old with high prescription costs, workers battered by taxes, victims of late-term abortions, a continent dying of AIDS. In foreign policy we must protect ourselves and the world from those who would harm us with massive, evil weapons.
A steady hand on the helm in high seas (http://www.opinionjournal.c om/columnists/pnoonan/?id=110002995)
The Right Man
State of the Union: Few sound bites, many thoughts.
Thursday, January 30, 2003 12http://gopusa.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wow.gif1 a.m. EST
You always hope a State of the Union address will be a sleek and handsome ocean liner cutting through the sea. Often they start that way and then turn, inevitably, into a greasy old barge riding low in the water, weighed down by policy cargo. It blows its horn proudly but the sound is more impressive than the ship; in fact it highlights the ship's inadequacy.
George W. Bush's State of the Union the other night flipped expectations and broke rules. It began as a barge and turned into a ship of state. Suddenly you realized its early slowness was in fact a stateliness, not a flaw but part of a design. It built. It didn't blast its horn and yet as it moved forward you couldn't stop listening.
It was the speech of a practical idealist, practical in that it dealt directly with crucial and immediate challenges and addressed them within a context of what is possible, and idealistic in that it applied the great American abstractions--freedom, justice, independence--to those challenges. The speech was held together by a theme of protectiveness. We must now more than ever, and for all the current crisis, continue as a uniquely protective people. We must protect the vulnerable and troubled--the young with parents in prison, the old with high prescription costs, workers battered by taxes, victims of late-term abortions, a continent dying of AIDS. In foreign policy we must protect ourselves and the world from those who would harm us with massive, evil weapons.
A steady hand on the helm in high seas (http://www.opinionjournal.c om/columnists/pnoonan/?id=110002995)