Doing the Math

Perhaps someone else can correct my "math" and I simply haven't seen it correctly, but there have been a couple of rather interesting implications in the news in the past week that have made me wonder. It is not so much the events themselves, though they are compelling enough. It is more what they say about an apparently discredited political philosophy.

It has become axiomatic in popular culture and in the media that if George W Bush had been for a thing it must have been bad. Often following hard upon this point is the corollary that if something is bad that W must have had something to do with it. I'm not planning on arguing here that everything he did was good or that nothing he did was bad. However, we can't very well say that we've thought the matter through if we don't take into account what would otherwise have to be some rather remarkable coincidences recently.

The first is rather subtle. The North Koreans, for reasons that never seem apparent to anyone, occasionally go on saber-rattling fests where they challenge the rest of the world with utter destruction like some odd combination of Dr Evil and Cobra Commander. Its most recent incarnation has involved the threat of launching of a new missile that could possibly reach out as far as the Aloha state. Since they have apparently acquired nuclear weapons, this poses a more serious threat than their past ramblings.

Yesterday, on MSNBC, a local newswoman was interviewed about the attitude of the Hawaiians in the face of the newest danger. She reported that the people weren't particularly worried in part because of the assurances of President Obama about our military capabilities and the increased presence of said military forces. As an example MSNBC showed pictures of one of the United States's giant domed radar ships watching and waiting for any incoming threat.

The other oddity has been splayed all over the news for the past week and more. The Iranians have presented Americans with a gift. A riot in the Middle East where we are not the object of hatred or even have much to do with the argument. Young people who've grown up under a theocratic tyranny are risking (and losing) their lives in a demand for democracy that soon could be more of a revolution than a simple protest.

Here's where I get puzzled. During his administration President Bush (43) was railed at unceasingly for his cowboy, unilateral tactics. Exhibit 'A' was early in his first term when his abrogated the Ballistic Missile treaty with the Russian Federation enabling him to establish at long last a mini-me version of President Reagan's so-called 'Star Wars' defense program. Instead of a massive, space-based missile shield, the United States would now field a few dozen anti-missile missiles in the Pacific and in Europe designed to counter limited threats from 'Rogue Regimes.'

In the same way W was decried for his naive proposal about challenging hostile states by enabling democracy in Iraq. His proposal was that when the populations in neighboring countries saw the Iraqis practicing free elections that this would lead them to wonder why they couldn't have such rights too. Then, with more opportunities for free expression in their own lands, the people would have less need to express themselves violently overseas.

So now, in the past week or so, we have seen Obama tout Bush's missile defense program and the protection Bush claimed it would despite the fact that the Democrats swore it never could, and we've seen a Middle Eastern tyranny be rocked by protests from its people demanding free and fair democracy just as Bush promised and not as the Democrats long denied.

If people want to go on thinking that Bush was the worst President in history, that is fine, but what will they make of this? Bush said he wanted to create a missile shield, and the Left said it would make things worse. Now, we have the protection and the Left thinks its all a great idea. Bush said fostering democracy in Iraq would lead to democracy movements in neighboring, hostile regimes. Now we have a massive democracy movement in neigbhoring, hostile Iran. Am I missing something here? or did maybe, just maybe, W got his math right?

by Timothy Padgett