It is grossly naive to believe that Americans abroad are “liked again”. When were we ever “liked”? In the sense that we may be more tolerable to those who dis-“liked” us before, not much has changed about European feelings for us since the end of WWII. Living in Spain during the Reagan years, Americans were viewed as being somewhere between “Dynasty” and “Dukes of Hazard”, and yet Europeans had an insatiable appetite for American clothing, music, and rhetoric, and this belied a stereotypical class envy. While Europe continues its lurch toward socialism and social discontent, it makes sense that capitalism continues to fuel envy. With GW Bush, the envy grew in proportion to the media’s campaign of against him. That assault developed into the anti-intellectual, irrational hero worship of Obama, a man who has done nothing but give pretty speeches to warrant such an attitude. Today, the Europeans still resent us as much as they used. The French will tell you they should be able to vote in our elections. Abroad, there is still as much envy and resentment as before. We may be more acceptable because we voted for a fraud who belives the same things they do, but believe me, we will not be “liked again.”

Above all, as the coming confrontation with political Islam becomes ever more obvious, he will be remembered as the first western leader to reject the appeasement consensus, to actively challenge the UN (rightly) and to diminish the physical threat posed by the Islamist, through the action in Afghanistan.

Whether the military action in Iraq will be viewed favourably by history is less certain, but at the end of his time in office he can justly claim to see the insurgency in Iraq defeated and democratic rule in place of the Nazist Ba’ath regime. Though his opponents would not admit it, other despotisms around the world have hesitated to threaten America during his Presidency for proper fear of military action. He has faithfully discharged his duty to use the resources of the state to protect the people.

I hope and pray that his successor will have the same courage and wisdom.

I’ve been reading political blogs for five years now, and if anything, I think how we feel about W is more indicative of our own behavior. I am beginning to think that it is more of our own self-righteous, self-entitled personalities coming through, as W does not do exactly what we want him to do…be it stop the war in Iraq, kick Mexicans back to Mexico, or provide us with free gas, or become a Democrat.

No one is the same person as President. We as a society will not allow it Hence, the Governor of Texas IS different than the President of the US. Especially since the President had to be told that war was declared on us by a non-state entity while reading to children. And that Americans would not stand by and be victims again.

Want a perfect example of a smirk? try Joe Biden

By the way, I never voted for W. I voted for Gore in 2000, wrote in Green in 2004, and wrote in Liebermann in 2008

George Bush is a classy man. He was very generous with a nation that has totally crapped on him. He deserves so much better than a vicious and ungrateful nation has dealt back to him. We are living in interesting times. The confluence of events and forces heightens the sense of danger and foreboding I feel.

There is an aspect that will be largely ignored, but is telling. Bush came to the Presidency in swirling controversy; already vilified by a large per centage of the country and by a near unanimous majority of the pundits and opinion makers. His transition was truncated by the legal mechanations of the opposition and made extremely turbulent by enemies in the Senate who fought his appointments. He inherited a largely hostile career bureacracy. Throughout his Presidency he struggled against these same forces. Yet as he leaves office, he has orchestrated one of the most cooperative and seamless transitions in history. Even the same hostile press which opposed him at every opportunity acknowledges that he has extended himself to insure that the incoming administration has an opportunity to succeed. His efforts have extended to making hard economic decisions during his last week in office to relieve his successor of that burden during his first days.

Bush’s actions in this regard, particulary viewed in contrast to his own experiences demonstrate to the American people, and to anyone in the world who is paying attention, the noblest aspects of democracy. It also demonstrates the character of George W. Bush.

I will miss him. I suspect the nation will miss him more than most can imagine at this point.

There are leaders out there, whose names we don’t know today, who will shoulder the unsought burdens, as Mr. Bush did after 9/11. His graceful exit is his last service to his country and world, for awhile at least.

Now put your energy and your intellect to work in a place where you can develop some leverage by changing a few minds.

I still remember that day in May of 1973, before I had graduated from high school, when I was in the Army’s delayed entry program and had to report to the U.S. Army offices on a wharf in Boston, MA, when I stood with a couple of dozen other young men and took the oath that every young serviceman takes upon entering the U.S. Armed Forces. Even though I am many years past my service completion I STILL TAKE THAT OATH SERIOUSLY. I believe our civilization is worth defending and I will not go down without a fight. Ask any NRA member who also joins a rod and gun club. We know – and most of us are military veterans – that it is possible our nation may need us again. Against enemies foreign and domestic.

But Bill Whittle’s description of what is happening in the Santa Monica High School and in just about every university across this nation and in Western Europe is very discouraging. Our young people are the seed corn of the nation and our civilization. They are being corrupted, deceived, and enervated of all natural energy and feeling for the land and ideas they were born to.

This is what depresses me. For every fine young man and woman, enlisted and officer, in our military there are perhaps at least five who are either not contributing, don’t care, or are outright hostile.

If I knew that hewing to the high road of ideas that you so well described in your above post would win the day, I would never succumb to the despair I feel. But I no longer believe that these people are in possession of minds that can think clearly, ponder deeply, and integrate the heart and mind in a synthesis that is elevated. Let me tell you what really drove it home: the recent research that revealed that over two thirds of our young people, from junior high through college and tech schools cheat on exams, papers, homework – you name it. Blew me away when I heard it. Worse than I thought it was.

It’s about more than just the loss of patriotism. It’s the loss of whatever shards of honor were left. As patriotic an American I believe myself to be, there are higher loyalties that cling to. God and Church. My fellow human beings, as God’s children. Not some kind of “citizen of the world” faux polity that the current White Horse riding into D.C. this weekend espouses. Being a Roman Catholic does not mean that one cannot embrace the idea of e pluribus unum – not just for our nation but for all the world. I DO believe in the nation state. I don’t believe in world government. I cannot believe in world government, when that world government wishes to supplant the Constitution of the United States of America, an extraordinary document that is one of a kind and which declares that human dignity and rights come from the Creator. Not Man. Not The Government.

I live my Christianity as an American, who believes that we must do what we can to help others but we must first secure the liberties for our people that much effusion of blood achieved.

So will it also be in the larger struggle. The party of freedom has made tremendous gains in the past eight years. We won’t keep them all in the years ahead. We need to focus on where we can rebuild our confidence and generate our energy.

You must have noticed that the pro-freedom side has been conspicuously lacking in self-confidence and intellectual vigor over the past three years. We need to pick the ground on which we can win. We need to take on the Left with facts and logic, avoiding temper tantrums and name calling. When the issues become clear to the voters in the middle, we tend to win; when they are a soggy emotional mess, we tend to lose.

Events also have a way of clarifying the issues. Reality has a way of interrupting fantasies. Our opponents will over-reach in various ways. We will get our chances.

And we need to have courage. In my opinion, the Republican politicians lost their nerve over Iraq in 2006; they broke and ran, shouting “sauve qui peut,” and they got slaughtered at the polls as a result. If they don’t make their case and defend their policy, the Democrats won’t make it for them.

Leadership is required, and firmness when it come to the grip. I’m sure you read this last fall: http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OGVlY2RhOGM0MWE5MjNmMGM2ZjY0NzcxMjMzMTc5NWI=

Whittle probably places too much faith in the steadiness of the old warhorse McCain; but the message is the right one: Defend the City. You will understand the the rightful meaning as Defend the Civitas.

My journey was a tad circuitous. Graduated from high school in ’73. Did the Army 1973 to 1976 (a three year hitch), and then did college ’77-’82 (took longer because I transferred from a college in Gunnison, Co and moved back to be with my folks in New Hampshire, transferring to the University of New Hampshire). After college, was a Jesuit seminarian for three years, getting an M.A. in Philosophy from Loyola of Chicago. Left the Society of Jesus, re-entered the world (as they say) and enrolled in the MBA program at Boston College, where I got an MBA in Finance. From ’77 until about 1987 I was a Marxist and did not hide that fact, but was also an academic type of one who also was listening to the arguments against socialism, liberation theology, and utopian thought coming from the likes of Michael Novak (and others). I too found many of the people on the Left unsavory, and some of them even vicious and amoral, which offended my ethical sensibilities. When I met my wife in ’87 I was already breaking with the Left, and there were strong intellectual as well as personal reasons for the break. Besides, in graduate business school I learned even more about how and why our economic system is so successful and why socialism is a failure, always was a failure, and ever shall be a failure.

So, I was a Marxist at 22 and by age 32 I had broken with it. I figure that people who stick with socialism beyond that age have something very seriously wrong with them in every dimension. Also, because I remained a Catholic throughout I experienced condescension and snobbery against me that took its toll. The hatred of Judaism and Christianity will wear down the best, which is why many Christians who remain on the Left eventually have to make so many compromises with their faith that they, quite unconsciously, end up with a subtle change in their faith loyalties. I could see the ways it was happening to me, and eventually I had to draw a line somewhere.

My former “friends” on the Left want nothing to do with me since I moved slightly right of center. It was not I who initiated the divorce. The thing about the Left is that if you do not share their religion, they have no use for you. I suppose, in the final analysis it’s probably all for the better. My decade on the Left convinced me that many are not true and deep intellectuals, as they don’t do a lot of self-criticism or introspection about their own values and ideas. It really is a kind of religion for these people. It’s actually pathetic and unfortunately it could be very dangerous for our society as a whole.

Of late I am decidedly more gloomy and pessimistic, which is actually not my natural way of being. I have come to believe that I am living in the time of the decline of Western Civilization. There is so much evidence of it all around us. Right now the Unholy Alliance of Marxism and Islam seems to be winning the day, even if they are experiencing military setback in Iraq and Afghanistan. In the wider cultural and ideological war in the West, they are winning and it’s truly depressing.

It’s interesting that critics of Reagan, such as that by Booger above, tend to use the deficits as one reason to put down the history of his administration – yet I have to admit that there ARE similarities between Reagan and Bush.

The Reagan deficits, which are always pinned on Reagan by his leftist critics, were the result of an agreement between Congress and Reagan.

Reagan would get his tax cuts (which Bogie criticizes) and Congress in turn would cut spending.

Didn’t happen.

Instead, as soon as tax revenues went UP as a result of the tax cuts and the subsequent economic expansion that followed, Congress began spending like there was no tomorrow and deficits started increasing.

Reagan, despite being president, could not cut the spending.

He had to either veto the spending bills in their entirety or spend the money as Congress mandated.

Anyone remember the Line Item Veto measure he pushed for unsuccessfully? The out of control Congressional spending was the reason he pushed this measure.

He had little choice in the matter, yet the deficits are always blamed on him instead of where it truly belonged – Congress.

Now look at spending under Bush.

Lot of deficits there, and the hundreds of billions of dollars in deficit spending annually were criticized by the leftists again even though Congress is the one actually writing the budget.

But wait – there’s more to the comparison between Reagan and Bush.

In BOTH circumstances (and most especially in the past 2 years of the Bush administration), the DEMOCRATS controlled Congress and wrote the budgets!!!!!!

Once more, a Republican president could either veto the bill – and be lambasted for shutting down the government – or he could allow it to become law and continue the necessary functions of government in spite of the deficit spending.

To place the matter in even greater clarity, consider that the hundreds of billions of dollars in deficit spending over the course of the last year of the Bush administration are about to be completely dwarfed by the TRILLION PLUS deficit spending – and that’s just for starters(!) – the now democrat controlled presidency and democrat controlled Congress are about to engage in.

Where, oh where, are the leftist budget hawks now???

Their outrage is entirely situational and completely dependent on whether or not their socialist brothers control the levers of power – and they have no compunctions at all about lying over the real reasons for what’s happening.

It is a textbook definition for hypocrisy.