Bush Critics Without A Hitch

Christopher Hitchens makes the case for George W. Bush:

[Had Democrats been in office, we] might have avoided the Iraq war, even though both Bill Clinton and Al Gore had repeatedly and publicly said that another and conclusive round with Saddam Hussein was, given his flagrant defiance of all the relevant U.N. resolutions, unavoidably in our future. And the inconvenient downside to avoiding the Iraq intervention is that a choke point of the world economy would still be controlled by a psychopathic crime family that kept a staff of WMD experts on hand and that paid for jihadist suicide bombers around the region. In his farewell interviews, President Bush hasn't been able to find much to say for himself on this point, but I think it's a certainty that historians will not conclude that the removal of Saddam Hussein was something that the international community ought to have postponed any further. (Indeed, if there is a disgrace, it is that previous administrations left the responsibility undischarged.)

Make That 40 Peaceful Transitions

Adam McCoy is a politically savvy monk, former prior of the Mt. Calvary monastery in Santa Barbara -- until it burned in November, one of four houses operated by the Episcopal Order of the Holy Cross. He was also my spiritual director several years ago before becoming rector of a church in Manhattan. Br. Adam on the inauguration:

Rick Warren’s prayer...made the appallingly ignorant point that “Now today we rejoice not only in America's peaceful transfer of power for the 44th time.” I have so far found no one in the media who pointed out that four of those transfers were at the point of a bullet: Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, Kennedy. So many brains were checked at the door, Warren’s and those of the people whose job it is to frame these events for the nation. The adulation of Obama worries me.

Twice Is Nice

My wife Kathy said tonight that if there was any uncertainty about whether President Obama had repeated the oath of office correctly, Chief Justice John Roberts should just administer it again. I pooh poohed the idea. Is my face red. ABC News:

Chief Justice Roberts came to the White House tonight and administered the oath of office to President Obama at 7:35 pm ET in the Map Room.

"Because there was one word out of sequence," in yesterday's oath, explained White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, the President took the oath again "out of an abundance of caution."

The only people in the room were Obama, Justice Roberts, Gibbs, White House communications staffer Katie Lillie, White House photographer Pete Souza, and four print reporters.

Marc Ambinder has the press pool report.

She Was For It Before She Was Against It

Caroline Kennedy decided she wanted to be a senator, then decided she didn't, then almost changed her mind, and then finally told the governor New York that she definitely doesn't.

Li And Glen, Ji and RN -- Together Again

Friendly U.S.-China relations have many fathers and mothers -- table tennis players, Richard Nixon and Zhou Enlai, Jimmy Carter and Deng Xiaopeng. Surely they include legendary Flying Tiger Glen Beneda and China's Li Xiaolin, longtime friends who were reunited today at the Nixon Library.

A fighter pilot from Nebraska, Beneda was shot down over Japanese-occupied China in May 1944 during a Flying Tigers bombing raid. After crash-landing his single-engine P-51 Mustang in a rice paddy, the injured Beneda evaded capture for two months until meeting up with the Chinese communist New 4th Army, commanded by Gen. Li Xiannian. Li later became President of the People's Republic, serving from 1983-1988. His daughter, pictured above with Beneda, is VP of the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries. She's perhaps China's leading citizen diplomat.

China is justifiably proud of its pre-revolutionary collaborations with Americans against the Japanese. Beneda is treated like an emperor when he visits China with his wife of 63 years, Elinor. She was a farm girl, sister of an air corps buddy of Beneda who died in a 1943 bombing mission over Romania. She told me Glen was a city boy -- 6,000 in his town, she said.

During a ceremony at the Library, Beneda reciprocated China's friendship by presenting Madame Li with his "walkie pointie," a phrasebook he used to communicate with the Chinese farmers who helped him along the way, as well as the Chinese flag he carried with him.

Madame Li and other Chinese officials were in Yorba Linda to show reporters a new exhibition marking the 30th anniversary of the opening of formal diplomatic relations between Washington and Beijing. The exhibit (on display through Friday before moving to longer installations back east) includes the famous photograph (above left) of President Nixon shaking hands with Premier Zhou Enlai at Capital Airport in Beijing during their historic meeting in February 1972.

Oddly, someone's missing from the photo in the exhibit. Standing directly behind Zhou at the airport that day was translator Ji Chaozhu. You can see him in the picture at right. Though Ji, one of China's most respected diplomats, later served as ambassador to the Court of St. James's as well as an undersecretary of the United Nations, he fell out of favor in Chinese politics and was airbrushed out of this most photo revered of photos. Although Ji has long since been rehabilitated, the Ji-less picture of the first Nixon-Zhou meeting still shows up occasionally in publications -- and now exhibits.

I was along in November 2002 when Julie and David Eisenhower visited Beijing to mark the 30th anniversary year of the Shanghai Communique. Appearing on Chinese television with Ambassador Ji, Julie decided to put him back in the picture (which I took the liberty of snapping, with a first-generation digital camera). As I wrote at the time:

Mrs. Eisenhower knew about the altered photo and had presented Mr. Ji with an autographed copy of the real McCoy during an earlier visit. She decided to do him one better with the cameras rolling. "I'd like to ask Ambassador Ji to show us where he was standing when my father met Zhou Enlai," she said. Mr. Ji gamely jumped to his feet and took up his accustomed position next to the statue of his late boss. He said he recalled President Nixon reaching for Zhou's hand and saying, "This handshake comes across the vast Pacific ocean and many years of no communication."

Nobody Does It Better

Hello, boss! That's the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, next to the Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd, dean of the Washington National Cathedral, as he opens this morning's prayer service for President Obama.

The Rev. Otis Moss Jr., who gave the stirring opening prayer, showed how to talk about Jesus Christ in an interfaith setting, saying, "O LORD, our strength and our Redeemer," and praying "in the name of our LORD."

Moving as one, the cathedral's acolytes carried the cross of Christ and candles up the aisle like none in the world -- except at St. John's!

Inaugural Pastors

Bishop Gene Robinson on his Sunday prayer and Pastor Rick Warren.

Obama Is The New Ford

Nixon Library director Tim Naftali:

The previous administration leaves under a cloud and is very unpopular. And when there are unpopular presidencies, the country is desperate for a healer. Gerald Ford was a healer and moved the country forward. And I have a great deal of hope and a great deal of expectation that Barack Obama will be another healer who will also move us forward.

Obamush In Office

What would RN be doing? Plumbing the foreign policy sections of the President's address. Obama's first comment:

Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred.

Good. We do have enemies. He didn't call them evildoers, but he called them haters. Same difference. Regretably, that's the high point.

As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our founding fathers ... our found fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake.

This bit he got backwards. Not only can we imagine the perils our forebears faced, we learn precisely what they were by studying history. In contrast, they couldn't have imagined the perils we face. Obama seems to be saying that because George Washington wouldn't have tortured someone to find out where a British cannon was hidden that could have killed or injured a half-dozen colonial soldiers, we shouldn't do so to find a nuclear weapon hidden in Manhattan that could kill half a million. I'm not advocating torture. I'm just saying that this particular invocation of the founders wasn't persuasive.

And so to all the other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.

President Bush probably heard that as a criticism. He may also have wondered why Obama didn't pledge that the U.S. would be a friend not only of those who seek peace and dignity but also those who deserve liberty.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint. We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort — even greater cooperation and understanding between nations.

Oddly, still no mention of freedom as one of our enduring convictions. It may be that the anti-neoconservative foreign policy realism of Brent Scowcroft and my Nixon Center colleagues is showing. That's not bad in and of itself. Focusing U.S. policy on promoting freedom and democracy is the paramount neocon aim, even if it means we overextend ourselves in reckless adventures. Instead, Obama stresses alliances, prudence, patience, and a Nixonian faith in "the force of our example." Ironically, W. talked about humility in his first inaugural as well. That was of course before Sept. 11.

We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan.

Worst split infinitive in inaugural history? I'll leave that to the experts. What does he mean by "responsibly?" Ditto. If he thought he could get out quickly, he'd probably have given Iraq its own sentence. "Forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan" is vague and far inferior to a promise to track Osama bin Laden and his savage, murdering cronies to the ends of the earth until they scream for mercy. During the campaign, he strongly criticized Bush for failing to do so.

With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the specter of a warming planet.

Is that all we get on Iran's nukes? Half a sentence leading to global warming?

We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

Another run-on mess of a sentence, striking fear in the hearts of no one besides Strunk & White.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this Earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

What a dispiriting muddle. I wonder if the otherwise gratuitous religious survey was an antidote to Rick Warren's gratuitously exclusionary prayer. The passage also suggests that the world is America writ large, that its sectarian, racial, and regional hatreds will fade because America's have. And yet our common national humanity has been drawn forth methodically and painfully over two centuries against the anvil of the genius of republican government and through the tragedy of civil war. RN too believed that freedom would win out in the end, but he was thinking in terms of generations or more. Obama's utopian vision will take a lot longer than four or eight years to be realized. Will the world's old hatreds pass, for instance, before Iran threatens its neighbors with a nuclear weapon? If not, what do we do in the meantime?

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West — know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

Another letdown. We do care about what oppressed peoples think of their oppressors. We care more about what their oppressors intend to do to Americans and our interests. What will we do if hostile powers and movements don't unclench their fists? He just doesn't say. We're at war, as he said, and yet he doesn't ever manage a direct, stark threat aimed at our enemies.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to the suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

In the economic circumstances we face, there has never been an emptier promise of more foreign aid. And what does he mean by saying that "the world has changed"? First he says that the world will follow our example. Now he's saying we should follow the world's.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honor them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment — a moment that will define a generation — it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

What they principally have to tell us is that they have volunteered to fight and risk death for freedom, their families, and their country. I would've preferred if he had left it at that.

And that's all he wrote. Obama's foreign policy vision was mush during the primaries, and mush it remains.

Two Confused Branches Of Government

Graciously, Chief Justice John Roberts took the rap for getting the oath of office wrong this afternoon, as well he should have. President Obama played a role as well, but his honeymoon is still in full swing, so we'll cut him some slack.

Here's what happened: Roberts tried to say, "I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear," but Obama interrupted him and said, "I, Barack Hussein Obama." That threw Roberts off his game. He'd memorized the oath, but having lost the rhythm of the words, he briefly forgot them. After Obama had caught up, Roberts continued, "will execute the office to (sic) President of the United States faithfully." Obama hesitated, because he knew "faithfully" belonged before "execute." Roberts realized it, too, and tried to fix it, which is what led to the comic portion of the process. Then Obama went ahead and said it Roberts' way (which is to say, wrongly).

It was your basic overachiever's nightmare. Couldn't have happened to a smarter couple of guys.