The Leader

Infantile resentment

22 November 2003

In so far as this may be an accurate representation of the marchers’ beliefs, it deserves an answer. Let us dispense with the trivial abuse. The President was duly elected. He cannot help his buzzard-like appearance. Whatever the deficiencies of his syntax, they do not justify the loathing in which he is held. It is said, next, that he is brutal and unilateralist, and in this respect the Left attempts to differentiate him from Bill Clinton, feminist, liar and all-round feng shui king, against whom they would not dream of marching. They point out that Bush believes in the death penalty. But Bill Clinton, be it ever remembered, flew back to Arkansas on the eve of one poll to throw the switch on Ricky Ray Rector, who was so mentally ill that he asked his guards to save his pudding for when he returned from the electric chair. So much for the conscience of the unimpeachable liberal.

Bush is blamed for shelving the Kyoto Protocol. Not only is this document based on dubious science. It has been ignored by most European countries, would entail devastating cuts in US growth, and was only signed by Al Gore in the full and cynical knowledge that it would have no hope of clearing Congress. Bush is attacked for refusing to submit America to the jurisdiction of the International Court. Bill Clinton was no less reluctant. So the argument turns on the ‘war on terror’, and it is here, in the view of the marchers, that Bush has been misguided if not positively evil.

We cannot know, of course, how another administration would have reacted to the murder of more than 3,000 innocents in Washington and lower Manhattan. Suffice it to say that the President has enjoyed more or less continuous bipartisan support. Whatever the problems of Afghanistan today, American taxpayers have paid for the removal of a barbaric regime, and installed free speech, the rule of law and the emancipation of women.

As for the war in Iraq, the marchers might reflect on this. English men and women, and many others, this week avail themselves of the ancient freedom of assembly. At huge expense to the taxpayer, and attended by every courtesy from the Metropolitan Police, they are allowed to insult and humiliate the leader of a country which has guaranteed peace in Europe for 50 years and which is Britain’s most important ally. As they bawl and wave, they might bear in mind that this was precisely the kind of behaviour forbidden in Iraq these last 25 years. It is no thanks to the marchers, or their supporters, that the Iraqis now have the freedom to demonstrate without being shot or tortured. It is thanks to the man whose visit they deplore. If their protest has any semantic value, if it amounts to anything more than a spastic yelp, the marchers must mean that the liberty they enjoy is a liberty they would have denied the Iraqis.