New Hampshire
‘It is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.’
Idealism is the new realism. Or as one of my disaffected conservative neighbours summed up the Bush speech: ‘Great. We’re gonna invade every country and shove freedom down their throats, whether they want it or not.’ Or in the words of a newly popular bumper sticker on the back of Vermont granolamobiles: ‘FOUR MORE WARS!’
As for what passes for the grandees in what’s left of the British Conservative party — the Hurds and Rifkinds — the President’s inaugural address will mark the final breach in their long soured relationship with the Republican party. And, watching the proceedings in the Elysée, M. Chirac was no doubt rolling his eyes and wondering when the men in the white coats with the tranquilliser darts would be rushing in.
It’s not the rhetoric. Forty-four years ago, JFK had plenty of soaring rhetoric: ‘We shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.’ That’s truly soaring rhetoric: it soared up into the stratosphere and disappeared out of sight en route to cloud-cuckoo-land. It was admired as a speech, not analysed as a policy. Within a few years, America decided that the price and burden and hardship of Vietnam was not one it was willing to pay and bear and meet, and its retreat ushered in the darkest period of the Cold War — the period when the Soviets gobbled up real estate in every corner of the globe from Afghanistan to Grenada, and America’s friends went unsupported and its foes unopposed.
The difference this time is that folks think Bush means it.
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