By Mike DeVine, Legal Editor
Russia invaded the democratic Nation of Georgia for no moral reason or purpose.
The United States of America did not invade said nation. The USA did not “allow” same, nor should they reasonably have been expected to deter same. Multiple war winning and stay the course until victory, insurgency defeating President George W. Bush did nothing, nor failed to do anything, to make said South Ossetia invasion more likely.
A megalomaniac bully with new wealth calculated and planned to commit an irrational evil act.
Yet, the first words out of not a few conservatives’ mouths were uttered, not to denounce the evil actor, but, rather to bemoan what the US should have done or not have done ( some even going back to 1999) or that we were “caught” flat-footed. The most illuminating of the bemoanings were from the gamecock respected Michael Ledeen in an interview with Dennis Prager at the end of which he basically admitted what I have concluded: There is nothing we could have done, short of having troops and tanks stationed everywhere on Earth (and even then), to deter all evil acts everywhere at all times.
Some have also ridiculed President Bush for not immediately leaving the Olympic Games for Washington to make a dramatic statement from the Oval Office. The more obscure have suggested that Bush’s close soul lookinginto (2001-2?) relationship with the Pu-KGB power behind the throne-tin ruler lead to the invasion of a democratic friend of the US that has the third most troops in Iraq.
Gamecock crows, Poppycock! To all that.
President Bush has made America’s deterrent effect real again. Libya confirmed the nation-state effect in public what is exponentially multiplied in private. See also Mookie al Sadr and the letters between Zawahiri (alive?) and Zarqawi (dead) and the tail between legs al Qaeda high-tailing it to the Afghan-Pakistani paradise sans liver machines.
But we can’t deter everything an irrational bully wants to do against a geographically vulnerable bully-bait.
President Bush was ridiculed by the left immediately after 911 and a few years into Iraq, only to see him win two wars. We know his values are Reaganesque on the question of good vs. evil.
Bush was great at 3am on 911, as confirmed by the account in Bob Woodward’s book that showed the president seeing we were at war instantly.
The Russian invasion of Georgia is serious, but for the US, its way past dawn, much less 3am, and this rooster knows dawns, backwards and forwards.
President Bush showed the calm of the world’s greatest power by staying in China to boost the morale of out heroes. Yes, Putin calmly planned his poop job on the Olympics and Georgia, but he didn’t make the Texas Cowboy blink in this high stakes poker.
I am constantly amused at the knee-jerk peanut gallery, left and right, but am in sorry that some on the right seem to echo the old Blame America First crowd (especially those that would tear ligaments reaching back nine years to try and rehabilitate a Wes Clark that wanted to “bomb the Russians’ or something close when they were our allies in Bosnia.)
I would close with a tip of the hat to Pat Buchanan who practically predicted this with his bemoaning of our carving up of non-NATO Serbia and antagonizing Russia with our NATO reach into their “former” sphere of influence.
But as I tip the hat at prescient intelligence, I at once reject the import of same for policy implications.
No, I favor embracing nations that want Liberty. That an evil man or nation will react at same deters me not at all. Would not embracing Liberty produce better results?
Of course not.
And I trust the man that has liberated over 50 million people to get this challenge right as well.
Let Bush be Bush and America will triumph.
Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer columns
Legal Editor for The Minority and HinzSight Reports
“The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.” - The Chief Justice
“One man with courage makes a majority.” - Andrew Jackson
Part of being president involves the tough business of tough choices, choosing where you can act and where you can't, what is a prudent calculated risk and what is an imprudent risk.
I think history will judge GWB kindly.