No Burning Bush

In his inaugural address, President Barack Obama let his predecessor have it yesterday. It was subtle, but it was clear. With the outgoing President sitting only a few feet behind him, President Obama blamed much of America's current problems on an era of “of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age" and, in an obvious reference to Guantanamo and the suspension of rights for anyone suspected of terrorism, a willingness to suspend our ideals "for expedience's sake."

“On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord," the new President said. "On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn- out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics.”

He said from now on Americans must make decisions based on science and not ideology and that our military power does not "entitle us to do as we please." He criticized policies that "use energy to strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.”

He said the current economic crisis showed how “without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control” and that the nation has to extend the reach of prosperity to “every willing heart, not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.”

Personally, I found it exhilarating that, after eight years of policies based on exploiting our fears, I heard a President reject “as false the choice between our safety and our ideals.” And, after eight years of hearing a President dividing the world between Americans and those who hate us, I found it refreshing to hear a President offering to “extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.”

In an analysis that appeared in the New York Times today, David E. Sanger wrote that President Obama's speech "must have come as a bit of a shock to Mr. Bush, who knew his policies had been widely criticized, yet rarely over the past eight years had to sit in silence listening to a speech about how America had taken a tragic detour. "

Actually, I think the truth rolled off Bush much as it has throughout his presidency. In fact, when he returned to Midland yesterday, Mr. Bush told an awaiting crowd: "“When I walked out of the Oval Office this morning, I left with the same values that I took to Washington eight years ago; when I go home tonight and I look into the mirror, I’m not going to regret what I see.”

And that, in summation, will always be Mr. Bush's greatest flaw, which makes him either a tragic figure of Shakespearean proportions, a puppet of the Chaney-Rove ideological machine or just plain stupid. History will provide the answer to that one.