Bunker Mulligan "Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry." ~Mark Twain

It is simply coincidental, yet a little serendipitous, that Alex put together his essay Anti-Americanism in Part One, Part Two, and Part Three at about the same time as Norman Podhoretz published World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win in Commentary.

Podhoretz’s article is far longer than anything I typically read on a monitor, so I printed it out and read through it at my leisure. Alex’s first part I linked to earlier. He writes from the perspective of someone who has lived in Europe, not simply visited as a tourist, or even living on a military installation and making weekend forays into the civilian population centers. Sarah can attest to the differences.

First of all, Podhoretz writes in unglowing terms about Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush 41, and Clinton. He has little good to say about Dubya’s first months in the Oval Office, either. Understand, this is all in relation to our responses to terrorist actions. He makes no comment regarding other areas of Presidential prerogotive.

But he is nearly absolute in his assessment of Dubya’s approach to things since 9/11. So, for those of you who immediately want to characterize him as a “chicken-hawk,” you can click that mouse button and ignore the rest of this post.

What he saw was a transformation. I think we all saw it. Some didn’t like it. Some still hate it. Others always will. The transformation I saw was what makes me an unapologetic Bush supporter. The 9/11 attack woke us all up, but he was the one politician willing to say the things that needed to be said. And he was willing to do the things which needed to be done. Still is. Still is. I see in him all the things I admire about Teddy Roosevelt and Harry Truman, who were viewed by “their betters” as a cowboy and a dullard.

Few, if any, of Truman