- Ending tyranny in the world? Well that's an ambition, and if you're going to have an ambition it might as well be a big one. But this declaration, which is not wrong by any means, seemed to me to land somewhere between dreamy and disturbing. Tyranny is a very bad thing and quite wicked, but one doesn't expect we're going to eradicate it any time soon. Again, this is not heaven, it's earth.
One wonders if they shouldn't ease up, calm down, breathe deep, get more securely grounded. The most moving speeches summon us to the cause of what is actually possible. Perfection in the life of man on earth is not.
- The speech can best be described by listing what it did not say. As expected, the president did not get involved in the nuts and bolts of domestic policy. He did not mention "Social Security" or "tax reform" or "tort reform." Social issues, notably same-sex marriage, were similarly ignored. Thus, domestic policy was taken care of in one catchall section.
Although the speech clearly was attuned to the nation's response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, there was no mention of "terrorism" or "the war on terror." Neither "Iraq" nor "Afghanistan" was mentioned.
How could the president make these omissions when the war in Iraq, fought as a battle in the war against terror, is his major second-term problem?
The answer is given by one Bush adviser by pointing to that second Lincoln inaugural. With the end of the Civil War in sight, Lincoln did not deal with the details of either military victory or Southern Reconstruction. Instead, he offered broad concepts of binding up the nation's wounds. As a result, that Lincoln speech is a rare inaugural address that has become a historical document.
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