March 10, 2005, 7:43 a.m.
Bush’s miracles, liberal crabbiness, amazing testimony, &c.

Back in the early days — January, February, March '01 — I was saying this administration was a kind of miracle. Why? In large measure because of the appointments that W. was making (or allowing): Otto Reich as assistant secretary of state? Elliott Abrams on the NSC staff? John Negroponte at the U.N.? Fabulous. (There's a good Bush word.)

I have this same feeling about the recent appointment of John Bolton — he, like Negroponte, is going to Turtle Bay. Comparisons have been made to Moynihan — the mid-'70s Moynihan — and to Kirkpatrick, and those are right. I would also add that General Walters was no slouch, and neither was John Danforth (especially on Sudan). Bolton is principled, knowledgeable, temperate, fearless. He has a keen sense of history, and of the place of the U.S. in the world. He loves liberal democracy not only for him, but for others. Of how many elites can this be said now? (Was it ever thus?)

Of course, we have had the predictable reaction. The world's nasties don't want him — neither does John Kerry: "[Bolton is] just about the most inexplicable appointment the president could make to represent the United States to the world community." The world community, huh? Bolton opposes tyrants: Castro, Assad, and all the rest. You would think that most of the world would be pleased about that. Bolton is a democrat. I'm reminded of something Jeane Kirkpatrick told me once, when we were discussing Carter's distress at the victory of Violeta Chamorro over the Sandinistas in Nicaragua: "You would think a democrat would have been happy."

And then there's Joe Biden. He is often credited, by conservatives, with being a sensible liberal. I'm not so sure. On Monday, he said, "In light of the president's recent efforts to reach out to allies and the international community, I'm surprised at the choice of John Bolton to be our U.N. representative."

First, what is the "international community," or "world community"? Do Biden, Kerry, and the others mean the world's governments? The world's governments are diverse: There's Kim Jong Il; and then there's the Czech Republic. They probably mean the French, the Belgians, and Kofi Annan. Quite possibly Hugo Chávez (even Castro?).

Second, what makes Joe Biden think that John Bolton can't "reach out," or that his appointment signals a decision by the administration not to reach out, or to shorten its reach? Bolton has earned the enmity of Pyongyang, Castro, and . . . well, the Howard Dean-led Democratic party. I regard him as perfectly positioned to represent our interests.

Jeane K. said something fascinating to Eli Lake of the New York Sun. She said, "My advice to [Bolton] is to stand for what he believes in. [I'm getting to the fascinating part.] It is harder in the U.N. than in other places. There are so many people who are not-so-serious in the United Nations. [I can just hear her straining to be polite.] But I told John that I had learned more about the world there than in any other place. [That is the fascinating part.]"

We conservatives do our fair share of griping about George W. Bush. In truth, I think we do more than our fair share. But there will soon come a day when we deeply lament the absence of a president who would do such things as send John Bolton to the United Nations.

Miraculous, or nearly so.

A common theme in the recent period has been, The liberals can't stand it. Can't stand what? The advances that are being made in the world, thanks in no small measure to George W. Bush and his team.

The other day, Michael Kinsley wrote the following: "'Transparency' is one of the blessings of democracy that President Bush is proud of having brought to Iraq — right up there with voting and somewhat less torture than before."

Yeah, "somewhat less torture than before." I have only one answer to that: He wishes. He wishes this were the sorry truth about the new Iraq. Why do people talk this way? The only answer I can think of is that, if life in Iraq were genuinely better, the Left and other Bush opponents would feel doubly ashamed for having fought Bush so hard on it. They need — they psychologically and emotionally need — the new Iraq to be only a slight improvement on Saddam's, at best.

It's pathetic, really — but that doesn't lessen the outrage.

You are sick of hearing me say what I will, alas, say again: There are some people who would rather homosexuals be stoned to death than that they be liberated by George W. Bush and the "Right."

Our liberals were crabby about the eastern Europeans' freedom, and the collapse of the Soviet Union — that might credit the despised Gipper. And they're crabby about the possibilities of freedom for Middle Easterners. This does not say something very nice about human beings.

You may wish to read a piece by ex-NR editor Meghan Clyne published in the New York Sun of March 4. It is an eye-opening piece about a press briefing held by the Iraqi and Afghan ministers for women's affairs. (Go here.) Can you imagine? Iraqi and Afghan ministers for women's affairs! Their briefing was sponsored by Freedom House. Startling and historic news may be ignored by the establishment media, but the Sun is an organ that pays serious attention. One quick passage:

"'We are not asking for eternal support,' Dr. [Massouda] Jalal added, nor are Afghans ignorant of the sacrifices made by Americans to help their country. Saying her countrymen 'will never forget the help' Americans provided in creating the new Afghanistan, Dr. Jalal told her audience: 'The children — they know the name of President Bush . . .'"

That would kill some Americans, but I know it doesn't kill you, dear Impromptus readers.

Of all the things that are depressing about Dan Rather, I think this might be the most depressing: He still believes his transparently fabricated documents are genuine. I guess he has to, doesn't he? I mean, if today's Iraq means only "somewhat less torture than before," then Bush was wrong. But if today's Iraq means a consensual and peaceable society . . . uh-oh. And if the documents were fake — documents I so tenaciously defended — I'm cooked. How can I look at myself?

Much analysis has been done concerning the Supreme Court's recent death-penalty decision — that lawless disgrace — and I can add little. But I would like to say this: Doesn't 18 seem to you blatantly random? I mean, why not 19? Why not 18 and a half? Why not 20? Why not 17? Should not these things be judged case by case? But the fivesome's conscience can't allow it. Besides, Americans in Europe are so sick of being hectored about our barbaric practice of executing vicious killers. Felix Rohatyn can barely attend a cocktail party!

Incidentally, I attended a "working dinner" at Davos concerning "dangerous ideas." One of them was . . . "Texas."

I kid you not. But then, if you read my Davos journals, you know I'm not kidding (and neither were they).

A few days ago, I was reading the New York Times's Sunday magazine, and there was an interview with Martha Burk, the anti-Augusta National feminist lady. (Remember? I did a piece on her and her nemesis, Hootie Johnson, in Jan. 2003: here.) Anyway, Ms. Burk said this: "I have a Ph.D. in psychology. When I applied for a faculty job at the University of Dallas, I was asked to take a typing test."

I feel real sorry for her. But, years ago, I took many a typing test, and I was grateful to do so. Also, I was fairly fancily educated. Nothing like the intellectual titan Martha Burk, but, you know, not bad. The ability to type was a gateway to better jobs; I was looking for any in.

But one must not spoil the martyrology of the likes of Martha Burk.

I want to be sure you know about the extraordinary testimony of three Cuban dissidents — to the U.S. Congress. Marta Beatriz Roque, René Gómez, and Félix Bonne testified by phone link, at great risk to themselves, of course. Reported the Miami Herald, "When Rep. Bob Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat and Cuban American, asked if they feared being arrested for their testimony, Bonne — who spent time in jail in the late 1990s — said that he had told his wife earlier that day that he was 'simply a soldier of liberty and democracy' and was prepared to return to jail 'to defend the interests of the Cuban people.'" The Herald account is here; a Voice of America account is here. I have spent a long time watching the Cuban dissidents and democracy activists, and their courage never stops amazing me. I don't really mind if Americans ignore the Cubans. No, what is galling is when they support their oppressors (see, for example, the Hollywood "community").

In the past few weeks, I have been citing New Yorker cartoons — like the one showing the old guys sitting around the men's club crowing about the coming enrichment of Wall Street by W.'s Social Security reform. Well, here's another one: Those same fellows sit around the men's club, smoking and drinking in their three-piece suits, and one of them says, "This just might be the greatest period of privatization since feudalism."

That is another perfect, perfect expression of the New Yorker mindset, and of the liberal mindset. Behold their conception of privatization!

An enduring mystery, why some of the best-educated people in the world are the most ineducable. And, by the way, I spend a lot of time — much of my life — among conservatives, a lot of them crusty: and I don't ever hear them talk the way they talk in New Yorker cartoons.

In the Sun, Jacob Gershman had a fascinating account of Natan Sharansky's thoughts on U.S. higher education: "The way in which the Middle East is studied and taught at Columbia and other schools reminds him of Soviet-era propaganda," wrote Gershman.

Mr. Sharansky, the former Soviet dissident and prisoner who is now Israel's minister of Jerusalem and diaspora affairs, said . . . that when he went to Columbia last year, the atmosphere for Jewish students "reminded sometimes of ghetto" [sic]. He said that in private meetings he had with hundreds of students, "the kids felt like they can be free and open," but that students are more fearful to speak in favor of Israel "the moment they go out."

Been there, believe me. So have a lot of us.

Reading a column by Mark Steyn, I picked up some refreshing quotes from Australian officials. It is often refreshing to read about Australia. Here's the foreign minister, Alexander Downer:

"Increasingly, multilateralism is a synonym for an ineffective and unfocused policy involving internationalism of the lowest common denominator . . . We are prepared to join coalitions of the willing that can bring focus and purpose to addressing the urgent security and other challenges we face . . . Our choice is whether we want to help lead rather than follow the international community in responding to a new and rapidly changing international environment."

And here's a newspaper report about my boy John Howard, leader of the Liberals, and of Australia:

"Australia's $1 billion aid package to Indonesia would not be wasted through aid-agency incompetence, John Howard last night vowed. Mr. Howard said he was determined there would be no U.N. involvement in Australia's massive package to Indonesia."

Mark cited these words in rebuking his native Canada for its . . . Annanism, for lack of a better word right now.

Along with Australia, South Korea is a member of the coalition of the willing. I was reminded of this by a striking photo — I wish I could link it for you — of hundreds of SK troops getting ready to go to Irbil, in northern Iraq. No, no matter what CNN tells you, or your children's teachers say, the U.S. is not alone, and there is indeed a coalition of the willing. And even if the U.S. were alone in Iraq, it would still be just.

In my little piece — published Tuesday — about Bush's visit to a Maryland community college, I mentioned one of his phrases from the '04 presidential debates: "the Internets." Well, I received the following letter from a man who's clearly informed: "Mr. Nordlinger, there are at least two Internets that I know of: regular Internet and experimental Internet2, much faster and now connecting just government agencies and some universities."

You learn something new every day. And I never publish anything containing praise — I don't think I ever have before, in four years of this column — but I thought the correspondent's P.S. was worth sharing: "Having immigrated from the Evil Empire, I really appreciate your writings on Cuba." It's nice to think that freedom is indivisible — I mean, that it is acknowledged as such, by some.

A little language? Owing to Hillary Clinton's, and John Kerry's, legislative attempts to give the vote to felons, I have read, and edited, quite a few pieces dealing with felons — and I was interested to learn that there is no such thing as an ex-felon, strictly speaking. The dictionary definition: "One who has committed a felony."

Harsh, huh?!

Do you want to read a great piece, by a great man (about a not-great man)? Read David Pryce-Jones on André Malraux, in the current New Criterion. You will be in the hands of a master — Pryce-Jones, that is.

A piece of music criticism — my review of a recital by Jonathan Biss, the much-vaunted young pianist.

Finally, a letter, this one touching on a theme we've been playing in Impromptus for, oh, a couple of years:

Jay,

I was in a chat room discussing politics/flirting with a girl. Well, she made some quip about how we pay to rebuild Iraq, but the terrorists don't pay to rebuild the WTC — and this is Bush's fault. So I said, "Well, they're terrorists, they blow up buildings, we kill them, and then we help whoever's left rebuild. Sure it costs more money, but it's why we're the good guys and they're the bad guys."

Her response: "You must be a Republican."

Man, that says a lot.

Does it ever!

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