Here’s George Wallace’s daughter on Obama’s victory:
And now a new call to arms has sounded as Americans face another assault on freedom. For if the stand in the schoolhouse door was a defining moment for George Wallace, then surely the aftermath of Katrina and the invasion of Iraq will be the same for George W. Bush.
The trampling of individual freedoms and his blatant contempt for the rights of the average American may not have been as obvious as an ax-handle-wielding governor, but Bush’s insidiousness and piety have made him much more dangerous.
I don’t object to her right to make these standard issue criticisms of Bush, but more dangerous than George Wallace? Yes, clearly African Americans would say they face a much more dangerous enviornment for preserving individual freedoms after eight years of Bush than when the state of Alabama was unleashing dogs on them for daring to sit at a lunch counter.
Katrina was a tragic failing of Bush’s presidency, but it was one of governance (and probably the blame should be shared by New Orleans incompetent mayor) not a deliberate attack on anyone’s civil rights — unlike George Wallace. Similarly, you may view the invasion of Iraq as a major blunder, but that’s a tough argument to make in the same breath you’re celebrating the election of a Vice-President who supported it and a President elect who wanted to cut and run at a time when it would have set Iraq up for a competitive round of ethnic cleansing.
But I’m sure typing that made Peggy Wallace Kennedy feel better about her father being despicable for most of his life and that’s what really matters.