The president’s State of the Union speech last night made
one thing clear: he has good speech writers.
Speech writers that allowed him to decry North Korea’s
breaking of international treaties by restarting their nuclear
programs while also allowing Bush to advocate for a
ballistic-missile defense system, which is in violation of the
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty of 1972 ““ eliciting
applause.
Speech writers that argued Hussein wants weapons to
“dominate, intimidate, and attack” the world while
arguing for Bush to do the same with his own weapons by calling for
a U.S.-led coalition to invade Iraq ““ regardless of U.N.
support.
Bush relegated the topic of possible war with Iraq to the end of
the speech, where he intimated that the U.N. inspections team is
playing a game of hide-and-go-seek with Hussein. The Iraqi leader
should be coming forward with weapons and the materials used to
produce them, rather than having the United Nations chase after
him, Bush said. Unless Iraq demonstrates clear and convincing
evidence that it has destroyed materials which could be used for
nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, Bush has made it clear he
will go to war alone, if necessary.
The president, however, continues to ignore the fact that the
presence of weapons inspectors serves to minimize any potential,
imminent Iraqi threat to the United States. With the inspectors in
the country, Iraq’s actions are under an international
microscope. Iraq knows everything it does will be scrutinized and
most likely used by the United States to continue making the case
against it. It doesn’t matter that Iraq will not cooperate by
refusing to bring forward material used for weapons production. It
will not start a war or attack the United States while being
investigated. The only chance the Hussein regime has to save itself
is the pressure the international community is placing on Bush to
let the U.N. inspections take their course before attacking Iraq.
The process is slow, but it’s better than war.
It’s difficult to believe Bush is sincere in saying he
wants the United States to liberate the Iraqi people from an
oppressive regime by way of potentially killing scores of them
first. But Bush’s speech writers pulled it off, eliciting
cheers ““ and, on occasion, tears ““ from patriotic,
democracy-loving members of Congress.
Bush’s speech writers are equally talented at fabricating
a rosy picture at home. They allowed the president to decry
excessive government spending and reiterated his support of tax
cuts while ignoring the fact that Gray Davis and the Broken
Governors’ Club will need to raise taxes to bail themselves
out of massive deficits. This makes tax cuts for average American
families in troubled states moot.
Surprisingly, Bush did have some progressive ideas that deserve
commendation. His recognition of the crippling effect AIDS is
having on Africa is admirable. The amount of financial resources he
plans on investing into the most desperate countries in the
continent is an excellent idea. Expanding the use of hydrogen power
is also something the country should pursue, not only because of
its ability to reduce dependence on foreign energy sources, but
also because of its environmentally friendly nature. Bush also
promised to ensure that Medicare provides affordable drugs for
seniors and pledged hundreds of millions to helping disadvantaged
junior high school students and children of prisoners.
While these efforts are good, the real issue now is whether Bush
will plunge the country into a war he admits will cost many lives.
Rather than twisting its arm to condone war efforts, Bush needs to
support an extension of U.N. inspections. If Hussein has weapons,
he can only hide them for so long. When they’re found, they
can be destroyed hopefully without starting a war. It will be
difficult for Bush’s speech writers to fashion a positive
spin once American corpses start amassing.