The relentless criticism of President Bush by the left has lacked any respect for the office of the president. Try to have a rational conversation about what policies are necessary to protect our homeland in a dangerous terrorist world, and the left launches into a rant about how the GOP paints anyone with their positions as not being patriotic. 

George H. W. Bush was dismissed as a lifelong government bureaucrat, but when crisis hit, he formed the most impressive global coalition in history to drive Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. 

I believe that history will show that George W. Bush understood the complexities of the global war on terror far beyond his “intellectually superior” opponents on the left – to our country’s benefit.  We have had hints now and again as the NYT’s has giddily compromised some of the most successful lines of attack, such as our success in tracking and shutting down al Qaeda financial transactions.  I believe that history will show that Bush has directed a multi-faceted offense and defense with a level of sophistication that is highly effective.

The administration of Bill Clinton (a Rhodes Scholar) had repeated chances to take out or capture Bin Laden.  Blustery protests to the contrary, and damning notes spirited out of the National Archives stuffed down the pants of loyal Clintonistas aside, they never had the fortitude to “pull the trigger”.  The article in the NYT’s about the program for rapid approval of special ops missions in a number of countries harboring al Qaeda was interesting on several levels.  I was encouraged by the strong governance of the order, with many more missions being rejected than approved.  But on a small number of occasions, it appears about 10 over the last 3 or so years, the administration has “pulled the trigger” to go in and get the bad guys when the rewards outweighed the risks.

I have often reflected on the William F. Buckley comment mentioned by Sowell that he would rather be governed by the first 100 names in the Boston phone book than the faculty of Harvard.  So-called intellectuals think they are so smart they can solve any problem through central planning.  Because they are so “smart”, they believe they can ignore well-established principals, truths and common sense.  Even Plato argued for an intellectual elite ruling class.  Perhaps he was the “first liberal”.  Every example in history of state-controlled media and thought and a centrally planned economy has been a catastrophe.  Their ego is their downfall.

Obama pledged during the campaign to close the prison at Guantanamo.  Now his advisors are working on a plan to do just that. 

A quick historical recap is in order.  President Bush decided that in accordance with previous war precedent that these captured enemy combatants should be tried by military tribunal.  Trial by military tribunal is a long-standing tradition for these types of situations in our country’s history, and around the world.  In a case brought before the Supreme Court, it ruled that it was fine to proceed with the plan of military tribunals, but the rules for the tribunals had to be set by Congress.  The Bush administration then worked with Congress and worked it the appropriate procedures.  Understandably, the rules are constrained in some cases by very sensitive intelligence information.

Now back to the Obama plan.  Team Obama is working to shut down Guantanamo and ship the enemy combatants to some sort of U.S. based facility.  They are also planning, due to sensitive intelligence issues, to create a new special court system to hear a number of the cases.  This court would be separate from the normal civilian court system with special rules. 

Now call me crazy, but this sounds an awful lot like the military tribunal process that has already been agreed to by the administration and Congress.  The administration and Congress spent something like two years working this all out and now Obama wants to create something that is different, but basically the same. 

I hope this is not an indication that Obama will not always be about appearance over substance.  This sounds like an awful lot of work just so Obama can say he did it “his way”.

Joe Biden says that paying higher taxes is “patriotic”. Today, Obama said that well to do families opposed higher taxes were “selfish”. All of this class warfare and class envy rhetoric begs the question, how progressive a tax system is progressive enough?  Barack Obama would have you believe that the Bush administration and the GOP only want to help the rich get richer. But under the Bush administration, the tax system has gotten more progressive than ever with the top earners paying an even greater percentage of the whole. 

Obama says that it’s still not enough.  That in spite of a tax code that is hugely skewed to “soak the rich” that those higher earners that think enough is enough are “selfish”.  Do the numbers below look selfish to you?