Presidential address

[Mobius74]

*Originally posted by Doctor Jackson *
**Criminy, people, there’s a difference between mispronunciation and accent. Bush pronounced ‘terrorism’ the same way a great many other Texans pronounce ‘terrorism’ - TERRA izm. Jimmy Carter pronounces it ‘TEHR izm’, as do many other Georgians. **

Sorry, but I beg to differ. George W’s “accent” was not so obviously apparent elsewhere in his address, so I will stand firm on my belief that terror is a word he simply can’t pronounce. (And, yes, I’ve spent a considerable amount of my life in the south, so I am aware that a number of southerners DON’T mispronounce terror even with their accent.)

Doctor Jackson (continued)
If that, and the perceived slight to Canada, is all you can find wrong with the speech it must have been pretty damn good.

You apparently didn’t read my initial post to this thread. It began by pointing out some of the good aspects of the President’s address.

As to the “perceived slight to Canada”, YOU should be ashamed to trivialize this oversight. I HOPE it was an oversight and not intentional. If you can “perceive” it, then so can the Canadians - who, without any thought of compensation, offered an immediate and decisive response to the tragedy of September 11th, and have continued to provide aid since then.

My post also listed (IMHO) a very grave blunder by the speech writers. For those who didn’t hear it themselves:

“The course of this conflict is not known, yet its outcome is certain. Freedom and fear, justice and cruelty, have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them.”

And if that isn’t inviting a declaration of HOLY WAR against the U.S., what is??? This is at least as inflamatory as George’s use of “crusade”.

Doctor Jackson (continued)
**Not that some people would ever admit that anything Bush did was good… **

Just for the record, I don’t expect ANY president to be perfect. I DO expect OUR President to have his heart in the right place, and it appears he does. For all the sniping I might do, I’m grateful that all the whining and posturing after the election didn’t swing the Florida vote the other way.

[waterj2]

I find it difficult to imagine Al Gore doing any better under these circumstances.

I’d be hard pressed to find a prominent world leader since Churchill that I could imagine doing noticeably better. Not that the rest would do worse, mind you, but I can’t think of anyone who could really add anything to it. Perhaps Kennedy at the top of his form could have been a bit more rousing.

As for Bush’s performance so far, I can’t help feeling a bit like this is his destiny. He sailed through a life of privilege without any real test of his strength until he gets to the top, then faces a challenge of monumental proportions. The US, faced with two uninspiring choices for a leader, accidentally ends up with the one that fewer people voted for, only a few months before its greatest crisis in recent memory.

Of course, this view is tempered by the fact that I don’t really believe in fate or destiny.