Still, there will be trying times during Obama’s presidency, and liberty will need staunch defenders. Can Obama reshape liberalism to be, as it was under F.D.R., a fighting faith, unapologetically patriotic and strong in the defense of liberty? That would be a service to our country.Uh, yeah right.
Harry Truman dropped two atomic bombs in defense of liberty and sent troops to Korea to help stop the spread of Maoist communism. Kennedy had a famous stare-down with Kruschev. Johnson sent men to die in Vietnam to defend their liberty, and committed political suicide in the process. And Bill Clinton forged some of the strongest ties ever with a resurgent Europe, ushering in an age of global prosperity that his successor recklessly squandered. These are strong, patriotic liberals. Even Carter was a patriot, and if not for his weak leadership, he might have succeeded as well. He was unfortunately hamstrung by Nixon's heinous deeds and Ford's ineptitude. Barack Obama, I believe, has more of a backbone than Carter, and he's going to need it to avoid being hamstrung by the worst presidential administration in US history. But this is typical Kristollian writing, propagandizing conservatives and trying to write history without the benefit of hindsight and objectivity.
Now, I won't pretend that I was a regular reader of Kristol's column. I prefer my conservatism packaged with a healthy dose of reality. Andrew Sullivan, George Will, even Reihan Salam at times. Whenever I would read Kristol's column, I got the same shudders of nausea I used to get when I'd read Jonah Goldberg, and to some extent even that skinny blonde who must not be named. So for reasons of self-preservation I skipped his column. But his smirk never escaped my attention. Now it won't have to be displayed on the NY Times website anymore.
Crawl back into your Weekly Standard hole, Bill.
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