WASHINGTON, 22 January 2005 — President George Bush used his second inaugural address on Thursday to outline an agenda that amounts to “ending tyranny in our world.”
In a proud, unapologetic and even defiant tone, Bush said relations with “every ruler and every nation” will be determined on how they treat their own people, a profound break from traditional US policy and Bush’s first term.
And he used religious pluralism, saying the nation was sustained “by the truths of Sinai, the Sermon on the Mount, the words of the Qur’an and the varied faiths of our people.”
He also addressed dictators with a quote from Abraham Lincoln: “Those who deny freedom to others do not deserve it for themselves; and, under the rule of a just God, cannot long retain it.”
But experts worried over the real meaning of his eloquent words.
William Niskanen, chairman of the Cato Institute, criticized Bush’s call for a more activist military role in the world as “dangerous, eloquent nonsense,” and rejected the implication that the president’s remarks “that anyone’s lack of liberty threatens us.”
Others agreed: “He correctly recognized that the roots of terror and extremists are societies that are oppressive; and that having more open, pluralistic, and democratic societies is both morally right and in America’s national interest as it would lessen the tendency for people to embrace extremist ideologies and terrorism,” said Stephen Zunes, professor of politics at the University of San Francisco, Ca.
“The problem is that the US has long been the primary military, diplomatic and economic supporter of some of the worse dictatorships in the Middle East as well as the Israeli occupation,” said Zunes.
“The speech emphasized that the US drive toward empire building will increase, and will use the rationale of freedom and liberty to justify military invasion and occupations,” said Phyllis Bennis, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.
Roberta Cohen, specialist in human rights issues at the Brookings Institution, viewed the speech as “a justification for the current policies in Iraq and Afghanistan, and our policies in the region. The war in Iraq was not fought for those reasons, but supposedly because Iraq was a strategic threat to the US. US rationale then justified that we invaded the country to promote democracy in the Middle East. Using this human rights rationale is not persuasive to those who are supporters for human rights and democracy.” But other Mideast experts cautioned against overreaction: “This was an inaugural speech, and not a policy speech,” said Mary-Jane Deeb, a Mideast specialist at American University. “The speech had one or two broad themes to define the next four years. This does not mean he will liberate the entire planet from every dictator.”
“People must not assume the US is going to go on a rampage of a liberating mission. The US will continue to pursue the policy of pressuring regimes in the Mideast,” said Deeb, “beyond that, I would not take the speech too literally.”
“The president was raising a banner of bold colors about the goals that free people should seek and champion for all peoples,” said Becky Norton Dunlop, vice president of the Heritage Foundation. “I don’t think this means he intends to propose major US government activities overseas for the next four years. He’s communicating a high standard he would like to see all people strive for.”
