Bush’s Really Good Idea: "Sometimes I think that president bush’s critics need to put up a sign somewhere in their rooms that reads: “Some things are true even if George W. Bush believes them.” A visceral dislike for the president is boxing many otherwise sensible people into a corner because they cannot bring themselves to agree with anything he says. How else to explain the churlish reaction among so many."

a deficit of freedom and openness were at the heart of the Middle East’s dysfunctions, that neither Islam nor Arab culture made liberty and democracy impossible there, and that American foreign policy had for too long supported a corrupt status quo that has been bad for the Arabs and bad for the West. “Sixty years of Western nations’ excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe,” he noted

Jordan’s Abdullah is a monarch, but he is a genuine liberalizer; his opponents in Parliament are elected but reactionaries.

Dear Sir:

Is there an admission in your article, "Bush's really good idea", that conservatives are undergoing a change? Didn't the right wing always maintain that a democracy could be less of a friend than an autocratic government? As a liberal I'm looking for a mea culpa that I'm obviously not going to get. I do greatly appreciate your ability to see both sides of an issue, however. This has to be the true nature of politics. Eventually we have to get back to it. I think it is because the right wing has had to give up so much and has so much more that it has to lose that we have lost our way. Unfortunately such a situation usually ends up in violence, a self fulfilling prophecy for conservatives. Things are only going to change faster and faster, however. Such is the nature of time. Violence can slow us down for a while. It can even be used to obliterate our current gains. I'm certainly not claiming that conservatives advocate violence. It seems that they want to evolve materially without changing spiritually. I can see where that could be lucrative proposition. I can only resort to what think is the conservatives most basic proposition, "There ain't no free lunch". I know I'm over simplifying here. Let me just say for a wingnut you've got potential.

Sincerely,

Cat Travis
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