I wrote a piece on Bush in Sunday's Los Angeles Times which compared him to Woodrow Wilson. A number of people have questioned the comparison, so I thought it useful to open a broader conversation. (A more detailed discussion is in my new book, The Powers to Lead.)
Wilson and Bush have many similarities. Both were highly religious men who came to office without experience in foreign policy and responded to a crisis with a bold moralistic vision. Many of Bush's speeches about promoting democracy could have been given by Wilson. Both men proposed policies that had a great gap between expressed ideals and national capacities. Both were stubborn. As one of Wilson's advisors said, "once a decision is made it is final. There is no moving him after that." Wilson was offered a compromise that would have led the Senate to ratify American membership in the League of Nations, but he adamantly refused. Bush, of course, has been notoriously stubborn about his Iraq War and thinks that history will absolve him as it did Wilson and Harry Truman.
In judging leaders, there is always a question of luck. Wilson was unlucky that a stroke crippled him in the midst of his campaign to educate the American public about the League of Nations. Ironically, had the stroke killed him, the Senate would almost certainly have ratified a version of his League and he would have left office (posthumously) as a hero. Instead, his stubbornness meant that his policies were rejected, and isolationism crippled American foreign policy for the next twenty years. Eventually, Wilson's reputation was rescued by World War II and the creation of the United Nations.
I doubt Bush will be as lucky in the long run. Some dimensions of luck are purely fortuitous, but people also help to make their luck. Reckless reality-testing and unnecessary risk-taking are often part of "bad luck".
Future historians are likely to fault Bush for reckless reality testing, and going it alone. As the Canadian political leader Michael Ignatieff puts it, "it was not merely that the president did not take the care to understand Iraq. He also did not take the care to understand himself." Good coaches analyze their game and their opponent's game so that they can capitalize on errors and benefit from "good luck." History tends to be unkind to the unlucky, but historians also judge leaders in terms of the causes of their luck. Wilson was stubborn, but not reckless or unilateral. He entered World War I reluctantly and sought a multilateral solution at the end.
Even if fortuitous events lead to a better Middle East twenty years from now, future historians will criticize the way Bush distributed the risks and costs of his actions. People who try to climb Mt. Everest accept a degree of risk, but a team leader still has to make sure that the whole group understands the balance between risk and achievement. It is one thing to pose a grand vision that leads people up a mountain; it is another to lead them too close to the edge of a cliff. Wilson was lucky that the outcome of World War II rescued his League idea. But even if the Middle East is better twenty years from now, historians will ask if it is because or in spite of Bush's actions.
Thank you.
Wilson was dragged into the war and he wanted to use the oucome as a basis for the creation of a League of Nations. Bush created a war to expand executive powers and as a precursor to some vague idea of democracy. In Bush's narrow vision, it is only elections which spell democracy and not institutions and the rule of law. In fact, Bush is doing all he can to subvert the rule of law at home.
Bush's lies to lead us into Iraq were much more than a hike up Mount Everest. Again this idea is so offensive. One can read any one of a number of books, like Hubris by Isikoff and Korn, to see how Bush twisted the intelligence. Finally, one does not wage war to create democracy, especially in a part of the world where we are hated anyway.
The fact that Bush had failed to do his pre-invasion homework by learning about the different religious sects (Sunni and Shiite) in Iraq -- one of the first lessons taught in "Waging Wars of Aggression in the Middle East, 101" -- is very revealing about our "Commander-in-Chief." If he had made the effort to study the regional cultures, developing an understanding about the fundamental differences among their religions, then perhaps he would have anticipated the disastrous violence following the removal of Hussein. He ignorantly assumed that the war was won following Hussein's fall, and he made a fool of himself by "playing dress-up" as a pilot and standing triumphantly beneath a "mission accomplished" banner. We now all know that he -- with all of his ignorance and arrogance -- made a colossal blunder regarding his failure to have a post-invasion plan for peace. The negative results -- an endless post-invasion occupation -- have been staggering, for Iraq and America, and I believe that this ultimate nightmare will ultimately condemn Bush as a failure by historians.
The lie thats been sent out to the American people 5 years on is the "progressive" lie about Bush lying. Because "progressives" think Bush is a moron; an intellectual lightweight;; how could someone that stupid lie to all the smart congressional leaders?
Because he didn't lie to any of them; they had equal access to all Intel out of Iraq; they saw the several truckloads of UN produced inventory on Iraqs weapons programs, plus much of that info was known for already a dozen or so years. Also, Bush CLEARLY told the American People the night prior to invasion that all of this would be unwarrented if Saddam were to just step down as dictator; Bush said the reason for invasion was REGIME change.
But the "progressives" whom are merely regressive have performed a lie about a MORON President lying to congress authorizing use of force on Iraq. All you backwards thinking Moronic braindead liberals bought Kerrys interpretation of that bill ; titled "the Use of Force on Iraq" to have some other meaning thats why he voted for it; Edwards is on record saying he was lied to ????
The historical facts are there...the lies are from the left
Inspectors, both UN, and otherwise, all came to the same conclusion BEFORE the invasion -- the weapons were not there. They had not been there for years. To this day, Bush continues his lies, as does Cheney, consistently insisting that the weapons were there, that Saddam had ties to the 9/11 attacks, that Saddam provided safe haven to al Qaeda when he in FACT saw al Qaeda as an enemy, lying in the face of the FACTS that you seem to have missed completely. Nothing Bush put forward as rationale for invading Iraq was true -- NOTHING. You make reference to "historical facts", yet you are completely ignorant of historical facts.
BTW, you do not have to be smart to be a good liar. There is a difference between being intellectual. and being dishonest as is Bush. People often are dishonest without being intellectually adequate. You just have to be dishonest.
I suppose that you also think that the reason that we went to war when we did was because of those war hungry DEMOCRATS!!!
The only comparisons to be made between Bush and past presidents are to point out the complete failure in virtually every facet of this administration. To begin with, Wilson was an intellectual, and the disparities between Bush and Wilson only grow from there, regardless to whether one considers personal qualities, or political qualities. Even a short historical, biographical read of Wilson reveals glaring differences in the high level of Wilson's accomplishments compared with Bush's, in and out of office.
As for comparisons to Truman, one need only look at Truman's military service, and then note how the disparities between Bush and Truman grow from that mark, and again, with only a brief historical, biographical reading.
Ironically, there is more similarity between Bush and Saddam. Both were installed in coups d'état, their administrations based on power grabs and lies. Both worked to reduce individual freedoms. Both started needless wars. Both were criminals. Both were paranoid insecure persons. Both were oil and war profiteers, responsible for tens of thousands of needless deaths. There is no "moralistic vision" from Bush, only self-serving, fraudulent rhetoric.
No president in our history has gone as far out of their way so as not to learn anything in their entire lifetimes as Bush. Now we see the results. Bush will return to the ranch and happily cut shrubs. Real thinking presidents and their cabinets will have to get us out of this mess. How can one, such as Bush, attend our nation's best universities and be as unknowledgeable about anything?
In fact, it was allowing the UN to decide how our armed forces were to be used that led us to Invading Iraq in the 1st place.
THAT would be the reality of it.
Ignoring that fact that he is a criminal is denying history at it's base.
FACTS don't lie.
He will be remember as the first utter failure as a president of the United States of America.
We've hit ROCK BOTTOM and he is the poster child for what this country will NEVER go back to again.
He is simply a criminal who we let live in the white house for 7 years who came close to destroying our country for good.
If we let him stay for the remainder of his term he will probably succeed in finishing the job and you can remove from the preceding sentence the words "came close to destroying" and replace them with "destroyed".
Just to mention Bush (or Cheney, or Rumsfeld, or Gonzales, or Wolfowitz, or Feith, or *fill in the blank*) in the same paragraph with historically honorable men is demeaning.
Wilson, in many ways naive about foreign policy, sought, in his own words, to "make the world safe for Democracy." His core idea was to create a partnership of democracies to promote world peace. Where he differed from President Bush and his fellow neoconservatives is in how to bring that about. Wilson's avowed method was primarily through trade and cooperation, backed by the use of force where necessary. The neoconservative's method is through a series of preemptive wars against "non-democracies," allowing the projection of America's version of trade and cooperation to the vanquished.
In practice, the two doctrines are indistinguishable. So, yes, Bush is "Wilsonian" in his vision. The question that remains, of course, is whether Wilson's vision was either practical or sane. American politicians of Wilson's day rejected both his vision and its instrumentality, the League of Nations. I'm inclined to see that rejection as a blow for freedom. Others are not.
You say, "...the two doctrines are indistinguishable."? Really? How to defend that statement? Use of force first, instead of last... No similarity at all in these two doctrines, especially when one considers the disgracefully dishonest approach from Bush's administration.
And, no, Bush is NOT, as you say, "Wilsonian in vision", unless you also consider other war criminals Wilsonian. Wilson had genuine motives behind his "vision", while Bush's actions lack all integrity and any vision at all beyond power, profits and revenge. Wilson's vision was based in his intellect, not out of ignorance as Bush's. To compare accomplishments such as Wilson's to failures such as Bush's would seem to indicate a dificit in terms of reading history, and in terms of interpreting events, as well as motives.
Advertising, media image creation is everything in the Republican-controlled MEDIA scene.
Smoke & mirrors, slick sound bites = Republican success in screwing middle-income Americans for another 8 years.
The Bush Presidency is rated a failure even by some loyal Republicans. How will historians, who should be neutral, rate it higher than loyal Republicans?
Better than what? Better than it is now or better than it used to be? And better for who - the masses, the local elites, or western corporations?