From an e-mail source I despise--Salon. But the writer is admirable.

Stand by our man

Is it too much to ask those who have long disliked Bush to take a moment and give him a chance?

- - - - - - - - - - - - By Andrew Sullivan

Sept. 18, 2001 | I want to say something that may not be congenial to every reader of Salon. But it's something that, I think, needs to be said after the last week or so. I am relieved that George W. Bush is president of the United States. I am more than ever proud of endorsing him last fall. Far from flunking the test of presidential leadership, as columnist Mary McGrory opined the day after the catastrophe, Bush has risen to this occasion with a variety of qualities that are distinct to him and not to everyone's taste, but qualities that I believe can greatly help us win this terrible war launched by evil men for evil reasons.

First, the caveats. It's clear by now that Bush's style is to put the executive into the executive branch. He tends to manage, not explain. He clearly feels that his first responsibility is to get the job done -- even if it means he is out of the public eye too much, or not insistent enough on explaining the reasons for his actions. When faced with a massive propaganda campaign, as the media directed after the inevitable withdrawal from the unworkable Kyoto Protocol, he has often failed to fight back coherently or eloquently enough. Sept. 11 showed the disadvantage of this impulse. Bush was placed in a uniquely confusing and destabilizing situation. Coded warnings were delivered to Air Force One that the president's plane and the White House were targets. We have no evidence to undermine this statement, and much evidence to believe it's true.

The security agencies decided to scramble the president's itinerary to foil any attacks. Maybe Bush should have returned directly to Washington. But at the time, it seems to me that the most important priority was to ensure that the president was in a secure place to direct whatever needed to be done. Instead of carping that he was not in Washington immediately, we should perhaps credit him with taking a political hit in order to fulfill his ultimate responsibilities as president. Congressman Martin Meehan opined that this explanation was "spin." On the contrary, it was the opposite of spin. It was a politically damaging act of civic responsibility. It says something of our priorities that we damn a president for this, rather than praise him.

Bush was back in Washington by evening to make his first, critical speech. It was barely adequate. It was designed merely to show that he was back, and that a war was underway. But from the beginning, Bush understood exactly what had happened and in his terse way, communicated the essentials. This was a war; and it was not only a war against terrorists but the regimes who harbor and protect them. On the day of the attack, he quietly framed the conflict. His subsequent statements and actions seem to me to be a paragon of what presidential leadership is about. He didn't lash out with a self-defeating and politically expedient strike, as other less resolute presidents have done. He gathered his experienced aides and directed a diplomatic, military and domestic strategy that already shows some signs of success. Frankly, we cannot know yet whether this war will be won quickly or how it will be handled. There will be time yet for such analysis. But Bush has started a process calmly, effectively and professionally.

And his emotions have been perfectly in tune with the mass of the country. Some have criticized him for tearing up in the Oval Office while recalling the tragedy. Personally, I found it deeply moving. It was real emotion -- not fake. It undergirded his resolve to fight back. In this, he is the antithesis of Clinton -- a man who used emotion for effect and idled while our national security weakened. And unlike Clinton, Bush didn't organize his schedule for photo-op political purposes. He went to New York not right away, when the media would have lapped it up. He let Rudy Giuliani perform miracles alone in a limelight that was more than rightly his. Bush doesn't need to elbow in on others' responsibilities or achievements.

-- Anonymous, September 19, 2001