World Media: Bush Inaugural a Jolt

By Jim Bencivenga
The Christian Science Monitor

Emphasis on freedom still takes unilateral road alienating foreign press.

Presidential inauguration speeches, especially in time of war, spark intense personal and political passions. The press is not immune to this tendency. But the press has an outlet in editorials, commentaries, and individual columns.

Prior to Pres. George Bush's speech, the world was keen to see whether the American president intended to go ahead with a unilateral or multilateral road in foreign policy.

So when Mr. Bush made it clear on Thursday that he was not about to "turn back from his doctrine of taking pre-emptive action, in the interests of American security (or, as he would put it, American freedom)" as the BBC characterized his speech, there was little room for noted British understatement in the headline of the Beeb's stellar roundup - "World press electrified by Bush vision."

'Hold on to your hats, this may be the most ambitious presidency ever.' That's the message from one Israeli paper [Haaretz] after President George W. Bush's inauguration - a message echoed across the world's press.

For China's press his speech raises the question whether Washington will head further down a 'unilateral' path in foreign relations.

One Polish paper heralds the speech as the dawn of a conservative revolution, while in Germany and Turkey there's a bleak forecast for the new Bush era.

Perhaps, the most telling phrase by Bush was: "The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands."

Kenya's Nation, and Ireland's Irish Independent bookend the range of international response to the specific theme of American liberty gone global.

Bush's speech focused on the 'power of freedom', saying that the best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world. On that, not many people will disagree. The differences are over what he understands by 'freedom' and how the benefits of democracy should be spread in the world - or indeed whether it is any country's business to export democracy to others... It is possible to have the freer world that Bush speaks of, but the idea that those who are strong and have a larger arsenal have an unchallenged right to impose their will on the weak, undermines democracy. - Nation

Critics who were hoping that he would get mired in detail about Iraq were mistaken. Instead he went back to basics, reaching out to the belief of most Americans in the fundamental importance of freedom and using that to explain his policies at home and abroad. At times it sounded more like a sermon than a speech. Mr. Bush may not be much of a speaker. But sometimes the message is more important than eloquence and what he had to say yesterday had the power of real conviction. - Irish Independent.

Iraq was never mentioned by name, yet its recent history resonated when Bush applied Abraham Lincoln's words: "those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves; and, under the rule of a just God, cannot long retain it" to his own phrase "the rulers of outlaw regimes."

This was too much for The Toronto Star which called such language "unabashedly aggressive." And though "delivered from the west steps of the US Capitol... tailored for world capitals."

The BBC viewed such words as "warning bells... ringing in foreign capitals such as Tehran and Damascus."

Such warnings can be couched in history, and history is always on stage at inaugurals.

Friday's lead editorial in The Wall Street Journal approvingly, said as much.

Not since JFK in 1960 has an American President provided such an ambitious and unabashed case for the promotion of liberty at home and abroad. ...The entire speech was about Iraq, as a way of explaining to Americans why the sacrifice our troops are making there is justified.

Offering a decidedly different and longer view of history, China's official newspaper, People's Daily warned against American historical intent.

No banquet under the sun will last forever. After the firework fades away Washington is still under a dark sky. The sole superpower sends a sense of inauspiciousness to the world when it's president is inaugurated under wartime security standards: America, where [are] you heading?

... Judging from Bush's inauguration theme in 2005, being morally conceited and militarily aggressive are two major elements of American nationalism.

People's Daily took the opportunity of the inaugural speech to offer its readers a different history lesson on the American character. Here is the English translation of that article.

American nationalism displays the following characters.

First, it is originated from the worship to 'The American Creed', with liberty, democracy and the rule of law lying at its core. The Creed takes form along with the shaping and developing of the country, but has been taken by many Americans as a truth or standard that 'fits all'. From a religious perspective, many Americans indulge themselves in a sense of superiority, believing themselves 'men chosen by God.'

Second, due to the nation's superior natural and geographical conditions, and its history of never being invaded, American nationalism is void of historical bitterness found in typical nationalism of some other peoples.

Third, American nationalism shows a strong inclination of being self-centered, a combination of an isolationism tendency (being disdain to associate with other peoples) and a sense of mission to save 'the fettered world' by whatever means it desires. American nationalism rejects nationalism in other peoples, which doesn't, or unwilling to learn other people's emotions and thoughts, but adopts American standards in all cases.

Fourth, in foreign policy, American nationalism takes a form of a mixture of morality and pragmatism. Sometimes America holds ideology as the benchmark, deciding a friend or foe by American values, beliefs and political considerations; sometimes it exercises double standards for the sake of national interest, showing a certain degree of moral hypocrisy.

Much more empathetic with the Bush administration's take on history, the Times of London editorialized:

The US will continue to regard the threat posed by radical Islamists, the dangers of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and the behavior of rogue states such as North Korea with more urgency than France and Germany. These countries should ask themselves whether their assessment of these perils is so much more modest because of evidence, or the inconvenience that acknowledging their intensity would entail. They might also ponder what it is about the promotion of freedom that they regard as so alien and objectionable.

Jan. 21, 2005

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