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Jewish World Review Jan. 23, 2001/ 28 Teves, 5761

Wesley Pruden

Wes Pruden
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Consumer Reports

A graceless getaway, a graceful beginning

http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- THE VOICE on the answering machine was a familiar one, calling from Little Rock. The lady wanted to talk about the inauguration of George W. Bush.

"This is a great day for Arkansas," she said, "and that's just the way I like it. That may be a cold rain beating against the window but all I see is the sun shining. I just wish my husband had lived to see it." There was a pause on the line. "I will say that when he died last summer, as much as he was suffering, he managed a more graceful exit than Bill Clinton made this afternoon."

Arkansas folks have a particular reason to celebrate. The days of whine and rogues are over at last. Bill and Hillary are no longer Arkansans, having scuttled like scalawags to the safety of Union lines, and now time can begin to erase the calumny, slander and libel the 42nd president of the United States called down on the people and place whose reputation he spent with ruthless and greedy abandon.

But they're not celebrating just in Arkansas. The sun is out all over the place.

George W. shot out of the gate with a rush yesterday, putting down markers of what we can expect from his presidency. Nearly everything he said and did looked and sounded pointed, like the tip of a cold blade, and a lot of it inevitably reminded everyone of the man gone to the suburbs of Gotham.

"I expect every member of this administration to stay well within the boundaries that define legal and ethical conduct," the new president told senior advisers after they were sworn in by Vice President Dick Cheney. The president told them to be civil and respectful to everyone, even to those eager to knock, grouse and pick at nits. "There is no excuse for arrogance."

But he is making it clear, with things as small as the bumper-sticker license tags he ordered stripped from the presidential limousine where Bill Clinton had put them to taunt the new president, to issues as large as abortion. He has an agenda, and he won't flinch from it.

Some people, who may not be as thick as they let on, don't yet get it. Ari Fleischer's first press briefing was an interesting exercise in dealing with people who think Elvis, or at least an Elvis impersonator, will be back any minute now. The correspondents were incredulous to discover that the new president, whom many had derided during the campaign as the class dunce, actually knows who he is, what he thinks, where he wants to go and has definite ideas about how to get there.

On the very anniversary (No. 28) of the Supreme Court decision finding a constitutional right to an abortion, the new president ordered that the $425 million foreign aid budget be kept in effect, with an important exception: the government spigot splashing money on organizations that provide abortions, or assist in providing abortions, be turned off at once. This was not in the script the media mavens prescribed. In their script, George W. mollifies the left, not the right. Isn't that what "bipartisanship" means? Wouldn't Al Gore have mollified the conservatives if he had been elected, perhaps with a loud, clear call to ban partial-birth abortion? (Of course he would.)

George W. will make his first foreign trip next month, to Mexico, which he clearly intends to make a high-profile neighbor. He will convene a meeting of top bureaucrats to discuss California's electricity shortage, but the White House regards this as "mostly a California matter." Neither the president nor his spokesman said so, but this is what Californians asked for. They don't want smelly, noisy, polluting power plants, like those in places like Cleveland and Kansas City and Knoxville, Tenn. They've got a taste of what life is like when they have to sit around like grown-ups in the cold and the dark, talking to each other instead of watching television. The prospect is scary.

The president is at work preparing his education package, to be put on display in a Rose Garden ceremony today. It will include a school-voucher program that makes Democratic teeth itch. Democrats are determined to keep schools as bad as they are if that's what it takes to pay off the teachers' unions.

The president called in Republican legislators, perhaps to do a little of the spine-stiffening that Republican legislators always need, and told them that he still wants to cut taxes by $1.6 trillion over a decade. He has plans for the military, for Medicare, for Social Security. Finally, he warned Democrats: "I am not worried about my legacy."

That's exactly the way to get a legacy, and George W.'s will be one of restoration — not a restoration of a Bush dynasty, but a restoration of decency, honor and dignity. Not just at the White House, but throughout American life. The hour has found its man.

JWR contributor Wesley Pruden is editor in chief of The Washington Times. Comment by clicking here.

Up

01/19/01: Once more to wave the bloody shirt
01/16/01: Bring on the lions, the clowns are ready
01/12/01: The dastardly plot to restore slavery
01/10/01: Mr. Lott's generosity to the Dems
01/05/01: Looking to the past for a bad example
01/03/01: A modest proposal for Arkansas folk
12/19/00: The reflexive sneer at George W. Bush
12/15/00: Taking inspiration from John Birch
12/12/00: It's time to raise high Florida's standards
12/08/00: A President Bush, and about time, too
12/05/00: Here come the judge --- and he's got a hook
11/28/00: Cry no tears for Al, lawyers are the losers
11/21/00: The useful loathing of America's sons
11/17/00: When this is all over, we spray for lawyers
11/14/00: Something murky in the twilight zone

11/10/00: Something sinister in Palm Beach

11/07/00: Low days in the life of the ruptured duck

11/06/00: A little race baiting in the final hours

11/01/00: Creator gets a hard time on the hustings

10/27/00: The sorcerer rides to rescue his apprentice

10/25/00: The founding father with a story to tell

10/23/00: A lonely passion for religious rights

10/16/00: Spending blood on the folly of fools

10/11/00: A big night for the embellisher-in-chief

10/06/00: AlGore's black problem

10/04/00: In headlong pursuit of the bigot vote

10/02/00: A modest proposal for Rick Lazio

09/27/00: When folks at home give up on a scamp

09/25/00: Gore plot exposed! The secret minutes

09/18/00: Playing politics with the blood supply

09/14/00: Al sets out to find his 'tolerance level'

09/12/00: When it's time for a thumb in the eye

09/07/00: Making a daughter a campaign asset

09/04/00: A footnote to the lie: How he beats the rap

08/30/00: Unbearable lightness of a cyberjournal

08/21/00: Clinton chickens on AlGore's roost

08/16/00: The long goodbye to California's cash

08/09/00: Innocence by proxy is a risky scheme

08/07/00: After insulin shock, an authentic rouser

08/02/00: When it gets hard not to get a little giddy

07/31/00: George W.'s legions of summer soldiers

07/26/00: He's set a surprise --- or a trap for himself

07/24/00: How do you serve a turkey in August?

07/19/00: Would Hillary sling a lie about a slur?

07/17/00: Process, not peace, at a Velveeta summit

07/12/00: The Texas two-step, a nudge and a wink

07/10/00: The Great Mentioner and his busy season

07/05/00: No Mexican standoff in these results

07/03/00: Denting a few egos in the U.S. Senate

06/28/00: Bureaucracy amok! Punctuation in peril!

06/26/00: The water torture of American resolve

06/21/00: The happy hangman is a busy hangman

06/19/00: Dick Gephardt finds a Dixie dreamboat

06/14/00: Taking a byte out of innovation

06/12/00: 'Go away, little boy, you're bothering us'

06/07/00: When a little envy is painful to watch

06/05/00: Fire and thunder, bubble and squeak

05/31/00: South of the border, politics is pepper

05/26/00: Running out of luck with home folks

05/24/00: The heart says no, but the head says yes

05/22/00: A fine opportunity to set an example

05/17/00: The Sunday school for Republicans

05/15/00: Hillary's surrogate for telling tall tales

05/10/00: Listening to the voice of an authentic man

05/08/00: First a lot of bluster, then the retreat

05/02/00: Good news for Rudy, bad news for Hillary

04/28/00: The long goodbye to Elian's boyhood

04/25/00: Spooked by Castro, Bubba blinks

04/14/00: One flag down and two memorials to go

04/11/00: Consistency finds a jewel in Janet Reno

04/07/00: Here's the good word (and it's in English)

04/04/00: When bureaucrats mock the courts

03/28/00: How Hollywood sets the virtual table

03/24/00: Dissing a president can ruin a whole day

03/20/00: When shame begets the painful insult

03/14/00: The risky business of making an apology

03/10/00: The pouters bugging a weary John McCain

03/07/00: When all good things (sob) come to an end

© 2000 Wes Pruden