I always enjoy articles that show parallels between present and historical events. President Lincoln 'Lied' Us Into War Too is an interesting piece by Thomas Bray at Real Clear Politics that does just that.
The President "lied" us into war. Much of the pre-war intelligence was wrong. The civilian defense chief was detested as "brusque, domineering and unbearably unpleasant to work with." Civil liberties were abridged. And many embittered Democrats, claiming the war had been an utter failure, demanded that the administration bring the troops home.
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No, Bush is no Lincoln. As Doris Kearns Goodwin makes clear, Lincoln was a rare combination of visionary - his rhetoric may be America's greatest poetry - and "political genius." Most, if not all, historians agree that a bloody Civil War was probably inevitable. Iraq bids fair to be the quagmire critics say it is, though its consequence is dwarfed by that of the American Civil War, which, as Goodwin points out, cost the equivalent of five million casualties in proportion to today's population.
But the parallels suggest a degree of modesty among those inclined to see Bush - and his embattled Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld - as unmitigated disasters. As with Lincoln, much will depend on the outcome.
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