The Great Debate

President Ronald Reagan (L), President George W. Bush (R, Top) and George H.W. Bush (R, Bottom) Reuters/Files

The hoopla over the new George W. Bush Library in Dallas, as well as some gauzy looks back penned by former aides, shows we are in the middle of “The Great Bush Revisionism.” The former president is being lauded and congratulated. But for what?

A new examination of Bushism may be helpful because the current scandals in Washington are the symptoms of too much power and too much arrogance.

The Internal Revenue Service did not target the Republican Party, which is considered part of the establishment. It targeted Tea Party and other conservative groups that were viewed as a threat to the establishment.

Americans need to be wary of revisionism at all times. They need to remember clearly how things were.

The following is a condensed version of George Friedman’s geopolitical column for STRATFOR, a global intelligence company where Friedman is chief executive officer.

It has now been nine years since al Qaeda attacked the United States. And it has been nine years of America primarily focusing on the Islamic world. Over this period of time, the United States has engaged in two multi-year, multi-divisional wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, inserted forces in other countries in smaller operations and conducted a global covert campaign against al Qaeda and other radical jihadist groups.

In order to understand the last nine years, we must understand the first 24 hours of the war — and recall our own feelings in those 24 hours. First, the audacious nature of the attack was both shocking and frightening. Second, we did not know what was coming next.