Political Perceptions: Obama Owes Bush a Thank You

President-elect Barack Obama owes President George W. Bush one big thank you, writes Weekly Standard’s Jules Crittenden . Most of those thank yous are on foreign policy matters. For example, “That difficult task, which required the terrible resolve to send men to their deaths and also required several painful readjustments of strategy and tactics, was done in time so that Obama should be able to fulfill his campaign promise of getting out of Iraq and ramping up in Afghanistan. It will be possible for Obama to draw down the U.S. troop presence in Iraq without a precipitous, premature withdrawal that could plunge the region into genocidal chaos and leave Iran the de facto regional power. Iraq is peaceful enough now that a policy fudge by Obama there-unlike on the Guantánamo issue-is something his liberal backers are unlikely to hold against him.” To be sure, “George W. Bush did not solve all the problems of the world’s most troubled and dangerous region. But, for all his shortcomings, he has ... (link)