CENTRAL VIEW for Monday, November 25, 2002

So much history in so little time

The last few weeks have been packed with amazing events. Leading off was the stunning Republican sweep of the mid-term elections with the GOP taking total control of the Congress and increasing the number of gubernatorial offices and legislatures under its party label. Bending to the obvious will of the people, even the Democrat-controlled, lame-duck Senate joined the GOP-controlled House to pass the Homeland Security Bill. And that was done even over the objections of the trial lawyers who wanted to be able to sue vaccine-making pharmaceutical companies into bankruptcy.

The United Nations by an amazing 15 to zip vote in the Security Council told Saddam Hussein to fess up or else. Then, when the experts said it wouldn’t happen, NATO condemns Saddam Hussein in the harshest terms and says it is ready to fight, if need be. On top of that, NATO voted to add seven nations to its ranks. Formerly under Soviet dictatorship, the new NATO members want to see the Iraqi dictator removed from office.

Four years after Bill Clinton failed to put any teeth in the previous 16 UN resolutions against Saddam Hussein and the UN weapons inspectors pulled out with their tails between their legs, a new, larger, better-equipped UN inspection team is back in Iraq. The new UN inspection team is backed by the strongest UN mandate ever and reinforced by U.S., U.K. and other forces spring-loaded to go into action if Saddam cheats some more.

Meanwhile, about to be former Senate Majority Leader, Tom Daschle, claims conservative talk radio hosts led by Rush Limbaugh not only cost the Democrats all those elections but caused Daschle to be threatened. Obviously, Senator Daschle is not a Limbaugh listener. If he were, he would know that Limbaugh is so aware of having the nation’s largest listening audience that he has an iron-clad rule against urging listeners to call or write elected officials. The only “call-to-action” Limbaugh permits himself is urging his listeners to vote.

If Senator Daschle wants to hear some vicious political rhetoric, all he needs to do is listen to James Carville, Paul Begala, Bob Beckel or luminaries from the Hollywood Left such as Alec Baldwin, Julia Roberts, Cher and others. On TV, Baldwin called for Congressman Henry Hyde and his family to be killed. Recently, the Democrats even ran a cartoon showing President Bush pushing a wheel-chaired senior citizen off a cliff.

Evidently, the liberals are happy to dish their political rhetoric out via their handmaidens at ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN and PBS News; however, they can’t take it when radio pundits such as Rush Limbaugh, Roger Hedgecock, Michael Reagan, Dr. Walter Williams and Ken Hamblin push back. Professor Williams and Ken Hamblin, by the way, are African-Americans. The Democrats even attacked Roger Ailes of “fair-and-balanced” Fox News Channel for urging President Bush to strike back in the wake of September 11th attacks.

Bill Clinton was not asked to campaign in North Carolina for Erskine Bowles, his former chief-of-staff. But, in Hawaii, Clinton’s efforts appear to have cost the Democrat gubernatorial hopeful the election. Clinton’s campaign trail failures energized Al Gore who came out swinging at a sitting President who appears to be doing everything right and whose approval ratings hover just under 70 percent. Duh.

The Democrat leadership appears to have drawn exactly the wrong lessons from their election debacle. They conclude that Bill Clinton’s former Center-Left coalition is the problem. So, instead of moving Right with the electorate, Al Gore, Senator Hillary Clinton and new House Democrat Minority Leader, Nancy Pelosi, want to take the Democrats farther to the Left. Double-Duh.

If Saddam folds, President Bush wins again. If Saddam cheats, and we kick his behind, Bush wins again. Only a military disaster in the desert can derail the Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice, Rove juggernaut. Unless Saddam already has a lot of deliverable weapons of mass destruction, that is not likely to happen.

William Hamilton, is a nationally syndicated columnist and featured commentator for USA Today, and the co-author of The Grand Conspiracy by William Penn – a novel about a terrorist attack on Colorado’s high country.

©2002. William Hamilton

Dr. Hamilton can be contacted at:

Email: william@central-view.com