February 2, 2005: Bush: US Will Foster Democratic Movements in ‘Every Nation and Culture’

President Bush during his State of the Union address. [Source: American Rhetoric (.com)]In his State of the Union address, President Bush salutes the Iraqi voters and the US soldiers who made the recent national assembly elections possible (see January 30, 2005). Presenting Iraqi human rights advocate Safia Taleb al-Suharl as his special guest, Bush says that Iraq has finally turned the corner towards peace, democracy, and stability. Iraq is only the first, he continues: the US will foster “democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world.” Dimitri Simes, president of the more traditionally conservative Nixon Center, is aghast at Bush’s words and their implications. “If Bush means it literally,” Simes says, “then it means we have an extremist in the White House (see January 22, 2005). I hope and pray he didn’t mean it.” [White House, 2/2/2005; Unger, 2007, pp. 327]