Comparing our nation’s birth with Iraq’s doesn’t compute

President Bush's speech December 12 in Philadelphia: Comparing our nation’s birth with Iraq’s doesn’t compute, says Founding Father expert Willard Sterne Randall, historical scholar in residence at Champlain College.

As Iraq’s people prepare for upcoming elections, President Bush will give a speech today in Philadelphia comparing the situation in Iraq with America’s early attempts at democracy. Willard Sterne Randall, historical scholar in residence at Champlain College and the author of half a dozen separate biographies on the Founding Fathers, says that the two aren’t comparable: “We won the Revolution and weren't occupied by an invading imperial army when we held our first national elections.”

Additionally, January 17, 2006 will mark the 300th anniversary of Benjamin Franklin’s birth. With President Bush’s approval rating at an all-time low, scholars and media alike have been left to wonder what our Founding Fathers would think of how America has fared in both domestic and foreign affairs in the past several years. Will this anniversary drive home the point that America has become increasingly alienated from the principles on which it was founded?

Randall says that “Benjamin Franklin was, first and foremost, a revolutionary. He would surely take issue with what the Bush Administration is doing, especially in foreign affairs but also day-to-day domestically. He would strenuously oppose faith-based initiatives, as he strongly believed in the separation of church and state. Most of all, he would oppose Bush’s spare-the-rich-and-soak-the-middle-classes agenda of tax cuts. In turn, the Administration would be threatened by him and probably have him trailed, wiretapped, and maybe even jailed under the Patriot Act.”

SOURCE: Willard Sterne Randall, six-time Pulitzer Prize nominee, historical scholar in residence at Champlain College in Burlington, Vt., and author of A Little Revenge: Benjamin Franklin and His Son.

http://www.willardsternerandall.com/