I just watched Bush's speech at the UN. I'm not sure it was a home run but it was definitely a triple off the wall. Bush made the case for democracy around the world and emphasized the idea of "human dignity" as what the US and its allies are fighting for in the War against Terrorism. He linked Afghanistan and Iraq as different battlefields in the same war against murdering fanatics. He openly spoke in favor of a Palestinian state and criticized Israel's settlements policy as he called yet again for peace in Palestine: his emphasis, though, was on the corruption and cruelty of the current Palestinian leadership, as he said that peace would be impossible while the current leadership was in place. Bush talked tough about Darfur, calling the current situation genocidal. The two things that most impressed me were 1) that Bush accepted partial American responsibility for the situation in the Middle East, stating that American policy had too often worked in the interests of stability and not enough in the interests of democracy and freedom and 2) that he did not back down on Iraq; he said America and its allies would stand firm and achieve victory. No flip-flopping or panicking here.

This was the speech of a President, not that of a mere politician.