§ Presidents Lincoln (16), Bush (43), and Obama (44)

§ ≡ A section of Preserve, Protect, and Defend: Faithfully Executing the Office of the President
{Section 5.4 « Section 5.5 » T•of•C}

{link » Senator Obama Speaking at Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum Dedication}

U.S. Senator Barack Obama speaking at the dedication of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum [in Springfield IL] on April 19, 2005. President George W. Bush is seated on the right, and First Lady Laura Bush is beind the Senator. On the left is U.S. Senator Dick Durbin, Congressman Ray Lahood, and then U.S House Speaker Dennis Hastert, all representing Illinois in Congress.
 — h/t Randy von Liski

{link » The dissident choice}

“That Barack Obama is the antithesis of George W. Bush is by now axiomatic. The President-elect is expected to change everything, from the prevailing ideology to the government's order of priorities to the partisan atmosphere in Washington to even the mood in America.

Amid all these differences, however, there could be an important point of convergence between Bush and Obama: supporting democracy by personally meeting with and acting on behalf of democratic dissidents.

He [President Bush] routinely met with democratic dissidents in the Oval Office. Indeed, during his tenure, he openly met in different forums with more than 100 dissidents and discussed with them the situation in their countries. Among them were Garry Kasparov, the former world chess champion and current leader of the democratic opposition in Russia; Sudanese human rights activist Ibrahim Mudawi; Gameela Ismail, wife of the imprisoned Egyptian democratic leader Ayman Nour; North Korean political prisoner Chol-hwan Kang; and noted Chinese dissident Harry Wu. To Bush, it didn't matter whether those dissidents were fighting regimes that were great powers (Russia, China), so-called friendly dictatorships (Egypt) or regimes that were overtly hostile to the U.S. (North Korea and Sudan).

Obama finds himself in a much stronger position to lead than that enjoyed by his predecessor. He could use his wide popularity and his considerable influence over public opinion in America and across the globe to support democratic dissidents from all over the world. In doing so, he could unite Americans behind a policy that is based on the very democratic ideals that have always made America, as another senator [sic] from Illinois who became president so aptly put it, ‘the last, best hope on Earth’.”
 — Natan Sharansky, a former Soviet dissident who spent nine years in the gulag, is chairman of the Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem and the author of "Defending Identity."

In our politically polarized society, any potential confluence of ideology between our outgoing and incoming Presidents (and their admirers), together with the virtually universal admiration for our greatest President is, in my humble opinion, worthy of widespread consideration by the American citizenry. That one such potential confluence could be identified by a foreigner, albeit from our only staunch ally nation in the part of the world harboring the greatest concentration of anti-American fanaticism, is also worthy of note. It illustrates the intensity of our own polarization in the wake of one of the most contentious Presidential elections in our long and proud history. It also illustrates the widespread willful ignorance of documented historical facts, high-school-level civics, and a rudimentary familiarity with Cultural Literacy among various sectors of our very outspoken partisan cliques who rely almost exclusively on sarcasm, sweeping generalizations, and outrageous hyperbole frequently bordering on and even exceeding traditional boundaries of decency and civil discourse.

I highly recommend Natan Sharansky's entire article to anyone who may be disheartened, as I am, by all the narrow-minded vitriol reverberating throughout our nation, and most certainly the rest of the world. Read it with an open mind, and give Sharansky the benefit of the doubt for his minor historical error in alluding to President Lincoln, whose only prior election to a Federal Government office was for a single term in the House of Representatives (not the Senate). That mistake only serves to highlight the truly awesome achievements and stature of President Abraham Lincoln, the man.