FIRE THIS TIME:

A shiver runs round the world as Bush bangs the drum for 'fire of freedom' (FRASER NELSON, JAMES KIRKUP AND ALEX MASSIE, 1/21/05, The Scotsman)

GEORGE Bush yesterday used his second inauguration as United States president to promise to bring the "untamed fire of freedom to the darkest corners of the world" and raise the prospect of a new US effort to topple oppressive regimes the world over.

In a speech certain to alarm Iran, North Korea and Saudi Arabia - and discomfort Europeans uneasy about the unbridled exercise of American power - the re-elected president said he would no longer "pretend" that intolerant regimes were acceptable.

Despite hopes from critics and friends - Tony Blair among them - that Mr Bush would use his second, overwhelming mandate from the American people to pursue a more consensual agenda at home and abroad, Mr Bush signalled that, if anything, his missionary zeal was redoubled. "Freedom is the permanent hope of mankind, the hunger in dark places, the longing of the soul," the president declared. "Fortunately for the oppressed, America’s influence is considerable and we will use it confidently in freedom’s cause."

In a 17-minute address that used the word "freedom" 27 times, Mr Bush left no doubt that the spread of liberty would be the hallmark of his policies at home and abroad.

The speech also laid the foundations for what Mr Bush’s aides are calling a "Thatcherite" domestic agenda in his second term - privatising the social security pension system with the same ideological fervour as the Conservatives sold British state monopolies and council houses in the 1980s.

The poor Europeans no longer feel the longing.

Posted by Orrin Judd at January 21, 2005 8:15 AM