Sure, the Bush administration is stubborn; what it wants, from war to tax cuts, it gets. And the result has been a yawn, or muddied applause, from America. But historically (and we can only hope it will all be ancient history soon enough), it will all be for naught; short-sighted policies and ugly demagoguery do not a great presidency make. “Presidents ought to try to do what is neither popular nor principled but what is wise,” and wisdom and eloquence, much less public spirit or even truth, are scarce around the howling void of leadership at the top. Instead, we have cynical Machiavellian spin, either breathtakingly postmodern in its rejection of truth or just doublespeak. As the newsbox graffitios say, “Lies!“