One theme runs throughout Bush’s address: The United States government cannot wave a magic wand and bestow freedom upon you. You first must want it – as much as life itself – and be willing to stand up for it wherever you are. And when you do, you will not stand alone. America will stand and, if need be, fight alongside you.

All of that goes whistling right over the thick heads of Bush’s insatiable critics. Or it hits them smack between the eyes, and they’ve no stomach for it.

The leftist-elite mainstream media are having a dickens of an awkward time coping with this inaugural address.

Caught Off Guard

First, it isn’t what they expected, whatever that was. So they have to fall back and try to figure how to draw a bead on this never-seen-before target.

It is simply too huge, too overarching, too ... too breathtaking for them to cram into their boilerplate paragraphs.

The usual suspects, even under cloak of ambush-journalism anonymity, are of little use. How to throw offal out of the pig sty at something soaring that far over their heads?

News-Media Myopia

When it comes to recognizing a historic presidential address when they hear it, today’s reporters are as irrelevant as those who failed to comprehend what Abraham Lincoln had told the world, until long after his Gettysburg Address.

So they nitpick at Bush for not having once mentioned Iraq in his address, when only cretins could fail to understand that’s what it’s about, and so much more.

Devoid of any solutions to problems, any plans of their own, they grumble that Bush did not spell out, step by step, every twist and turn in the road ahead. Had he done so, they would staple-gun him with each and every specific.

Mentioning the Unmentionable

Bush is criticized, even by some who profess to support him, for allowing God into this equation. They forget who came first. Not Bush. Certainly not they.

Some say Bush’s unblushing acknowledgement of a divine authority grates against their sensibilities. No doubt it does.

Those who find themselves uncomfortable in God’s presence – obviously Bush isn’t one of those – have their own angel to wrestle. Bush has manifestly gone through that riveting experience and emerged with peace of mind his critics clearly lack. Who’s to be pitied, who’s to be envied?

Not What They’d Have Said

Then there are the sophists of semantics, who don’t care for Bush’s choice of words. To them, his address is either too lofty or not eloquent enough. They transparently aren’t prepared to give him a kind word no matter where he thumbs through the thesaurus. Internet searches for heart-stopping, awe-inspiring, spirit-lifting presidential addresses they have composed will prove fruitless.

Nor were these text-deviates paying attention in class when Bush was speaking. Right off the bat, he advised everyone not to get into a lather over the words he employs but to keep an eye on the unfolding of history.

Yet, history does reveal that words create history, as with Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S Truman and Ronald Reagan. History will affirm, even if it escapes universal notice at this moment, that Bush’s address is a catalytic event of grand scale.

Two Simple Words

The words that infuse his address – and give it that enormous effect upon world events – are “liberty” and “freedom.” It is worth remembering the Founding Fathers, like Bush, were not ashamed to utter those words, enshrining them in this nation’s basic documents. Nor is that a coincidence. They, too, believed in God.

Nearly everyone these days seems to use liberty and freedom interchangeably. Not Bush, who comprehends clearly the difference and the relationship.

In the Bush glossary, freedom is treated as the goal and liberty as the fork in the road toward that goal.

John L. Perry, a prize-winning newspaper editor and writer who served on White House staffs of two presidents, is a regular columnist for NewsMax.com.

Read John Perry's columns here.

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