Critics of President Obama are saying that certain of his policies are no better than those of former president George W. Bush. I want to give credit where it is due. The critics are consistent. I used to think that they were driven by Bush hatred. It now appears that they have a principled (if mistaken) position.
Addendum: The Obama administration claims that even when it ends up doing the same things as the Bush administration, it is doing them for different (and legitimate) reasons. This is an important distinction, one that is lost on critics who care only about the bottom line. Just as in our moral lives we care about motives as well as acts, in law and public policy we care about the grounds of presidential decisions as well as the decisions themselves. I'm not saying that I agree with President Obama's grounds. I'm saying that he is right to emphasize his grounds, as well as to point out how they differ from those of former president George W. Bush. That the two sets of grounds support the same decision or policy is merely an accident.
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 