David Sanger of the New Tork Times has a nice analysis of Bush�s press conference comments about Iraq last night. Using �the language and zeal of a missionary�, W. made it clear that he still thinks he (and thus we) are on a mission from God.

Drawing later on a line he often slips into his campaign speeches, he reminded a global audience that “freedom is the Almighty’s gift to every man and woman in this world. And as the greatest power on the face of the Earth, we have an obligation to help the spread of freedom.”�

He described an America chosen by God to spread freedom. He never used the word “crusade,” which touched off a firestorm of criticism in the Muslim world when he uttered it soon after Sept. 11, 2001. But he described one.(President Makes a Case for Freedom in the Middle East)

On the editorial page, the Times says, �The United States has experienced so many crises since Mr. Bush took office that it sometimes feels as if the nation has embarked on one very long and painful learning curve in which every accepted truism becomes a doubt, every expectation a question mark. Only Mr. Bush somehow seems to have avoided any doubt, any change.� (Mr. Bush’s Press Conference) But we know how he avoids doubt and change. He views this as a crusade commanded by God and thus justified even in the face of failure, misery, destruction and death. It is almost beyond comprehension that so many people in this country, a country founded on Enlightenment ideals, think that it�s good to have a president who thinks this way. How easy it is to interpret fanaticism as moral clarity and steadiness.