George W Bush’s speech on Iraq and Petraeus and all the rest of it yesterday had a pretty simple message. Hold tight. Stay patient. Endure. Something extraordinary will turn up.
Since the President’s transformation into Mr Micawber seems complete, this passage from David Copperfield seems somewhat troublesomely apposite. If Mr Bush is Mr Micawber; then the American (and Iraqi) people are the other Micawbers:
Mr Micawber…then addressed himself to me, and proffered me the satisfaction of “witnessing the re-establishment of mutual confidence between himself and Mrs Micawber”. After which, he invited the company generally to the contemplation of that affecting spectacle. “The veil that has long been interposed between Mrs Micawber and myself, is now withdrawn,’ said Mr Micawber; “and my children and the Author of their Being can once more come in contact on equal terms”… …His house was not far off;and as the street door opened into the sitting-room, and he bolted in with a precipitation quite his own, we found ourselves at once in the bosom of the family.
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