There's a lot to say about Michael Gerson's new book, "Heroic Conservatism." It has moments of lyricism; it is sometimes moving; it contains a concise and effective summation of the case for war with Iraq; and it has been slapped with a plagiarism charge by another former Bush speechwriter. In the current print edition of National Review, David Frum reproduces side-by-side the lines that appeared in his book, "The Right Man," and in Gerson's book. There is little room for doubt.
Gerson will choose how to respond to Frum's allegation. But there are other reasons to be distressed by this book.
Michael Gerson is certainly one of the most gifted speechwriters in history. It's an irony that he crafted language for one of the least literary and least articulate presidents in living memory. That this marriage came off at all is a minor miracle, and credit belongs both to the writer who adapted his prose for a Texas sensibility and to the president who stretched himself to master the eloquence Gerson and others provided.
There were some rhetorically soaring moments in this presidency. At the National Cathedral, three days after 9/11, the president spoke these words to a grieving country:
"On this national day of prayer and remembrance, we ask almighty God to watch over our nation, and grant us patience and resolve in all that is to come. We pray that He will comfort and console those who now walk in sorrow. We thank Him for each life we now must mourn, and the promise of a life to come.
"As we have been assured, neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, can separate us from God's love. May He bless the souls of the departed. May He comfort our own. And may He always guide our country."
Beautiful. And perfectly suited to the occasion.
Alas, Gerson's agenda in "Heroic Conservatism" is not to reprise the greatest hits of the Bush presidency but to scold his fellow Republicans for their miserly, cruel and indifferent conservatism, which he contrasts with his own -- well, you've seen the title he gives his version.
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