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President Bush’s Second Inaugural Address Essays

Decent Essays

President Bush’s Second Inaugural Address Since President Abraham Lincoln’s famous second inaugural address nearly 150 years ago it has been a long standing tradition for the President’s inaugural address to present a somewhat ambiguous claim for world transformation and diplomacy. President George W. Bush’s second inaugural address is no different. It set forth President Bush’s ambitious vision of the United States’ role in advancing of freedom, liberty, and democracy worldwide “with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world” (para. 7). In order to persuade his audience to adhere to his arguably over ambiguous goal, President Bush uses a rhetoric strategy that blends elements of ethos and pathos with specific word choice to …show more content…

To create common ideals and values President Bush relies on the assumption that he has successfully created a common history by saying that because we have a common history “America’s vital interests (ideals) and our deepest beliefs (values) are now one.” The establishment of common ethics is done in the same subtle manner as the establishment of common morals. When he is addressing the “peoples of the world” he is making promises on behave of the United States to support those who would seek liberty, freedom, and democracy. He then addresses his “fellow citizens” once again in paragraph 22 and says that we have “accepted obligations that are difficult to fulfill, and would be dishonorable to abandon.” In other words the US already has obligations to help the spread of freedom so either the audience supports his goal to end tyranny or they are dishonorable and thus unethical. Because President Bush’s address is ideological, it relies heavily on the assumption that his world views, religious views, and ideals line up with those of the audience. If there were discrepancies in any of the three, his argument would fall flat. He began his address by presenting his world view with the statement that, “for as long as whole regions of the world simmer in resentment and tyranny - prone to ideologies that feed

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