Kids Today

Peter Feaver, formerly of the Bush administration, laments the fact that the world is lacking grownups:

I point out that one important and under-appreciated source of transatlantic friction during the first Bush term was President Bush’s willingness to do roughly what Biden described -- telling them to “belly up to the bar and pay their dues” -- when it came to dealing with the security problems bequeathed from the previous administration (rogue state proliferation, state-sponsorship of terrorism, the Afghanistan sanctuary for Al Qaeda, the second intifadah, etc.). This, I argue, was tantamount to asking an adolescent heading out on a date to pay his own way, and doing so publicly in front of his girlfriend even when it was clear that he couldn’t afford to pay. The result was predictable: adolescent tantrums.

The key to dealing with adolescents is to treat them in public as if they were responsible adults, but privately to hedge against expected irresponsibility. Of course, the way to deal with adolescents is not to call them adolescents.

Funny, I thought conservatives disliked and distrusted the nanny state. Oh well.