Obama reads Lincoln and wants to be like him. Big shoes to fill.
Bush already is like Lincoln. Here is a recent comment by President G.W. Bush.
......(we're) "going to have to rely upon the military a lot. There's four basic constituencies for a President during war; one is the American people. And this has been a difficult assignment, to convince the people that what happens in Iraq matters to our own security at home, that what happens in Afghanistan matters to the security, and that -- the first task was to remove the regimes that threatened peace and threatened our security. And the next task is to not replace one strongman with another, but encourage a democracy to grow because we're in an ideological struggle. And it's the ideology of liberty that defeats the ideology of hate every time.
"A second constituency was the enemy. And they got to know we're going to go after them all times, all places -- unrelenting pressure on them.
"Third, in the case of Iraq, with the Iraqi people, they wanted to know
whether or not America was going to keep its word, because if not, they're
going to find a local militia that could keep their families safe.
"And the fourth is the military. And the military must know that the mission is just, the goals are clear, and the President will not be making decisions with their lives based upon an opinion poll.
......"I've been reading a lot about Abraham Lincoln recently. I just finished James McPherson's book, and, once again, he talks about how Lincoln would visit with the enlisted folks as well as the generals, visit with the widows as well as the moms, visit with the wounded. And it's going to be very important for the country as we head down the future to recognize that this all-volunteer forces needs to be sustained by commitment as well as -- by monetary commitment as well as psychological commitment. We got to be with these kids."