Doris Kearns Goodwin Is Maturing

Presidential Historian and Boston babe Doris Kearns Goodwin no longer hates the New York Yankees. Over the years, such visceral dislike of the Yanks has not only defined her, but has led her to wish Alex Rodriguez would break an arm, a leg, or an ankle.

Has she grown? Perhaps. Or maybe the Boston Red Sox winning two World Series Championships in 2004 and 2007 made last week's Yankees victory easier to digest. Either way, such personal progress was no excuse for Goodwin breaking into song.

Once she composed herself, Goodwin said no matter the motive behind last week's shootings at Fort Drum, evil is at the heart of it.

"I know maybe he was feeling certain things," she said about the alleged emotional problems of Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the perpetrator. "But none of those rationales in any way explain what he did...it's wicked, it's miserable, it's wretched, it's malicious. It's a reversal of everything that's good."

Hasan, a Muslim, is accused of having ties to radical Islamic clerics who have since called his acts honorable. While the inclination to clarify such a horrific event "terrorism" has been suppressed, Goodwin said despite all the political correctness in the world, "We have to be able to say what is true."

Part of the problem, she believes, is the limited size of the military. After September 11, 2001, then-Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld desired a smaller, more mobile army. Soldiers are thus cycled over and over for duty, and nobody is weeding out those unfit to serve.

Along those same lines, Goodwin hopes President Obama takes as much time as he needs to decide the country's next move in Afghanistan. She compared this critical decision to that of President Johnson during Vietnam, when advances at home were scrunched under the weight of escalating war abroad.

"He is a man who understands history," she said of Obama. As for whether he will heed General McChrystal's call for 40,000 more troops, Goodwin said Obama's temperament is such that if he agrees to send in more troops, it will be for the right reasons.

"If you're going to have a counter-insurgency strategy, then you've got to have more troops," she said, adding that the extra troops would aid in holding areas free of the Taliban once they've been cleared.

The biggest danger, in her view, is America continuing to go it alone. "There have to be alliances," Goodwin said. "The world can't expect us — and we can't expect ourselves — to be the only ones who are fighting these battles."

She then refuted insane accusations by Imus that she was in a sour mood. "I'm liking you so much today!" Goodwin chirped.

So she's the one...

-Julie Kanfer