En regardant cet après-midi, dans mon TGV, le début de la vidéo du discours de Barack Obama, j’ai été frappé par une tournure de phrase qui m’a rappelé un extrait d’un célèbre discours d’un non moins fameux président américain.

“From Berlin, Rome and Tokyo we have been described as a nation of weaklings - “playboys” - who would hire British soldiers, or Russian soldiers, or Chinese soldiers to do our fighting for us. Let them repeat that now! Let them tell that to General MacArthur and his men. Let them tell that to the sailors who today are hitting hard in the far waters of the Pacific. Let them tell that to the boys in the Flying Fortresses. Let them tell that to the Marines!”

Franklin Roosevelt, le 23 février 1942.

“And when one of his (McCain, note de XIII) chief advisors – the man who wrote his economic plan – was talking about the anxiety Americans are feeling, he said that we were just suffering from a “mental recession,” and that we’ve become, and I quote, “a nation of whiners.” A nation of whiners ? Tell that to the proud auto workers at a Michigan plant who, after they found out it was closing, kept showing up every day and working as hard as ever, because they knew there were people who counted on the brakes that they made. Tell that to the military families who shoulder their burdens silently as they watch their loved ones leave for their third or fourth or fifth tour of duty.”

Barack Obama, le 28 août 2008.