It was a chilly day with a light rain, September 27, 2002, when my wife and I went to the Coconino County Fairgrounds in Flagstaff, Arizona to see and hear President George W. Bush speak.  “I love the rain,” he said to a rousing applause, “thanks for standing out here. I appreciate you all enduring the weather.”

I must confess.  At first, I kind of liked George W. Bush.  And most of you did, too, a year earlier, when he stood atop a fire truck at ground zero of the World Trade Center, using a bullhorn to declare, “I can hear you.  I can hear you.  The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon.”

But, by the time his second term had ended, moments like that were few.  His book, “Decision Points,” given to me by my wife on Christmas 2010, served as a reminder. Living in Texas at the time, we donated to the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, a gesture that put us on George and Laura’s Christmas card list.  No longer.

After Barack Obama took office, Bush said, “I’m not going to spend my time criticizing him.  He deserves my silence.”  In effect, he abdicated his role as the leader of our party.  I was disappointed, but as I recall, I came to believe no one would care what he had to say.

He did not support the candidacy of Trump in 2016, an obvious response to his mocking of Jeb Bush, who was considered the heir apparent during the campaign.

Following the January 6, 2021 breaching of the Capitol, however, he surfaced to say, without mentioning President Trump by name, “I am appalled by the reckless behavior of some political leaders since the election,” adding that the assault on the Capitol “was undertaken by people whose passions have been inflamed by falsehoods and false hopes.”  A reference to the “big lie?”

Bush emerged again recently for the South by Southwest Conference, where he was interviewed by the Texas Tribune, for the purpose of promoting his new book on immigration. He talked about politics today with the Tribune’s Evan Smith.

Acknowledging that “all elections have some kind of improprieties … politics has always been rough …  right now, we’re at a period of time though, when there’s a lot of anger in the system, which causes people to worry about the future of democracy,” he said, as if those who were part of the Trump movement were not interested in a democracy.

Yet, when asked if the Trump-led federal government put democracy at risk in the aftermath of the 2020 election, Bush responded with one word: “No.”

“History and the United States has shown these populist movements (Make America Great Again) begin to fritter over time, and so I’m optimistic about democracy,” he added.

Bush is now promoting his new book covering immigration, which he considers one of his greatest disappointments.  While he concedes that undocumented individuals shouldn’t get to jump ahead of those in line, he continues to believe there should be a path to citizenship.

“(I’m) deeply concerned with the rhetoric around immigration,” he said while citing the need for an “overhaul, which means that we get politics out of the system.”  His answer to that is to “get sober-minded people focusing on what’s best for our economy and what’s best for our country.”  Who would that be, and how could that be accomplished without Congress?

I found it interesting that CNN’s Chris Cillizza sought to recall Bush’s “relentless focus on decency and civility” in politics and life, noting his compassionate conservative approach as he compared his presidency to that of Trump.

“Bush’s version of what it means to be a Republican is unrecognizable from where the GOP stands today,” Cillizza noted.

It’s because Bush was pure Republican establishment, like Dole, McCain, Romney and yes, McConnell, all more comfortable in a status quo type of government, that explains why more than 75 million Americans responded to Trump’s message in 2016. At least half of the other 16 GOP candidates he opposed are also card-carrying establishment members. Couple that with eight years of Obama, and Trump was their obvious choice.

When asked how he wanted to be remembered, Bush, with no real accomplishments to point to, said “that I upheld the honor and dignity of the office I was so privileged to hold.

“Whatever the verdict on my presidency, I’m comfortable with the fact that I won’t be around to hear it.” 

Not that he’s worried about the opinion of this blogger, but I have never been more sure that President Trump and his MAGA movement was just what America needed at the time, and needs again to disrupt the radical agenda of transforming our democracy into the socialism of the Democrat Party.

I have no doubt that Donald Trump will soon emerge as the true leader of the Republican Party.

Now, more than ever … May God continue to bless the United States of America.