The George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum will open today with much fanfare, including the presence of every living president, and it seems to coincide with a strange new respect for the much-maligned leader.
All the late night talk shows will make the predictable jokes about coloring books, and the still-seething critics will make their snarky comments across the internet, but red-hot Bush-hatred now seems as embarrassingly out of date as a five-year-old pop hit or commercial catch phrase. The coverage of the library opening has thus far been polite and occasionally even complimentary, with former Associated Press honcho Ron Fournier going so far as to write in The National Journal that Bush was a nice enough guy to hang out with, and even the usual critics in the mainstream media have been far more restrained in their histrionics than when Bush was in office. Blaming Bush for everything remains a favorite policy of the current administration, but they rarely mention the name these days, and even Obama himself felt obliged to accept an invitation to the big opening.
When Obama and Bush meet today they will have about the same standing in recent opinion polls, which will not provide either of them with much to brag about. The rough parity in the polls represents a dramatic turn of fortune for both men, though, as Obama came into office as a sort of messiah just as Bush exited as history’s greatest villain. Elite opinion still favors Obama, and still holds some sway over the great unwashed masses, so it’s all the more remarkable that public opinion is now about evenly split.
One explanation is that all presidents become more popular over time, but Bill Clinton was one of several exceptions to this rule. Another theory grudgingly concedes that Bush has done an exemplary job of leading a dignified private life and not meddling in public affairs in his retirement, which could also explain Bill Clinton’s declining poll numbers. Our pet theory is that the relentless demonization in both the news and entertainment gradually tapered off after Bush’s departure, some hard realities were exposed by the light of Obama’s glow, and the country moved on from Bush hatred.
We were supposed to hate Bush because of the Patriot Act and Guantanamo Bay and the toppling of Middle Eastern dictatorships and drone strikes and of course those half-trillion dollar deficits, which Obama denounced as “irresponsible” and “unpatriotic,” but it’s hard to hold those grudges while maintaining a proper respect for the successive administration. The Iraq War will also remain controversial, although the “blood for oil” shtick and many other arguments against it have been definitely disproved and the notion that everything would be hunky-dory if only Saddam Hussein was still in power is also losing luster. There’s still the economic collapse of ’08 to hang on to, but much of the public has gotten word that that happened not as a result of mythical de-regulation but rather a sub-prime mortgage boondoggle that Bush tried to avert, and the recovery that has since been affected has not been impressive.
The perspective on the Bush presidency will continue to change with the events of time, and with comparison to subsequent presidencies, then yet get another look if another Bush seeks the presidency. We have our criticisms of Bush as well as our praises, but we expect them to change and over time and we hope he enjoys his big event today.
— Bud Norman
The Central Standard Times 