I spent the Bush years warning Conservatives he was a Rockefeller Republican. He used social issues like Gay Marriage and Abortion to cover up his Liberal economic and foreign policies. Yet I was derided and even called a Communist. Unfortunently for this country, I was vindicated in my warnings Well low and behold, Progressive commentators E.J. Dione now admits he misses Bush. The reason he does, he realizes that Bush was a Liberal Republican!
Perhaps I should thank the current crop of Republican presidential candidates for providing me with an experience I never, ever expected: During this week’s debate in New Hampshire, I had a moment of nostalgia for George W. Bush.
Let me note that this was tempered by another response to Bush that I’ll get to. Yet compared with the New Hampshire Seven — and with today’s Republican majority in the House of Representatives — Bush was the reincarnation of Theodore Roosevelt.
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That’s why I felt nostalgia for Bush, especially the guy who was a candidate for president in 2000. Unlike this crowd of Republicans, Bush acknowledged that the federal government can ease injustices and get useful things done.
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Bush criticized the view “that if government would only get out of our way, all our problems would be solved” as a “destructive mind-set.” He scorned this as an approach having “no higher goal, no nobler purpose, than ‘Leave us alone.’ ”
On the contrary, Bush declared: “We have always found our better selves in sympathy and generosity, both in our lives and in our laws.” Amen. A Republican who expressed such sentiments today would be pummeled mercilessly by Fox News.
E.J. Dionne spent the Bush years trashing him. Now he admits that Bush Wasn’t a Conservative at all. Well you should have realized this when he was there. As an anti-Bush Right-winger, the Progressive can have Bush as one of their own! He was a failure and I don’t want him associated with the Right at all. Mr. Dionne should have supported Bush when he was President.
