Change We Can Believe In: Obama Honors George H.W. Bush for Public Service
October 17th, 2009And all the crises and reforms (real reforms, too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter…
The dictatorship, and the whole process of its coming into being, was above all diverting. It provided an excuse not to think for people who did not want to think anyway.
—Milton Mayer, They Thought They Were Free
The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can ‘throw the rascals out’ at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy.
—Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in our Time
Obama Senior
Via: Los Angeles Times:
Reporting from College Station, Texas – In a glowing tribute to a Republican predecessor, President Obama on Friday praised President George H.W. Bush as an example of someone who eschewed “a life of comfort and privilege” and instead devoted himself to public service — inside government and out.
During an evening speech to honor the public service institute that Bush founded two decades ago, Obama called for cooperation between Republicans and Democrats. The former president, he said, proved that “the R or D next to your name is irrelevant” in challenging times.
“You might not always know it from watching the cable news shows or listening to folks on the radio,” Obama said, but “I think we’re standing in one of those moments.”
For his part, Bush reflected on Obama — the man who succeeded his son, President George W. Bush — as someone who at their initial meeting showed greater concern for Hurricane Katrina evacuees than for the television cameras.
“He came without fanfare,” Bush said of Obama’s 2005 visit to the region. “He was someone I could quickly see was genuinely concerned about helping others.”
They were joined onstage Friday in the Texas A&M University auditorium by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, who also served in the previous administration and was CIA director under the elder Bush.
The event presented a slightly odd situation, given that Obama’s administration has at times broadcast a rejection of policies and ideas under George W. Bush.
On Thursday, Obama had fielded tough questions in New Orleans about the federal response in the four years since Katrina. And he was not subtle in pointing to the failings of the younger Bush’s administration.
Friends of George H.W. Bush said that he has a genuine regard for Obama and that he came up with the idea six months ago of inviting the president to come to this college town to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Points of Light Institute.
The former president is said to be unhappy with the Bush-bashing in Washington, but one former advisor said George H.W. Bush doesn’t hold it against Obama.
“Politics is politics,” said Ron Kaufman, a former White House political director. “But some things are bigger than that. He, like other Americans, would like to see the president be successful.”
Nevertheless, in the heart of Republican country, Obama inspired some protests and criticism.
Outside the auditorium Friday, a crowd of more than 100 chanted and waved signs, including one about the Obama administration’s spending and one about the national debt.
Inside, Bush had put together a polite and enthusiastic crowd.
The former president, who celebrated his 85th birthday in June with a parachute jump, walked gingerly with a cane. But he spoke in an unwavering voice of his admiration for Obama.
The evening was devoted to lauding the work of the Points of Light Institute, the name of which comes from a speech Bush gave envisioning the combined effect of individuals in public service.
Obama called on the audience of mostly college students to find time in their lives for service, even when it isn’t convenient or easy.
If the senior Bush could serve in combat missions overseas, Obama said, then “you can keep going when your service project gets tough.”
“He didn’t call for one blinding light shining from Washington,” Obama said. “He didn’t just call for a few bright lights from the biggest nonprofits. . . . He called for a vast galaxy of people and institutions working to solve problems in their own backyard.”
I’d like to respond to the quotes that begun this post, and speak of the Miami Cubans and say that perhaps they’ve begun to recognize [or perhaps incrementally publicly acknowledge] the larger real situation they agitate around so much.
Sure, they, the Versailles restaurant exile crowd, castigate Obama as a socialist demon etc -they in general keep their politics hot and simplistic -but I see an added nuance as well, a toning down as if to seque into understanding their overtly political ways are not really the way to go as neither is violence. I took a viewing yesterday out of curiosity after seeing Andy’s Garcia wonderful Cuba movie, ‘The Lost City’. I was wondering if they realized even the US government was itself one entity now, and become marginalized and nearly completely disenfranchised. I was wondering the concept of ‘socialized risk and privatized profit’ escaped them. I was wondering if they understood the real root meanings fascism [vs.] and socialism. This affair as posted should add to that illumination, I believe, even if just a bit.
I wonder if they realize their own mollification from the bones Obama has tossed them. I wonder how many retreat from the larger picture and recluse themselves to solely matters of Cuba alone -and how many don’t. I believe more don’t now than one might presume. They’re smart and cultured, and now’s their opportunity to be more so. But incrementally…
All my Googling was insufficient and I need to return to it and see if I can gather a glimmer of what their banking sector thinks. (And I wonder in general how privy they are to the authoritarian machine, Fusion Centers et al.)
…But then Google itself is yet another story… (What the devil is dual class ownership? And can they really ever come to monopolize the whole of human ‘knowledge’? Something to think about during Banned Books Week here in the US. I say here in the US: Support your local library, they’re *seemingly* more at the forefront of the fight than is acknowledged -a scary proposition given they’re a public entity courtesy of Uncle Sam… And we just almost lost the Philadelphia system, y’know.)
sheesh. If Obama’s a socialist, so are [fill in the blanks]…
Read the reviews of Garcia’s movie. I was surprised how panned it was, but should have guessed. It was a great movie, dammit. I knew the truth of it already but never suspected others would call it false. Also, it, and the reviews, made me want to go back to Miami and talk to my old buddy, Fernando ‘Mucho’ Machado, and ask about his grandfather, Gerardo, a subject I’d always politely circumvented (for more than one reason)… If you see the movie, afterward return to this post and those two pertinent opening quotes.)