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Friday, July 29, 2011

Mr Bush and The Children: The President Who Did The Right Thing Even When No One Was Looking

Reuters ran this headline yesterday: "Bush explains slow reaction to September 11 attacks: Former President George W. Bush says his apparent lack of reaction to the first news of the September 11 2001 attacks was a conscious decision to project an aura of calm in a crisis."

If I recall correctly, at the time no one criticized, but instead the media rightly praised Mr Bush's quick thinking in continuing to read the storybook to a group of little children, wrapping up calmly so as not to frighten them unduly, and waiting until he had left the classroom before switching into the take-charge crisis mode as Commander in Chief.

Regardless, I never questioned the wisdom or validity of his very-appropriate response, because I already knew, from experience, how patient and caring Mr Bush is toward children. He respects them, listens to them, and treats them kindly.

I blogged last year about my young son's encounter with then-Governor Bush in this post:

The Kids and the Future President of the United States
"Some years ago, when George W Bush was Governor of Texas, we lived in a neighborhood in Midland near Laura's family. It is an ordinary middle-class neighborhood, a few blocks from where the elder Bush's lived when George was a child. When George and Laura came to visit their family, he sometimes took walks, alone, around the quiet streets. Back then, he didn't need the Secret Service to shadow him."

Go to the original post to read it all, and find out why I will always think of Mr Bush as "the President who did the right thing even when nobody was looking."
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7/31 UPDATE: Thanks to Pat @ SIGIS for the link in her always-marvelous (even when I'm not in it) "Full Metal Jacket Reach Around: Jennifer's Birthday Trip to Second Hand Rose Edition".

2 comments:

  1. Tina, we'd like to invite you to become one of our Authors in Alexandria.

    You may mirror your existing posts from here or elsewhere or produce original posts there, on anything you wish, as you desire. For your contributions and participation we will blogroll you with no reciprocation required. See our Guidelines for Authors for full details.

    Come contribute your perspectives and opinions to the ongoing conversations there or, even better, start some new - and different - ones of your own. Contact us through the site for full invitations and instructions.

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  2. Hello, and welcome. Thank you for the invitation. I appreciate it, but I will postpone acceptance at this time.

    I believe my first question is: "Why?"

    In reviewing the Alexandria Blog, I don't see any bloggers or named blogs that I recognize (either from their visits here or from my own reading and commenting on other sites).

    Perhaps we all move in different blogging circles. So I suppose my second question would be: Who? Who do we know in common? Whence came this sudden invitation?

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