Marc A. Thiessen’s Sept. 12 column in The Herald, “Obama breaks norms as well as Trump does,” presents George W. Bush as an ex-president who adhered to a “standard of grace and decency” by staying out of the political fray.
Bush seems to be an odd choice as Thiessen’s standard bearer. When he left office, major factions of the left and right were outraged with his handling of the war and the economy. Were there any Republicans outside the Bush family interested in getting his opinion or support? I don’t ever remember a candidate or pundit saying “We need George Bush’s support on this issue.” In fact, the Republican party seems to want us to believe that there were only three presidents between 1980 and 2016 — the sainted Reagan and those two disastrous Democrats.
Ironically, Bill Clinton is probably a better example of the silence that Republicans want to foster in the era of Trump. Clinton left the presidency as a popular and influential figure. To the dismay of liberals like me, he squandered his goodwill on post-presidential schemes to get rich, even while Bush led us into an endless war and the largest recession since the 1930s. When he finally showed up during his wife’s campaign, it was clear he had lost the touch.
Obama’s involvement is not ground-breaking. Many ex-presidents have criticized successors or stayed active in partisan politics. Theodore Roosevelt formed a third party and ran against his hand-picked successor. Another, Dwight Eisenhower made a TV ad for Goldwater. Herbert Hoover remained a fixture in the Republican Party and spent the remainder of his long life criticizing the New Deal and America’s involvement in WWII in books, articles and speeches
If the Republicans want to see a bright side to Obama’s involvement, history shows that the popular ex-presidents were generally unsuccessful in rallying their fans to support the newcomers. Apparently, the presidential mojo only lasts so long. We’ll see this time.
Francis J. Lynch
Edmonds
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