Another girl from the class, Mariah Williams, says:
"I don't remember the story we were reading — was it about pigs? But I'll always remember watching his face turn red. He got really serious all of a sudden. But I was clueless. I was just 7. I'm just glad he didn't get up and leave, because then I would have been more scared and confused."Do these kids know how much people have abused Bush over the years for what, to them, was the care he took? Yes.
One thing the students would like to tell Bush's critics — like liberal filmmaker Michael Moore, whose 2004 documentary Fahrenheit 911 disparaged Bush for lingering almost 10 minutes with the students after getting word that two planes had crashed into the World Trade Center — is that they think the President did the right thing. "I think he was trying to keep everybody calm, starting with us," says Guerrero. Dubrocq agrees: "I think he was trying to protect us." Booker Principal Gwendolyn Tose-Rigell, who died in 2007, later insisted, "I don't think anyone could have handled it better. What would it have served if [Bush] had jumped out of his chair and ran out of the room?
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If that's really the way it went down then I take back some of what I thought and said about GWB.
"Excuse me, Children, I would like very much to finish reading this book to you, but something very important has just come up and I must now leave. That happens when you're president. It's been a pleasure coming here. Thank you for having me."
}}} schwing {{{
Yesterday I read on Ace that the seven minute delay was for Secret Service to prepare the vehicles and arrange a hasty exit. But that doesn't sound right. Admit it, the thing looked feckless regardless of Michael Moore saying so. Com'on, seven minutes is a long time.
Who knew those little kids would all grow up to be such racists?
Not only was Bush a better president than his critics gave him credit for, he is a better human being than most of his critics.
The left back then didn't take long in showing that they really cared a lot more about damaging W than they did for the good of their country. Contrast that with the vast majority of conservatives praising Obama for finally showing some guts.
PS== Well said, KenK, as long as you aren't including /sarc in your comment
I didn't begrudge Bush for this. But I'm not a typical liberal. However, I will say the nuance that is being presented here is not the kind of nuance that partisans ever show to a president they hate.
Bush was criticized for everything he did by liberals and given the benefit of the doubt by conservatives. Obama is critized for everything he does by conservatives and given the benefit of the doubt by liberals.
It's the same old story....
A little different from Little Zero needing to "sleep on it" before making the decision to go.
If he did at all.
Obviously Bush didn't undertand then and these children don't understand now that we have a new paradigm. For important decisions the President must wait 16 hours.
There are times when it's, bot,h refreshing and gratifying to learn my view of reality is accurate.
This is one of those times.
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream---and not make dreams your master;
If you can think---and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings---nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And---which is more---you'll be a Man, my son!
He may not have done the right thing but he didn't do the wrong thing. Nothing changed in those few minutes that he could've impacted. Obama would have finished the hole or maybe even the front nine.
...but Bush is an evil war criminal weenie! Sully told me so!
Crack, you have encapsulated what's wrong with this Administration perfectly.
WV "xyqfr" bin Laden's last words.
The left might as well have raised a banner reading "we are so utterly without reason or integrity we'll pretend this is an issue because partisan politics is more important to us than defending America".
No justification of the seven minutes is necessary. Let the fools show everyone how small they are.
After they die, all of the Bush haters can yuk it up with Osama Bin Laden. Osama can tell them how he hid for so long, the Bush haters can tell Osama that he's evil, but at least not as evil as Bush.
Then they can go back to their eternal weeping and gnashing of teeth in the blackness of darkness in the lake of fire reserved for the devil and his angels and those that follow him.
Justice.
Sweet.
Chip, by the time he finished your speech and said goodbye to all the kids ten minutes would have passed. Just about as many minutes as it took him to finish reading the story (it wasn't a Francis Bacon essay, you know) and take his leave in the way he actually did. Sometimes I think what really frosts the anti-Bush crowd's shorts is that he stayed low-key instead of acting all impressive and important. In their minds a proper leader is someone who is always reminding someone that he is Important and has Important things to do. You know, like Obama does. Now he's Presidential. Bush was too mundane and ordinary.
7 Minutes!!!!
vs.
16 Hours
The Alinsky method of ridicule aimed at Bush by experts in the tactic never made any sense to a thinker. It was a stupid idea to accuse Bush of something done poorly when he was really doing it all right. That reminds me of the anti-Obama ridicule industry desperately mouthing strange ideas to slander Obama the last 2 days, such as Levin and Hannity. Why can't they withdraw themselves from such arrogance. It only destroys their credibility.
The kids are alright.
Excuse me, Children, I would like very much to finish reading this book to you, but something very important has just come up and I must now leave. That happens when you're president. It's been a pleasure coming here. Thank you for having me."
I think that still would have freaked the children out.
WV: Micker. See also, Birther.
"Yesterday I read on Ace that the seven minute delay was for Secret Service to prepare the vehicles and arrange a hasty exit. But that doesn't sound right."
It sounds about right to me, As I recall, in all the confusion, the White House did not immediately have a full understanding of the nature and scope of the attack. Since they had to consider whether it was a full-fledged attack on the entire country, they did not know where it was safe to fly the President. Even after AF-1 was in the air, it would have taken time to figure out whether it was safe to head directly for Washington, better to fly to a secure command center elsewhere in the country with access to better communications than those on AF-1, or more prudent to stay in the air and (I presume) arrange for refueling.
It doesn't really matter what he did. If Bush had politely excused himself and left the classroom, he would have been criticized for that by the Michael Moores of the world ("He panicked..." "Couldn't he have stayed for 7 minutes more to keep the kids calm" "He's a war criminal' etc.)
tradguy,
Hannity has credibility? When did he acquire that???
Kirk...Hannity is a problem. I really don't think Hannity cares about his credibility. His line of Irish blarney just rolls along seldom letting his guests speak. He is just as partisan as Maddow and Mathews.
The problem wasn't that he took 7 minutes. The problem is that he is a Republican who took 7 minutes. If he had been a democrat we would have been hearing how cool he was under fire, deliberating all possible options because of his superior intellect.
Good God! Please go back and review the video!
The problem wasn't that he took 7 minutes. The problem is that he is a Republican who took 7 minutes.
And it was on tape.
It's The Pet Goat
[Siegfried Engelmann and Elaine C. Bruner, McGraw-Hill, ISBN 0-02-686355-3]
I guess the law (or the Left) really doesn't take account of trifles. . .
I spend more than 7 minutes wondering what to eat for dinner.
He spent 7 minutes reacting to the most horrible news, with the greatest weight on his shoulders.
And some people can't give him even the slightest latitude.
I remember soon after 9/11 hearing people blame Bush for the entire attack, and how that bodes well for the next election.
This whole thing was about the Bush v Gore in Florida debacle.
That's why what Gore did was so horrible. He convinced so many people that Bush stole an election. It fundamentally screwed up this country. In a way, the anger with Obama is a direct descendant. Many don't know another way to oppose a politician they greatly dislike.
Gore knew he was causing a bitter division when he threw away the votes of American soldiers, or demanded unfair recounts, or dissembled cheating, and as a result, Bush was so hated that he was getting eggs thrown at him before he was inaugurated.
That's the real reason he had such a huge swing up in the polls after 9/11. All that negative energy had to take a breather. It was like a tightly held rubber band that was released for a little while.
Fair or not, we gotta try to get over this bitter division. We have to beat Obama without letting our personal feelings about his policies lead us to paranoia or derangement.
For example, Obama showed true resolve and guts as his administration produced a momentous and excellent result with Osama's destruction. Yes, of course he mucked it up in several ways, but we need to give credit and respect, while criticizing.
I refuse to accept a status quo of massive anger with one another.
Anyone who watched any of Michael Moore's movies, and thought that they were learning something is a fucking idiot.
Bush was criticized for everything he did by liberals and given the benefit of the doubt by conservatives. Obama is critized for everything he does by conservatives and given the benefit of the doubt by liberals.
It's the same old story....
Actually,
it isn't.
Bush was accused by the left of invading Afghanistan over an oil pipeline he had nothing to do with (Michael Moore).
Bush was accused by the left for being AWOL from the TX Air National Guard.
Those were lies.
Those lies were wholly embraced by a majority of the left.
You are a silly liar.
Crackin' good Kipling reference there. Yes.
"I think he was trying to protect us." Wow. Whether I agree with his actions or not, this is powerful. Bush was trying to protect us. He had his faults, and his fiscal policies were decidedly not conservative enough for me. However, at the end of the day he loves this country and would try to protect us. What I have in common with Bush is far greater than what I don't. Bush won elections in part because people felt like he was somebody they could sit down with and share a cup of coffee. Not so the current guy.
President Obama is worried about getting re-elected. We have far too many pictures of Barack and Michelle looking really arrogant.
Tim Maguire: Spot on.
Moore would have criticized him if he ran out of the room. That is what Moore does. He is a liar and a fraud.
I've always operated under the assumption that anyone who considered the reaction of President Bush at that moment, continuing reading the book in the classroom, as something that was inappropriate, was a childless human. Disregarding the partisan hacking involved with the idea, only a human without child could possibly forget about the child immediately in front of them, and have no compassion for how their actions might impact the emotions of that child.
You see, it's all about the children, except when it isn't.
WV: foxis:
We are two wild and crazy guys looking for foxis.
Is this really worth discussing? Anyone who feels that in those few, unprecedented moments 7 minutes signified anything...
anyone who believes that is beneath contempt.
I don't know enough about BO's decision to judge the 16 hours.
Obviously they are two entirely different moments and cannot be compared.
As for Moore...pfffft
@traditionalguy...
I listened to Mark Levin Monday and he played a tape of former Pres. Bush being grilled by Matt (Lauer??) regarding methods of interrogation. Bush was passionate and held his ground, citing his intent to honor his oath of office by protecting the people of the United States of America. That replay was more instructive and relevant than ANYTHING I have read or heard since the excellent news that OBL is dead.
"Excuse me, Children, I would like very much to finish reading this book to you, but something very important has just come up and I must now leave. That happens when you're president. It's been a pleasure coming here. Thank you for having me."
The child remembered his face turning red. President Bush was clearly emotionally stricken by the news. I don't think he was in a state right then to rattle off such a smooth exit line and then go stand in the hallway with his entourage waiting for the limo to arrive.
He did exactly the right thing, the noble thing, naturally and without pre-meditation. His detractors and second-guessers are idiots.
May favorite of the younge people's comments:
"Today, when we talk about 9/11 in class and you hear kids make mistakes about what happened with the President that day, I can tell them they're wrong," she says, "because I was there."
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