President Barack Obama
lauded George W. Bush Thursday for facing a storm of terrorism head on, putting
ideology aside as his predecessor opened a new library that makes his case for
history.
With all US living presidents at his side, Bush
admitted some of the choices he made were unpopular, but said he had always
been driven to spread freedom, in two tumultuous terms marked by the Iraq War
and the September 11 attacks.
The dedication of the 226,000 square foot library,
museum and policy center in Dallas put a capstone on Bush’s political career,
and it will now be left to historians to debate his controversial legacy.
Obama, who had flagrant foreign and economic policy
disagreements with Bush, chose to dwell on the qualities of the 43rd
president’s character, and spoke of a special bond with one of the few men
alive who sat in the Oval Office.
Obama speaking at the event “He’s comfortable in
his own skin. He knows who he is. He doesn’t put on any pretenses … he is a
good man.” Obama recalled the grief-stricken days after the 2001 Al-Qaeda
strikes on New York and Washington, when Bush steadied a nation traumatized by
terrorism and began to plot the US response.
“We’re reminded of the incredible strength and
resolve that came through that bullhorn as he stood amid the rubble and the
ruins of Ground Zero, promising to deliver justice to those who had sought to
destroy our way of life. “No one can be completely ready for this office,”
Obama said. “But America needs leaders who are willing to face the storm head
on. That’s what president George W. Bush chose to do.”
Bush, who led America through the dramatic first
decade of the 21st Century, wiped away a tear as the tributes rolled, in a
ceremony lent added poignancy by the frailty of his father, and fellow
ex-president, George H.W. Bush, 88. “There was a time in my life when I wasn’t
likely to be found at a library much less found one,” Bush, 66, quipped in a
reference to his misspent youth. The 43rd president made an impassioned case
that controversial foreign policy he pursued, which featured the concept of
pre-emptive war, was born of a principled desire to spread freedom.
“I believe that freedom is a gift from God and the
hope of every human heart,” Bush said, reprising an argument familiar from the
days when the failure to find weapons of mass destruction put his Iraq policy
on the line. “When our freedom came under attack, we made the tough decisions
required to keep the American people safe,” said Bush, who choked up in the
coda to his speech when he paid tribute to his “brave and noble” country.
The new library, on the campus of Southern
Methodist University, is stuffed with millions of papers and artifacts of
Bush’s White House years, but the horror, and political aftermath of September
11 casts a long shadow.
A steel beam twisted in the inferno of the World
Trade Center reminds visitors of the fury of terror attacks which led America
into war in Afghanistan and eventually Iraq and exacted a heavy human and
economic price. In a series of interviews to pave the way for the opening of
the library, financed by private benefactors, Bush expressed no regrets. Asked
by ABC News whether he had any second thoughts about the 2003 invasion of Iraq,
which is convulsed in a new wave of violence, Bush said: “I am comfortable in
the decision-making process.”
Like Obama, former Democratic presidents Bill
Clinton and Jimmy Carter chose to skip over their differences with Bush. Both
chose to praise him for the emergency plan to battle HIV and AIDS in Africa
which is credited with saving thousands of lives. “I like president Bush,”
Clinton said, and praised the Republican’s sense of humor and no-nonsense
manner. World leaders who were closest to Bush were also in Dallas to honor
their former comrade-in-arms, including British ex-prime minister Tony Blair
and former Australian prime minister John Howard, who was in Washington on
September 11.
Key members of Bush’s administration were also on
hand — hoping that history will look kindly on their boss after he left office
in 2009 under a cloud of unpopularity. Bush meanwhile had a kind word for his
hawkish vice president Dick Cheney, after reports that their friendship
fractured during his second term. “He served with loyalty, principle and
strength,” Bush said.
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