For over eight years, President George W. Bush kept mum. When his predecessor set out to fundamentally change America and dismantle our society, Junior said nothing. Yesterday, Bush woke up and decided to let us know the biggest threat to America is the new Republican President. Bush railed against nationalism and conspiracy theories. That from a man who took America to war on dubious evidence and the canard that Saddam was in bed with Al Qaeda.
Mr. Bush finally located those 2003 WMD’s, and he dropped one on Donald Trump. It blew up in Bush’s face.
Bush misunderestimated the memory of conservatives when he continued the Bush family dynasty strategery of trying to destabilize the Trump presidency as political payback for Jeb’s abject failure as a candidate. Let’s not forget political history and reality.
George Bush was so bad, he gave us Barack Obama. Jeb Bush was so bad, he gave us Donald Trump. Sadly, yesterday’s news cycle was so bad, it gave us back George Bush.
Seventeen years after Mr. Bush promised that the people who knocked our buildings down would hear from all of us soon, the War still rages in Afghanistan. In Iraq, American-backed Iraqis are trying to re-take cities Americans already won and surrendered in a war we should never have fought. Meanwhile, W. is breaking his silence about the outrage of nationalism and political division.
Bush was the face of the establishment and its love of big government. He gave America one incomplete war, one improper war, Socialism Part D, and a whole bunch of children left behind by the federal government’s inexplicable lurch into K-12 public education. He left us trillions in debt and paved a path to the presidency for a transparently left-wing, American apologist.
In 1999, candidate Bush humped his first establishment tripe coining the lie, “compassionate conservatism.” I wrote a piece for my law school newspaper eviscerating this snake-oil sale’s pitch, which was nothing more than a false apology by a country club politician for being republican. Conservatives didn’t need a lecture on compassion from Bush.
Conservatism is liberty, and liberty is the greatest form of compassion known to man.
Bush’s big-government, neo-con expansionism was always at odds with liberty. He started two wars and won neither. He exploded the national debt, grew the size of government, and deeply divided our country over the war in Iraq.
By the time Bush was done, the Republican party was defeated and destroyed by a young, radical, socialist, named Barack Obama. If Bush’s aim was to destroy conservatism and hand the country over to the altleft, it was a mission accomplished.
For eight years Mr. Bush has been painting, bike riding, and working hard on behalf of the numerous veterans devastated by his failed wars. In that time, he never once spoke up for America as it was under siege from within. But when the establishment came under siege, that was too much for him.
So yesterday, on behalf of Jeb, Karl Rove, and the entire silver-spoon, country-club, DC establishment, Bush broke down to let you know for sure … he doesn’t like Trump. He doesn’t like nationalism, and he surely doesn’t like his swamp being drained. Team Bush has been fly-fishing in that swamp for eight decades, and there is gold in that-there swamp.
I have been, at times, a harsh critic of Mr. Trump. However, just as I felt on the morning of his election, I feel today:
Thank goodness, we did not elect a Clinton or a Bush.
Mr. Trump is an imperfect man, seemingly hell-bent on making sure he is not happy until everyone else is unhappy. He’s rude, simple, thin-skinned, a terrible negotiator, a dubious selector of talent, and a seemingly classless, old-fool who accidentally became President solely because one major party found a candidate worse than him.
But here’s the thing … Trump isn’t Clinton and he isn’t Bush. Thank God.
Trump is not a traditional Republican, nor is he a conservative. He’s not even really a politician. Mr. Bush is right about one thing, our political system is broken and our division is horrible. We can thank both major parties, and most recently, the Bush and Clinton families for that.
Mr. Bush woke out of his slumber yesterday to try to again be relevant. In so doing, he found an easy target in the delightfully troubling Mr. Trump. But the real story of the day was Bush reminding us why Trump got elected.
Trump wasn’t a Bush or Clinton … and that was good enough.
Just remember, no matter how horrible Mr. Trump may be to some, America looked the establishment in the eye in 2016 when presented Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton, and it decided, “I’m with crazy over there.” That was the Trump phenomenon.
As a Conservative, I am faithful to the values of conservatism, and I understand the difference between being a responsible Trump critic, rather than a knee-jerk hater. My colleague on this site wrote a very tough piece in defense of President Bush, and when I read it … I completely understood his perspective.
Bush plays the role of decency well, and from people I know who know the President, and work with him, they say it is who he is. Still, he is not a conservative, and his Presidency was a blow to conservatism, and to the GOP. His long silence during the Obama years gave us one less voice to combat the transformation. Now, he reappears to take down a President, who, like him, is not a conservative.
Yet for all Trump’s failures, he has given us a real conservative on the Court, and he is dismantling the administrative state … true aims real Conservatives. He could do and be so much more, which is why real conservatives try to steer him that way.
Perhaps President Trump could benefit from some private counsel by President Bush. Mr. Bush knows, as does his team, handlers, and the dynasty, that his speech and actions are just more of a persistent war on Trump designed to stop anyone who opposes the establishment. For conservatives, that is quite troubling.
For Americans, fed up with a country ripped apart by corrupt political parties serving the establishment elite, Bush’s reappearance reminds them how things got so bad. Trump’s economic populism and nationalism may scare some, and there are components of each that are at odds with conservative values. However, what Trump demonstrates to many is that for all his flaws, he is not part of the establishment. He’s not in the “in-crowd.” Americans love that.
The truth is, the establishment dropped a WMD on American society, and the people understand who was responsible. They may not love Trump, but they know he isn’t on either side of that establishment.
Whatever the merits of Bush’s criticism of Trump, Americans understand this too: The Bushes are the establishment. The establishment is the enemy, and the enemy is not going down quietly. They even have W out doing his part for the team. It’s all part of the War on Trump.
Author: Richard Kelsey
Richard Kelsey is the Editor-in-Chief of Committed Conservative.
He is a trial Attorney and author of a #11 best-selling book on Amazon written on higher education, “Of Serfs and Lords: Why College Tuition is Creating a Debtor Class”
Rich is also the author of the new Murder-Mystery series, “The ABC’s of Murder,” book one is titled, “Adultery.”
Rich is a former Assistant Law School Dean and Law Professor. At Mason Law Kelsey conceived of, planned, and brought to fruition Mason’s Center for the Protection of Intellectual Property, known as CPIP, drawing on his expertise as a former CEO of a technology company specializing in combating cyber-fraud.
In 2014 he was elected by the graduating class as the faculty speaker at their graduation.
He is a regular commentator on legal and political issues in print, radio and on TV. Rich has appeared on hundreds of stations as a legal expert or political commentator. He provided the legal analysis for all stages of the Bob McDonnell trial and appeal for numerous outlets including NPR and WMAL.
Rich also writes on occasion for the American Spectator and CNSNews.com.
In his free time, Rich is part of the baseball mafia of Northern Virginia, serving on numerous boards and as a little league and travel baseball coach.
His Twitter handle is @richkelsey.
