George H.W. Bush

Kathleen Townsend Kennedy made a comment this past week that President George H.W. Bush was voting for Hillary Clinton. She apparently learned this after speaking directly with Bush. She should not have publicly disclosed it. She has no right to speak for someone else and reveal a confidence.

Quite rightly the Bushes said that the former President's vote is private and he would never publicly announce it. Chances are he probably is going to vote for Clinton because he believes she is the best qualified person to lead the nation.

I voted for George H.W. Bush because I knew the totality of his life and believed him to be an honorable person who believed in public service above party pettiness. He was arguably one of the most prepared persons to ever seek the office. He proved my belief by doing two significant things. He brought together the largest international coalition since World War II to launch Desert Storm. He had a strategy and a goal that he stuck to, to liberate Kuwait and push Saddam Hussein back to Baghdad, no more, no less. He was greatly criticized at the time and for many years after for not pressing on to Baghdad and removing Hussein from power, but he was a Statesman who understood very clearly that was not the mission and the consequences to the middle east would be catastrophic. Unfortunately for us and the world at large we now know he was right.

The second thing he did was to raise taxes, which violated a campaign pledge but which was necessary, we again see the Statesman trump the politician. It cost him greatly and played a role in his defeat.

But the biggest reason he was defeated is because he and his entire team underestimated Bill Clinton. They simply could not believe that this young Governor from Arkansas could possibly be a threat to this World War II fighter pilot that had such vast experience and accomplishments. They were wrong and by the time they realized it, it was too late. Many blame Ross Perot but that wasn't the reason. One on one Clinton still would have beaten him. Perot had galvenized a lot of voters that normally would not have voted and those that would came from a pool of Republican, Democratic and independent voters.

Donald Rumsfeld was interviewed about the disclosure of Bush voting for Clinton and he said "well he's getting up there in years". What a disrespectful statement, to dismiss him as being too old to know what he's doing. Rumsfeld is in his eighties so his comment is all the more deplorable, and that is the correct use of that word.

George H.W. Bush is not a perfect man, none of us are, but when it counted most he displayed the values of a Statesman and disregarded the short term gains of the politician.