George HW Bush – In Memory of Daddy Bush

In Memory of Daddy Bush

“I will make thy name to be remembered in all generations: therefore shall the people praise thee for ever and ever.” Psalms 45:17 KJV

My brother-in-law, Chuck, is a very special person. He has Down Syndrome, but he doesn’t let that stop him. Almost everyone who meets him will walk away with a memory. I’ve often wondered how, someone with such a condition, can have such an impact on so many people.

My wife and I once took Chuck to the Redskin’s training camp in Richmond, Virginia. Richmond was 50 miles from where he lived. We sat in a small section for the “handicapped” people. This section was very close to the field. Behind us, it was roped off for those people who had special passes to get really close to the Redskins.

Sure enough, from behind the rope, someone yelled, “Hey, Chuck! Hey, Chuck!” The sound came from a burly, muscular man that had many tattoos. He dragged Chuck behind the rope because he wanted to get a picture of Chuck, with him and all his buddies. It suited Chuck fine because Chuck has never had a picture he doesn’t want to be in.

Just about everyone I know, who knows Chuck, has a Chuck story. Probably one of my favorites is the one where his family and I were sitting around the table. A big storm came by. It had all the elements: heavy rain, winds, and lightning. All of a sudden there was a loud clash of thunder.

Chuck pointed to the ceiling, but he was really pointing to the sky outside. Chuck then said, “That’s God talking!” Someone asked him, “What’s God saying?” Without missing a beat, Chuck responded, “He’s saying, ‘Chuckie, stay inside.’”

To me, it is the words of Chuck that amazes me. They are simple. They are innocent. Yet they get to the point better than even the most educated teacher’s wisdom. He’s not trying to say anything wise; he’s just explaining things as he sees them.

It is in one of my conversations with Chuck that I first heard the term “Daddy Bush.” Chuck does sometimes get some things mixed up, but the father-son duo of George Bushes isn’t one of them. He would always call George HW Bush “Daddy Bush” for the simple reason that he was George W Bush’s father.

To me, the nickname “Daddy Bush” is the perfect name for George HW Bush. He was perhaps one of the nicest of the Presidents. You may not agree with him on policy, but it was hard not to like him as a person. This “niceness” probably led to him being more fatherly to us than Presidential.

I once knew a guy who was a Secret Service Agent at the White House. I asked him which President, who was there when he served, did he enjoy working for the most. Without a pause, he said George HW Bush. I asked him why.

The former Secret Service Agent used a story to illustrate his point. He said that one time President Bush landed on the White House lawn aboard Marine One, the Presidential helicopter. Millie, who was the family dog, had just had her puppies. He said, as President Bush and his wife, Barbara, stepped off the helicopter, they noticed the crowd standing in line to take the White House tour.

The former agent said that President Bush went over to the line and grabbed some of the kids out of the line and took them over to see Millie and her puppies. He went on to say, that’s just one example of what a great guy he was.

He said where we were just Secret Service agents to some Presidents, but not to President Bush. He was always nice and friendly to all of us. President Bush thought of himself as no better than anyone else. He said he wished he could say the same thing of other Presidents and their wives.

This is new territory for me. Since I have started writing blogs, George HW Bush is the first President to die. I published my first blog on October 11, 2013. The last President to die, before Bush, was Gerald Ford and he passed away on December 26, 2006.

That means the span between the Presidential deaths of George HW Bush and Gerald Ford is a little short of twelve years. That would be the fifth longest period between Presidential deaths.
John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both died on the same day. They were the second and third Presidents to die (they were also the second and third Presidents). George Washington passed away about 27 years earlier. That is the longest distance between Presidential deaths.

The gaps between Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon (over 21 years), Franklin Roosevelt and John Kennedy (over 18 years), and Calvin Coolidge and Franklin Roosevelt (over 12 years), would also rank longer than the span between George HW Bush and Gerald Ford’s deaths.

President George HW Bush is the only President I have seen while he was President. My wife and I went and saw Barack Obama at a campaign event at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Virginia, but Obama had not become President yet. He was just running for the office then. I have also witnessed both the caskets of Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford when they arrived in Washington DC.

I was in a crowd of people when President George HW Bush was at Montpelier, James Madison’s home, to observe the 200th anniversary of the Bill of Rights. In the short speech he gave to the crowd, he announced that his proposed budget for Fiscal Year 1993 would include $1 million for the restoration of Montpelier.

Part of Bush’s speech went this way:

The Constitution and the Bill of Rights have endured for 200 years, far longer than most nations’ charters for government. And they’ve enabled us, 10 generations of Americans, to govern ourselves and keep ourselves free. Their greatness is that they harmonize our national law with American civic virtues: hard work, commitment to family, commitment to community, postponement of gratification for the sake of larger and longer term good. They are not simply dry ink markings on a brittle, old parchment; they are the spirit that animates the American Nation. This spirit will keep America alive for new generations only if each of us renews the habits of liberty and justice. The Republic that Madison gave us will live for years to come only if we keep our culture committed to the civic virtues that he cherished.

The popularity of George HW Bush, when he was President, almost mirrors his son’s popularity. Both were extremely popular at the beginning of their terms and both had very low ratings when their terms came to a close.

“Daddy Bush” was very popular for the way he handled the First Gulf War. He was patient as he tried to give Saddam Hussein, of Iraq, the opportunity to remove his troops from Kuwait. Hussein had just invaded the small, oil-rich neighboring nation. Hussein’s stubbornness really gave Bush no other option but to use force to get Iraq out of Kuwait.

President Bush didn’t just go in and kick Iraq out of Kuwait. Instead, he got with leaders of 32 other countries together for Operation Desert Storm. Together those countries came together with a mission that Bush directed. Within 100 hours, Iraq was booted out of Kuwait.

But Bush’s popularity, and luck, wouldn’t hold the rest of his term. The economy tanked and people soon forgot his war leadership and voted their pocketbooks. So Bush was turned out of office after just one term.

But George HW Bush was a fun ex-President to watch. He didn’t just sit back and sulk about his defeat. He didn’t get involved in politics. He didn’t whine about had bad he had been treated. He didn’t bad-mouth all the moves of Bill Clinton, the man who defeated him.

No, George HW Bush decided that he was just going to have some fun. The former World War II hero, decided to take to skydiving. His first jump since he had to bail from a plane in World War II, came in 1997, on his 75th birthday. He would do it again on his 80th, 85th, and 90th birthdays, too. Sadly, he won’t be around to do it on his 95th birthday.

President George HW Bush was confined to a wheel chair at the end of his life, but that didn’t mean the fun ended. Bush took up the love of odd socks. People loved to give them to him and he loved wearing them. When he showed them off, it would bring a smile, and a little laughter, to almost anyone’s face. His daughter, Doro Bush Koch, would write in her book My Father, My President, “Brandishing colorful socks is simply his way of making the best of his mobility situation and still finding the joy in life.”

Perhaps the strangest part of George HW Bush’s life happened after he left office. Former Presidents George HW Bush and Bill Clinton, despite being rivals in the political world, teamed up, in 2005, to help African and Asian nations who had been devastated after an earthquake and a tsunami. Together they would raise nearly $2 billion.

That’s not the strange part; that was just the beginning of a very unlikely friendship. Despite the fact that Clinton had defeated him for the White House, they became very close friends. George W. Bush would say, of his father’s friendship with Clinton: “My mother calls him (Clinton) my fourth brother.”

Just a year and six days ago, George HW Bush became the oldest President ever. He passed Gerald Ford, who lived 45 days longer than Ronald Reagan. George HW Bush lived 94 years and 171 days. He now hands over the reins of the oldest living President to Jimmy Carter. If Carter lives past March 20, 2019, he will become the oldest President ever, passing George HW Bush.

President George HW Bush, thank you so much for serving our country in so many different ways. Thanks for your service as President, Vice President, Director of the CIA, Chief US Liaison to the People’s Republic of China, US Ambassador to the United Nations, member of the US House of Representatives, and for being a World War II hero. Thanks for showing me, like you said, “old guys can do neat things.”

Prayer: Dear Mighty Father, Thank You for the life of George HW Bush. Thanks for those individuals, like former President Bush, who are willing to sacrifice themselves for our country. Thank You for his example of being able to enjoy life after defeat. Thank You for showing me, through him, how bitter rivals don’t have to make their differences personal. Please be with the Bush family and all the friends and colleagues who are saddened by his passing. Thank You for President George HW Bush. Amen.