There are undoubtedly a lot of Democrats who are anxiously awaiting the end of the current Administration because it means an end to the eight years of White House traditions installed by George and Laura Bush. But there is one tradition that Barack Obama should respectfully continue to observe:
[T]he size and scope of Mr. Bush's and Mr. Cheney's private endeavors to meet with wounded soliders and families of the fallen far exceed anything that has been witnessed publicly, according to interviews with more than a dozen officials familiar with the effort.
"People say, 'Why would you do that?'" the president said in an Oval Office interview with The Washington Times on Friday. "And the answer is: This is my duty. The president is commander in chief, but the president is often comforter in chief, as well. It is my duty to be - to try to comfort as best as I humanly can a loved one who is in anguish."
Mr. Bush, for instance, has sent personal letters to the families of every one of the more than 4,000 troops who have died in the two wars, an enormous personal effort that consumed hours of his time and escaped public notice. The task, along with meeting family members of troops killed in action, has been so wrenching - balancing the anger, grief and pride of families coping with the loss symbolized by a flag-draped coffin - that the president often leaned on his wife, Laura, for emotional support.
When you're the President, a lot of criticism rightfully comes with the territory, and George W. Bush has done a number of things that deserve to be panned. But nothing makes me livid faster than the utterly vicious attempts by liberals to portray George W. Bush and Dick Cheney as an insensitive, blood-sucking warmongers who cackle as they lick their lips and rub their hands together while poring over casualty reports from Iraq and Afghanistan.
When Barack Obama takes the Oath of Office, the casualties will continue. Hopefully they will be greatly abated, but they will still fall under his watch. I hope that his White House agonizes over each of them the way that the Bush White House has done.
[T]he size and scope of Mr. Bush's and Mr. Cheney's private endeavors to meet with wounded soliders and families of the fallen far exceed anything that has been witnessed publicly, according to interviews with more than a dozen officials familiar with the effort.



Comments (19)
Be a cold day in hell befor... (Below threshold)1. Posted by GarandFan | December 22, 2008 9:14 PM | Score: 5 (13 votes cast)
Be a cold day in hell before Obama meets with any of the troops.....unless of course it's a straight up photo-op.
1. Posted by GarandFan | December 22, 2008 9:14 PM |
Score: 5 (13 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 21:14
2. Posted by Jason | December 22, 2008 9:14 PM | Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Liberals are the insensitive ones. They think nothing of rewarding the losers and sociopaths in our society at the expense of hard working law abiding heroes. They "lick their lips and rub their hands together" while poring over their plans to destroy AmeriKKKa.
http://rightklik.blogspot.com/
2. Posted by Jason | December 22, 2008 9:14 PM |
Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 21:14
3. Posted by Gmac | December 22, 2008 9:23 PM | Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Yep, you can flush that tradition the second W hits the door.
Obama and his minions would just as soon piss on the graves of anyone in the service as to show them any respect because in their eyes they're all baby killers that strike in the dark against freedom fighters that do no wrong.
3. Posted by Gmac | December 22, 2008 9:23 PM |
Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 21:23
4. Posted by JLawson | December 22, 2008 9:43 PM | Score: 2 (8 votes cast)
Naw, GMAC - all they need is PROOF the suspects are terrorists.
Preferably well-shot video, from four different angles, with exceedingly clear sound, with all conversation in the original Arabic, with matching (and completely correlating - no differences in phrasing or nuances allowed!) translations from six different, independent sources, completely uninterrupted from the time the 'terrorists' concieve of their plot to the time of execution.
And of course, it wouldn't be proper to stop them before they commit the alleged crime and accuse them - because they wouldn't have done anything at that point, so they're obviously innocent.
/sarc, if you couldn't guess.
4. Posted by JLawson | December 22, 2008 9:43 PM |
Score: 2 (8 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 21:43
5. Posted by GianiD | December 22, 2008 10:04 PM | Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Contrast how W and Cheyney treats the troops, to say, a prominent lib, like Murtha, or Hanoi John Kerry.
5. Posted by GianiD | December 22, 2008 10:04 PM |
Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 22:04
6. Posted by jp2 | December 22, 2008 10:36 PM | Score: -19 (25 votes cast)
I know - he is SO respectful of the troops and their families.
http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/news_theswamp/2007/05/bush_to_mother_.html
How can anyone say he is insensitive? Totally agree with whoever the hell the poster is.
6. Posted by jp2 | December 22, 2008 10:36 PM |
Score: -19 (25 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 22:36
7. Posted by irongrampa | December 22, 2008 11:07 PM | Score: 1 (3 votes cast)
Lip service and little else.
Unless there's political gain to be made.
7. Posted by irongrampa | December 22, 2008 11:07 PM |
Score: 1 (3 votes cast)
Posted on December 22, 2008 23:07
8. Posted by jmc | December 23, 2008 3:17 AM | Score: -12 (22 votes cast)
Well, when you send 4000, people to their deaths you should have the decency to feel bad. To everyone claiming Obama won't do it (he will) but if he didn't perhaps it would be because he is not the idiot that put them in harms way.
8. Posted by jmc | December 23, 2008 3:17 AM |
Score: -12 (22 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 03:17
9. Posted by hermie | December 23, 2008 8:14 AM | Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Of course jmc, you'll feel the same way when Obama sends 30,000 into Afghanistan as he pledged to do.
I'm sure one of Obama's aides will send a very nice text message to the families.
9. Posted by hermie | December 23, 2008 8:14 AM |
Score: 5 (11 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 08:14
10. Posted by John personal fitness austin | December 23, 2008 8:48 AM | Score: 8 (8 votes cast)
From friends I had to endure the constant jab that Bush never visits the wounded. I knew it was not true. I said nothing as they would not be persuaded otherwise. With this latest news they will call it a stunt.
10. Posted by John personal fitness austin | December 23, 2008 8:48 AM |
Score: 8 (8 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 08:48
11. Posted by GianiD | December 23, 2008 9:31 AM | Score: 3 (7 votes cast)
If only lib turds would extend their same 'faux compassion' to the 1000's of unborn babies they help murder every day.
11. Posted by GianiD | December 23, 2008 9:31 AM |
Score: 3 (7 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 09:31
12. Posted by Falze | December 23, 2008 10:30 AM | Score: 2 (2 votes cast)
But nothing makes me livid faster than the utterly vicious attempts by liberals to portray George W. Bush and Dick Cheney as an insensitive, blood-sucking warmongers who cackle as they lick their lips and rub their hands together while poring over casualty reports from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Who would say such a thing? Why, certainly not any congressmen from California like Fortney "Call me Pete" Stark (recently re-elected with 75+% - way to go District 13!).
12. Posted by Falze | December 23, 2008 10:30 AM |
Score: 2 (2 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 10:30
13. Posted by D-Hoggs | December 23, 2008 10:37 AM | Score: 4 (8 votes cast)
Wow jp2, go figure that a woman who speaks like this, "he didn't know nothing then, and he definitely don't know nothing now, because the United States is in worser shape now that it was in 2003", and had a clear hatred for Bush to begin with, couldn't understand him joking around about selling a presidential coin on e-bay. And go figure you can't either. Bush has always been one to try to lighten moods and crack jokes, often awkwardly, but this is FAR from making him insensitive, if he were insensitive he wouldn't have gone to the trouble of flying all these families for a meeting with no media to begin with! Of course if the messiah has a meeting with any families rest assured the entire world will see a second by second live telecast of it. With columns and everything!
13. Posted by D-Hoggs | December 23, 2008 10:37 AM |
Score: 4 (8 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 10:37
14. Posted by rileyb | December 23, 2008 11:35 AM | Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
...and don't forget, D-Hoggs, everything he said would be on his
teleprompter...no deviation from the script.
14. Posted by rileyb | December 23, 2008 11:35 AM |
Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 11:35
15. Posted by jmc | December 23, 2008 11:54 AM | Score: -6 (6 votes cast)
If only lib turds would extend their same 'faux compassion' to the 1000's of unborn babies they help murder every day.
Ad the conservative with the 'fsux compassion for mothers they cut aid to everyday.
15. Posted by jmc | December 23, 2008 11:54 AM |
Score: -6 (6 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 11:54
16. Posted by jmc | December 23, 2008 1:09 PM | Score: -3 (5 votes cast)
Of course jmc, you'll feel the same way when Obama sends 30,000 into Afghanistan as he pledged to do.
Not really, I blame Osama Bin Laden for starting the idiot war in Afghanistan. I think George Bush started the idiot war in Iraq.
It's simple really, finish the job with the country that attacked Ameerica. At least that is a sacrifice worth making.
16. Posted by jmc | December 23, 2008 1:09 PM |
Score: -3 (5 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 13:09
17. Posted by Marc | December 23, 2008 3:46 PM | Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
jmc - "It's simple really, finish the job with the country that attacked Ameerica. At least that is a sacrifice worth making."
Good idea, but I have to ask - do ya think The Messiah can cajole/sweet-talk the Germans into helping a bit more in Afghanistan?
I mean hell, it is a NATO run war at this point and well... the German troops spend more time getting drunk than they do any actual fighting.
17. Posted by Marc | December 23, 2008 3:46 PM |
Score: 1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 15:46
18. Posted by Brad | December 23, 2008 4:55 PM | Score: 3 (5 votes cast)
It's simple really, finish the job with the country that attacked Ameerica. At least that is a sacrifice worth making.
**Sigh. A country did not attack us, you moron. Al Qaeda did, aided and abetted by the Taliban, which no longer runs Afghanistan. Al Qaeda, the most prominent of a murderous Islamic ideology, died by the multi-thousands in Iraq because they went there, because we could not leave a jerk like Saddam and his predictable unpredictability (perhaps you'd like to still be playing the weapons inspection shell game)--al Qaeda called Iraq the central front in the war on terror. You stupid liberals seem to believe there is "Al Qaeda Land" out there somewhere and if only we'd go there to fight it, we would not have lost any soldiers, or not as many, or something. When are you idiots going to understand the enemy is in a lot of places? That Iraq being what it is now is a HEAVY blow to the ideology of al Qaeda, but you're too goddamn stupid to figure it out. Reading idiot remarks like yours gets so tiring. Gee, why did FDR fight in Europe when it was the Japanese who attacked?
18. Posted by Brad | December 23, 2008 4:55 PM |
Score: 3 (5 votes cast)
Posted on December 23, 2008 16:55
19. Posted by mens socks | December 24, 2008 4:41 AM | Score: -1 (1 votes cast)
How can bush smile after happening anything like this....! They are real politician.
19. Posted by mens socks | December 24, 2008 4:41 AM |
Score: -1 (1 votes cast)
Posted on December 24, 2008 04:41