{"id":191998,"date":"2018-12-02T01:38:45","date_gmt":"2018-12-02T06:38:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=191998"},"modified":"2018-12-02T01:38:45","modified_gmt":"2018-12-02T06:38:45","slug":"from-bush-to-clinton-a-grace-note-for-the-ages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2018\/12\/02\/from-bush-to-clinton-a-grace-note-for-the-ages\/","title":{"rendered":"From Bush to Clinton, a grace note for the ages"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
FILE: Former Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton film a public service announcement encouraging the American people to make cash donations to the tsunami relief effort through www.usafreedomcorps.gov in the White House Library Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2005. (Photo By White House photo by Eric Draper – whitehouse.gov, Former Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Public Domain<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 It was a grace note for the ages.<\/p>\n

\u201cDear Bill,\u201d George H.W. Bush scribbled Jan. 20, 1993, to the Democrat about to succeed him as president. \u201cWhen I walked into this office just now I felt the same sense of wonder and respect that I felt four years ago. I know you will feel that, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Short yet intimate, the note left in the Oval Office from vanquished to victor seeded a friendship that flowered in the decades since, to a point where Bill Clinton said upon Bush’s death Friday : \u201cI just loved him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hillary Clinton says the letter made her cry, when she first read it back then and again when she heard Bush was gone. \u201cThat’s the America we love,\u201d she said on Instagram . \u201cThat is what we cherish and expect.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is traditional for an outgoing president to leave a letter for his successor. Barack Obama’s to Donald Trump offered congratulations on \u201ca remarkable run\u201d and checked off verities of American leadership \u2014 advice to \u201cbuild more ladders of success,\u201d \u201csustain the international order,\u201d yet take time for family. It was as guarded as when they awkwardly posed for photos together and shook hands.<\/p>\n

Bush, who months before writing his letter had warned voters to \u201cwatch your wallet\u201d with that Democrat Clinton, was self-effacing and personal in his handoff.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish you great happiness here,\u201d he wrote. \u201cI never felt the loneliness some Presidents have described. There will be very tough times, made even more difficult by criticism you may not think is fair. I’m not a very good one to give advice; but just don’t let the critics discourage you or push you off course.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou will be our President when you read this note,\u201d he continued (underlining \u201cour\u201d). \u201cI wish you well. I wish your family well.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour success now is our country’s success. I am rooting hard for you.<\/p>\n

\u201cGood Luck \u2014 George\u201d<\/p>\n

Writing in The Washington Post on Saturday, Bill Clinton said those words showed a man with \u201cnatural humanity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Clinton said the two men had a respectful friendship during his own presidency, but it was after that they truly got to know each other, when President George W. Bush asked his father and Clinton to be involved in U.S. relief efforts for the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami disaster and Hurricane Karina in 2005. They travelled together far and wide in their efforts.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis friendship has been one of the great gifts of my life,\u201d Clinton said. \u201cI cherished every opportunity I had to learn and laugh with him.\u201d<\/p>\n

They were 22 years apart \u2014 Clinton, 72, Bush, 94.<\/p>\n

In June, Clinton visited Bush in Kennebunkport, Maine, and a photo posted on Twitter shows the 41st and 42nd presidents together as Bush displays a pair of \u201cBill Clinton socks\u201d from his colorful sock collection.<\/p>\n

Affection between presidents, across today’s toxic political divide, has extended beyond Clinton and the elder Bush. The Clintons and the Obamas both became friendly with the Bush family and attended Barbara Bush’s funeral in April. Trump did not, though first lady Melania Trump did.<\/p>\n

Trump had mocked two generations of the Bush family in his political rise, criticizing father and son presidents while defeating the other son, \u201clow energy\u201d Jeb Bush, for the Republican nomination. The elder Bush called Trump a \u201cblowhard\u201d and voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016.<\/p>\n

Without naming names, Bill Clinton closed his remembrance in the Post with an observation about the way things are now.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven what politics looks like in America and around the world today, it’s easy to sigh and say George H.W. Bush belonged to an era that is gone and never coming back \u2014 where our opponents are not our enemies, where we are open to different ideas and changing our minds, where facts matter and where our devotion to our children’s future leads to honest compromise and shared progress,\u201d he wrote. \u201cI know what he would say: ‘Nonsense. It’s your duty to get that America back.’<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should all give thanks for George H.W. Bush’s long, good life and honour it by searching, as he always did, for the most American way forward.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 It was a grace note for the ages. \u201cDear Bill,\u201d George H.W. Bush scribbled Jan. 20, 1993, to …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":191999,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-191998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-w","mauthors-calvin-woodward","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}