George W. Bush won’t be at Ground Zero with President Obama Thursday in part because he feels his team is getting short shrift in the decade-long manhunt for Osama Bin Laden.
“[Bush] viewed this as an Obama victory lap,” a highly-placed source told the Daily News Wednesday.
Bush’s visit to the rubble after the 9/11 attacks was the emotional high point of his presidency, but associates say the invitation to return with his successor was a non-starter.
“He doesn’t feel personally snubbed and appreciates the invitation, but Obama’s claiming all the credit and a lot of other people deserve some of it,” the source added.
“Obama gave no credit whatsoever to the intelligence infrastructure the Bush administration set up that is being hailed from the left and right as setting in motion the operation that got Bin Laden. It rubbed Bush the wrong way.”
Bush spokesman David Sherzer said Bush “appreciated the invite, but has chosen in his post-presidency to remain largely out of the spotlight.”
Associates familiar with his thinking say Bush does not believe Obama or his handlers wanted to exploit his presence. But the tag-team idea “was for the benefit of Obama, and Obama withheld credit from people Bush believes deserved it,” a source said.
Asked about the matter at Thursday’s White House briefing, spokesman Jay Carney said “this is a moment of unity for Americans and a moment to recall the unity that existed in this country in the wake of the attacks on 9/11.
“We completely understand that he’s not able to come, but…the invitation was made in that spirit,” Carney added.
Since leaving office in 2009 the 43rd president has stuck to a rigorous code of silence about criticizing Obama.
After Obama telephoned him on Sunday evening with the word Bin Laden was dead, Bush issued a statement calling it “a momentous achievement.”
“I congratulated him and the men and women of our military and intelligence communities who devoted their lives to this mission,” Bush added.
In his remarks to the nation Sunday night Obama mentioned Bush in passing, noting that “I’ve made clear, just as President Bush did shortly after 9/11, that our war is not against Islam.”
The closest Obama came to praising his predecessor’s efforts was indirect: “Over the last 10 years, thanks to the tireless and heroic work of our military and our counterterrorism professionals, we’ve made great strides” in the war against Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda terror network.
(Source: NY Daily News)
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13 Responses
Sour Grapes.
The fact is, while Bush deserves credit for his anti-terrorist infrastructure his priority was knocking out Saddam and Obama’s stated goal was finishing off OBL. So each of them achieved their priority.
sane conservative…
I don’t think it’s sour grapes.
I think Bush probably feels that HE is the one that started this effort, and now that the goal of wacking binLaden has been finally achieved, if he appears with Obama, he will look like, nebach, he tried but couldn’t, Obama tried and succeeded.
That is NOT the case.
Obama just happens to be the one sitting in the Oval Office at this point in time.
sane conservative (or insane liberal…),
Bush’s priority was to capture Osama bin Laden. He inquired about him every week! His war in Iraq and “controversial” methods of interrogation led to Bin Laden’s capture. Obama deserves credit for his decisive and “gutsy” decision (bombing the place wouldn’t get us the intelligence and confirmation which we have now). Bush, however, set it up for him. Bush stated explicitly that it may take years, but a future president will get him…
Fact: Obama would’ve never captured Bin Laden without Bush. He ought to recognize it and shrink his ego for once.
Dave Hirsch:
“His war in Iraq and “controversial” methods of interrogation led to Bin Laden’s capture”
How did his war in Iraq lead to Bin Laden’s capture? It was a distraction (W.O.M.D.???) and hindered the war against Al Kaida. Also, Obama’s intervention in Libya is insane and needlessly provokes the Arab world.
I did agree with you on your 2nd point in my post(which an “insane liberal” wouldn’t).
Please read this article very carefully, examine the sources, and be sure you understand what Bush said, what his authorized representatives said, what others have said without his authority, and the logic – or absence of logic – of the conclusions that the author of the article has jumped to.
Yes, this is Obama’s victory lap, but that’s what politicians do when they have victories. Consider George W. Bush’s “mission accomplished” moment in a jump suit on an aircraft carrier. That was a victory lap many years before anything close to a victory was achieved in Iraq.
Read carefully this quotation from the article: “He doesn’t feel personally snubbed and appreciates the invitation, but Obama’s claiming all the credit and a lot of other people deserve some of it” …. Who is saying that “Obama’s claiming all the credit”? The gracious former president, or his graceless spokesman? I for one do not think President Obama is claiming any credit not due him, and I think he has given due credit to the many others who contributed to the success of this mission.
The statement that “Obama gave no credit whatsoever to the intelligence infrastructure the Bush administration set up …” comes from an unidentified source, not President Bush.
The objections – mostly preposterous and fact-defying – to President Obama’s post-mission words and conduct are attributable, I believe, to (i) the persistent desire of some of his opponents to deny that he has has any validity or legitimacy as US president, from his birth certificate to his education to his competence, and (ii) the persistent falsehood that Republicans are better at protecting the US than the Democrats. The success of this mission is a flagrant and factual refutation of that myth, and some Republicans recognize that the erosion of that myth is accelerating.
No. 3: You have overlooked the statement of President Bush in 2002, approximately 6 months after 9/11/01, that he does not give much thought to Bin Laden and is not concerned about capturing him.
@sane conservative.
You ask “How did his war in Iraq lead to Bin Laden’s capture?” Well, read the following from the Daily Mail…
“They identified him as one of Bin Laden’s couriers, an aide the terror chief trusted with his life. But details were scant and agents quickly found the trail went cold. It was not until 2004, when Al Qaeda operative Hassan Ghul was captured in Iraq, that the CIA began to make progress. Ghul told the intelligence service that al-Kuwaiti was a courier and that he was close to Faraj al-Libi, Al Qaeda’s operational commander, who replaced Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Hmmm, any thoughts ?
Hakol holeich achar hachasom/ha’chitum — Everything is decided according to the end.
sane conservative is right. The Iraq war cost the US a fortune, and diverted the US military from finding OBL. I’m not a Bush-hater, but the Iraq was a disastrous policy decision.
I like Bush, I really do, but at the end of the day he lost site on the goal which was to capture OBL. He became fixated on Iraq, which no complaints from me that SH is dead, but in a conversation about OBL… he failed.
Would Obama have been able to get to OBL without the foundation of intelligence that Bush laid? Of course not. But Obama got it done.
No one remembers Nixon’s extensive travels and dialogue with Russia and China what they remember is Reagan ending the Cold War.
At the end of the day the credit goes to the one who gets the job done.
nfgo3…
Since you are such a defender of our Hawaiian (?) president are you also on his side regarding his policies re Israel and the “palestinians” (aka yishmaeli Pereh/adam)???
To No. 10: To give you an over-simple answer to your question, and without reviewing every last word and deed of our (yours and mine) current US president with respect to the State of Israel, and for the sake of revealing my arcane hashkafos, and subject to the understanding that I do not at the present time want to discuss US policy with respect to the State of Israel, other than to say that I saw no improvement in the security of Israel in the period from early 2001 to early 2009, other than as a result of the courageous decision of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, which was not forced upon him by the current US president, to withdraw from Gaza: yes.
And if you have read this far and do not have a whopping headache, you are a more patient man than I am.
nfgo3…
By calling the decision to expel the Jews from Gaza and hand it over to the Yishmaeli savages a “courageous decision of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon”, it certainly would seem that you approved of that decision.
IF that IS what you are saying, I can only conclude that either you make such a statement just to be controversial and evoke the response of others, OR you have completely ‘lost it’.
To evict some 9,000 Jews from their magnificent towns, yeshivas, farms, businesses, (and even cemetaries) to turn over a Biblical part of Israel to arabs to use as a terrorist base was nothing short of insane on many levels.
If you support/ed that decision, it totally ‘shtims’ with your current, equally incomprehensible, support of obama.
Just to be clear, I am saying that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s decision to turn over Gaza to the Yishmaelis was courageous. Hashem promised Abraham that He would make the decendants of Yishmael a great nation. Apparently, Hashem is taking His time with that, but I take Him at His word and therefore refuse to join the chorus who call Yishmael’s decendants “savages.”
As for my support of the current US president, it would be completely comprehensible if you accept the facts that I accept in concluding that he is, so far, the greatest president of the 21st century, and one of the best presidents since LBJ.