Bush, McCain speeches spot on
Within the same week, two prominent Republicans, former President George W. Bush and Arizona Senator John McCain have delivered eloquent, powerful speeches in which they have taken the unprecedented step of sounding an alarm about the administration of a sitting president of their party.
Without naming him, Messrs. Bush and McCain prominently noted the danger to the United States in our current retreat from a position of moral leadership and authority in the world, ceding control to other countries, and of generating hatred and seeking scapegoats rather than working to solve address serious challenges.
To his credit, Mr. Bush said “he deserves my silence” when he turned the Oval Office over to Barack Obama, and he honored his pledge throughout the eight years in which Mr. Obama served. Unlike the bitter and bombastic former Vice-President Dick Cheney, Mr. Bush declined to criticize or seek to undermine his successor. The fact that Mr. Bush has chosen to speak out against Donald Trump is highly significant and unprecedented and it places him in the class of many other honorable GOP members who cannot stand by idle as the country burns.
Naturally, Mr. Trump’s reaction to the McCain speech has been to spew disrespect and contempt, threatening to attack the senator if he does not begin to keep his mouth shut. Trump sees nothing unseemly in going after a distinguished and honorable elder statesman of his party as he fights a terminal illness with what Mr. McCain said is a “very poor prognosis”.
Thank you and bless you, President Bush, Senator McCain, and others who are courageous and honorable enough as to speak publicly about what is being inflicted on us, something which threatens to change the nature and character of a country.
Oren Spiegler
Upper Saint Clair