DALLAS Here’s my takeaway from last week’s half-hourish media tour of the new George W. Bush museum: He was president for a while and he had a dog. And he liked baseball.
That’s exaggeration, of course, and it’s meant in a good way. The too-short tour left me eager to return for a longer visit when it opens to the public May 1. I think you’ll find it worth the trip. Presidential museums are important, even those of presidents you may not like.
The 2000 election turmoil exhibit includes a Tampa Tribune headline that says, “Exhaustive media ballot recount confirms Bush victory over Gore.” There are chads and a butterfly ballot and campaign memorabilia.
Nearby there’s a recounting of the optimistic days that led to 9/11. That leads to the famous photo of White House Chief of Staff Andy Card whispering into Bush’s ear in a Florida classroom.
From there, just to the right, visitors are confronted by and invited to touch a 17-foot-high section of twisted steel from the World Trade Center. Around the base are words from Bush’s Sept. 12, 2001, speech: “These acts shattered steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve.”
Bush’s key decisions are the interactive subject in the museum’s Decision Points Theater where visitors pick from four topics (Hurricane Katrina, the fiscal crisis and two involving Iraq)and get video briefings from various sources. You’re asked to pick a course of action. On the invasion of Iraq, the choices are “Seek new UN resolution,” “Lead international coalition” or “Take no action.”
Bush, on video, explains his decisions. Here’s part of what he says about Iraq:
“My first choice was to use diplomacy rather than putting American troops into harm’s way. . . . It became clear that the diplomatic track was not working. So rather than accepting Saddam’s defiance, we led an international coalition to topple his regime. Before 9/11, Saddam Hussein was a problem America might have been able to manage, but after 9/11 the stakes were too high to trust a dictator’s word against the weight of evidence and the consensus of the world.”
I’ve got to think there were meetings about how to handle the fact that no WMDs were found in Iraq. That’s waved at this way:
“Saddam posed too big a risk to ignore,” Bush says. “He had used weapons of mass destruction in the past, showed every sign of continuing to pursue such weapons and supported international terrorist organizations.The world was made safer by his removal.”
Last note: May 1, the day the museum opens to the public, will be the 10th anniversary of Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech on an aircraft carrier. They picked that date anyway.
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Ken Herman is a columnist for the Austin American-Statesman.
Editorial, Pages 10 on 04/29/2013