Media Uses Bush Passing To Bash Trump

Loving Couple: George & Barbara Bush

by Mike Huckabee: President Trump ordered Air Force One to transport the body of late former President George H.W. Bush from Houston to Washington, to lie in state and for a state funeral at the National Cathedral before he is returned to Texas for burial. Trump also declared Wednesday to be a national day of mourning, and flags to be flown at half-staff on all federal buildings. Check out this linked story for more details about the memorial observances.

This moving story contains the inspiring final words of the late President Bush, as revealed by his family and friends. I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that he expressed faith in God and joy at the thought of soon being reunited with his wife Barbara and his daughter Robin in Heaven. And his very last words on Earth were to express love for a family member.

Among the many nostalgic feelings evoked by President Bush’s death was a longing for the days when political humor was good-natured and bipartisan rather than mean and one-sided. There couldn’t have been a better illustration than the contrast between the current “Saturday Night Live” and the actions of one of its biggest former stars.

Carvey, who famously spoofed the first President Bush on “SNL,” recalled how Bush was able to laugh at Carvey's impression of him, and what “an honor and a privilege” it was to get to know and spend time with Bush, and to work with him at charity events and become friends with him over 25 years.

Meanwhile, on this weekend’s current incarnation of “SNL,” Alec Baldwin returned to his nasty, one-dimensional cartoon portrayal of President Trump (apparently, getting arrested for allegedly assaulting someone gets you only a brief suspension if you’re a member in good standing of showbiz’s “Hate Trump Club.”) His comments off-screen also made it clear that his impression of Trump is born out of pure hatred.

I wonder how much longer liberal TV shows, women’s magazines and other media outlets are going to continue hemorrhaging viewers/customers with their incessant anti-Trump hatefests, even though they’ve long ago driven away conservatives, and now, even many Trump-despising liberals are starting to grumble that they’re bored with the same-old, same-old obsessive attacks night after night after night.

It was heartening to see that Dana Carvey wasn’t the only celebrity who expressed admiration and respect for former President George H.W. Bush. Even some of the more strident liberals in Hollywood, New York and DC showed the kind of decency that’s sadly become rare these days and put aside partisanship in the wake of Bush’s passing to praise him as a kind, decent and patriotic American and a heroic military veteran.

As usual, though, the professional provocateurs on the liberal cable news channels failed to get the memo telling them to act like mature adults for at least 24 hours. Many shamefully exploited Bush’s passing as yet another opportunity to attack President Trump, praising Bush primarily so they could then denigrate Trump in comparison. If their big issue with Trump is that they think he’s rude, crass or incapable of controlling his worst impulses, then allow me to direct them to the nearest mirror.

I noticed this immediately, but I didn’t want to comment on it right away because I still cling to the archaic tradition that life, death and human compassion are more important than partisan political squabbles, and that politics should be put aside when someone has died and the grieving family is still processing the news.

But now that a couple of days have passed, I will at least allow myself to say how disgusting it was to see so many news outlets try to use Bush’s death as a weapon to bash Trump. Yes, it’s true that their styles are very different. But some of us lived through the first Bush Administration and aren’t suffering from amnesia. We remember only too well how those same media outlets mocked and denigrated Bush for the same qualities they now celebrate. They now praise his courage, leadership and willingness to compromise in agreeing with Democrats to raise taxes to lower the deficit, but they don’t mention how those same Democrats never delivered on their promise to cut spending and gleefully slammed Bush for breaking his “no new taxes” promise. They lament how he showed such class and respect for the Presidency, unlike the current lout who has lowered the dignity of the Oval Office. They don’t mention how hard they worked to insure that Bush would be replaced in 1992 with Bill Clinton.

President Bush earned all the praise that the liberal media outlets are giving him. Sadly, for some of them, their praise is accompanied by hypocrisy that has more layers than a debutante’s wedding cake.

Then again, as Ed Driscoll at PJ Media reminds us, to the liberal media, every Republican President or Presidential nominee is always a stupid, sexist, racist warmonger and “literally, the worst ever” until his death, whereupon they praise him as a great statesman to create an unfavorable comparison for the current Republican standard bearer, who is a stupid, sexist, racist warmonger and “literally, the worst ever.”

Driscoll takes us on a trip down Memory Lane, showing how this same trope has been repeated, all the way back to Dwight Eisenhower. I hope I'm still around in 20 years or so, to see them have to force themselves to tell us that whoever the current GOP President may be, he's "literally, the worst ever," and certainly no statesman, like President Trump was.
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Mike Huckabee was former governor of Arkansas and a signatory to the Right on Crime Statement of Principles. He is a popular commentator and entertainer. You can reach Governor Huckabee through MikeHuckabee.com

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