Democratic efforts to resurrect him as a political punching bag.
But just a week later, the former president is back
in the public eye launching a publicity tour for a new book that
includes a prime-time network special and a visit to Oprah’s couch.
The book’s excerpts and the interviews offer new
insight into Bush’s presidency, but show a familiar certainty and
self-assuredness about the decisions he made.
On the decision to launch a war with
“You just don’t have the luxury when you’re president,” Bush told
Among revelations: Bush and Vice President
once the vice president’s chief of staff, who was convicted for his
role in the Valerie Plame leak case. Bush commuted Libby’s sentence,
sparing him from a 30-month prison term, but Cheney wanted a full
pardon that would set aside the verdict and a fine.
“I can’t believe you’re going to leave a soldier on the battlefield,” Cheney told Bush, according to his book.
“I chose to let the jury verdict stand after some
serious deliberation,” Bush told Lauer. He said he and Cheney have
since repaired their relationship.
“We are friends today,” he said. “I was a little concerned at one time.”
There also was some Oval Office drama four years
earlier, when Bush considered replacing Cheney on the ticket in his
re-election bid. The idea of dropping Cheney came from the vice
president himself, Bush wrote, according to excerpts reviewed by
Bush on his tour acknowledged some missteps, citing
the public response to Hurricane Katrina. For instance, a photo showing
Bush surveying the damage from Air Force One was a “huge mistake,” he
says now.
But not all bygones are bygones. Popular singer
care about black people was “one of the most disgusting moments in my
presidency,” he said.
“My record was strong I felt when it came to race
relations and giving people a chance,” Bush said. “It was a disgusting
moment.”
As he makes the rounds, Bush is offering his thoughts on present-day politics, telling
“It inspires me to know that our democracy still functions,” he said in the interview, set to air Tuesday.
He also said he wishes — probably in vain, he realizes — that his brother, former
would run for president. “He has made it clear he is not running in
2012,” he said. “And when the man says, ‘I’m not running,’ he means it.”
Beyond that, Bush said he’s keeping out of politics
— even when it comes to talking about his predecessor, or about another
potential
“I am not a political pundit. I’m really not,” he tells
In the book and interviews, Bush dwells on his heavy
drinking earlier in life, calling it “a love” that interfered with his
family life. Bush quit drinking at the age of 40, about 10 years after
receiving a drunken driving ticket that first became public weeks
before the 2000 presidential election.
Once, he said, he was drunk at his parents’ dinner
table, with his family and wife. “And I’m sitting next to a beautiful
woman, a friend of Mother and Dad’s,” he recalled. “And I said to her
out loud, ‘What is sex like after 50?'”
The episode showed he was a “wiseass,” Bush told
Lauer. Then, on his own 50th birthday, the same woman wrote to Bush
when he was governor of
As Bush’s publicity tour rolls on, he also is set to break ground on his new presidential library in
———
(c) 2010, Tribune Co.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
