George W. Bush, who once said that he wanted to be a uniter, not a divider, managed to unite the left and the right in seething disdain with his remarks at the Shanksville, PA memorial service for the victims of Flight 93, in which he called for unity and condemned political polarization but also had strong words for domestic violent extremism.
In a way, the speech, widely praised by centrist liberals, was the culmination of W’s political “redemption”—that is, his embrace by bien pensant liberal society—since the start of the Donald Trump presidency. (Remember the appearance on Ellen? The cute friendship with Michelle Obama?)
Leftists hate Bush’s redemption because they think he’s really far worse than Trump: the wars, the illegal detentions and torture, the domestic spying, etc. (They also believe the War on Terror, including the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, led directly to Trump.) It’s not just about Bush as a person; what irks the left is that liberals are still basically fine with the exercise of American power, including intervention abroad, and with the notion that America is a force for good in the world.
Rightists hate Bush for (as they see it) pandering to the libs. Some are also rushing to use the occasion to disavow pre-Trump conservatism as weak and wimpy.
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