Former president quiet on incumbent
The graceful silence of George W Bush needs to be saluted, writes Cass Sunstein.
IN THE domain of foreign affairs, 2014 has brought heated national debates on an impressive range of subjects: Russia, Ukraine, Iran, Syria, Ebola, immigration policy and, most recently, torture, North Korea and Cuba.
One of the more remarkable features of all these discussions has been the consistent grace of former president George W Bush.
This month, Bush offered a rare comment on a public debate.
Responding to the Senate’s release of the CIA torture report, he said: ‘‘We’re fortunate to have men and women who work hard at the CIA serving on our behalf. These are patriots and whatever the report says, if it diminishes their contributions to our country, it is way off base.’’
Note that Bush paid tribute to the employees of the CIA – and pointedly declined to take a shot at the Barack Obama administration.
No-one doubts that, on some important questions, Bush is in profound disagreement with his successor. Nonetheless, he has maintained silence.
In March, he said: ‘‘I don’t think it’s good for the country to have a former president undermine a current president; I think it’s bad for the presidency for that matter.’’
The substance of his views is hardly absent from public debate today. He’s aware that whenever a former president speaks out against the current one, the criticism gets amplified beyond its merits. Bush doesn’t want to exploit his past role in that way.
‘‘I really don’t long for publicity,’’ he said. ‘‘I’m perfectly content to be out of the limelight.’’
Contrast that statement with the case of Leon Panetta, Obama’s former CIA director and secretary of defense.
In Panetta’s book Worthy Fights, he discloses internal debates that officials expected to remain private and complains that the White House was ‘‘so eager to rid itself of Iraq it was willing to withdraw rather than lock in arrangements that would preserve our influence and interests’’.
In an interview promoting his book, he said of Obama: ‘‘These last two years, I think he kind of lost his way.’’
Similarly, in his book, Duty, Robert Gates, secretary of defense under Bush and Obama, writes that, in 2010, he concluded, with respect to Afghanistan, Obama ‘‘doesn’t believe in his own strategy and doesn’t consider the war to be his. For him, it’s all about getting out’’.
It should go without saying that if Panetta and Gates had not had the privilege of working in the Obama administration, few would pay attention to their books.
The contrast with Bush could not be greater: Panetta and Gates have exploited their own roles.
Unlike a former president, moreover, former cabinet members owe a duty of loyalty to a sitting president, not least because they have been able to participate in internal discussions where officials generally deserve to be able to speak on the understanding that what they say will not appear in a book – certainly not while the president remains in office.
Sure, if a former official was exposed to genuine wrongdoing he or she may have a duty to speak out. But neither Panetta nor Gates points to such wrongdoing.
Grace is an underrated virtue; gracelessness is an insufficiently acknowledged vice.
For continued silence about his successor, a salute to George W Bush. When he leaves office, may Obama follow the example.