America begins its long goodbye to 41st president George Bush Sr
● George HW Bush’s body has gone on display after state funeral
began saying goodbye to former president George HW Bush yesterday after his body arrived in Washington, DC for public viewing in the Capitol Rotunda.
The public viewing kicked off four days of events including a state funeral at Washington’s National Cathedral tomorrow and a private service at Mr Bush’s long-time church in Houston on Thursday.
Tributes from leaders around the world have been pouring in since his death on Friday night.
Former secretary of state Colin Powell called him “a perfect American” for how “he served the country in so many capacities”.
“He never forgot who he was ,” Mr Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during Mr Bush’s presidency, told ABC’S This Week on Sunday. “He never let it all go to his head. He was a man of great humility.”
Mr Bush, who died at his Houston home at age 94, will be buried on Thursday on the grounds of his presidential library at Texas A&M University.
President Donald Trump, who ordered federal offices closed for a national day of mourning tomorrow is to attend with First Lady Melania Trump and other highranking officials.
On Sunday, Mr Bush’s spokesman posted a photo of the late president’s service dog lying in front of a flag-draped casket.
Jim Mcgrath posted the picture of the yellow Labrador retriever named Sully on Twitter with the caption, “Mission complete. #Remembering41.”
Mr Bush received Sully in June from America’s Vetdogs non-profit organisation. The president had a form of Parkinson’s disease, and Sully could open doors, pick up items and summon help.
James Baker, Mr Bush’s former chief of staff and secamericans
retary of state, called his boss’s tenure in office “a consequential presidency” because of his foreign policy achievements.
“Yes, he’s a one-term president but he is going to be and was a very consequential oneterm president. And I would argue far and away the best one-term president we’ve ever had,” Mr Baker said.
Mr Bush’s crowning achievement as president was assembling the international military coalition that liberated the tiny, oil-rich nation of Kuwait from invading Iraq in
1991 in a war that lasted just 100 hours.
He also presided over the end of the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union.
A humble hero of the Second World War, Mr Bush was just 20 when he survived being shot down during a bombing run over Japan. Shortly before leaving the service, he married his 19-year-old sweetheart, Barbara Pierce, in a union that lasted until her death earlier this year.
Mr Bush turned his attention to politics in the 1960s, being elected to his first of two terms in Congress in 1967. He would go on to serve as ambassador to the United Nations and China and head of the CIA before being elected to two terms as Ronald Reagan’s vicepresident.
Soon after he reached the zenith of his political popularity following the liberation of Kuwait, the US economy began to sour and voters began to believe that Mr Bush, never a great orator, was out of touch with ordinary people. He lost his bid for re-election to then-arkansas governor Bill Clinton, who would later become a close friend.
It was not only former political rivals Mr Bush found easy to befriend. Mr Molina, whose family owns Molina’s Cantina, one of Bush’s favourite Texmex restaurants in Houston, said he remembers Mr Bush’s kindness to his staff. “No matter which party you’re affiliated with, everybody seemed to say the same things about President Bush,” Mr Molina said. “He was a down-toearth person, approachable, and just a good man.”