Bush, center, with former President George H.W. Bush, left, and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, walk together after participating in the christening ceremony of the aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush in Newport News, Va., October 7, 2006.
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Rumsfeld served two stints as the U.S. Secretary of Defense – from 2001 to 2006 in the junior Bush’s cabinet, and from 1975 to 1977 under President Gerald R. Ford.
The 41st president’s assessment of Mr Rumsfeld, his son’s Secretary of Defence, was even harsher. He stood by George W. Bush’s war in Iraq, saying “he did his best”, while shirking away from comparisons between that conflict and the first Gulf War led by his own administration in the early 1990s, during which Cheney was defense secretary. “I guess you could say I have mellowed”.
Jeb has repeated asserted that he’s his own man and is forging an identity distinct from that of his presidential relatives, but that hasn’t stopped reporters from pressing him on his views of George W Bush’s time in the White House, including the wisdom of the Iraq War.
George H.W. Bush also anxious about the fiery language that he thought his son gave in to.
Donald Rumsfeld reacted to George H.W. Bush blaming him and Dick Cheney for damaging the nation with their hawkish policies by making a gratuitous swipe at the former president’s old age.
Mr Bush claims that the Vice President’s hawkishness had been encouraged by his conservative wife Lynne and daughter Liz.
According to the New York Times, the elder Bush told biographer Jon Meacham that Cheney “had his own empire there and marched to his own drummer”.
“Bush 41 is getting up in [age] years and misjudges Bush 43, who I found made his own decisions”, he said.
“There’s a lack of humility, a lack of seeing what the other guy thinks, ‘ Bush said of Rumsfeld. He’s more kickass and take names”.
Of his son, Mr Bush said he would often worry about the former president’s rhetoric.
But Junior didn’t share his father’s opinion.
Former President George W. Bush issued a statement Thursday, saying: “I am proud to have served with Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld”.
The younger Mr. Bush was also shown a transcript of his fathers remarks. Ever. I’d say in terms of topics of conversation in the Bush family: “family, sports and then well, that’s about it”.
“Saddam’s gone, and with him went a lot of brutality and nastiness and awfulness”, Bush told Meacham. On the campaign trail in New Hampshire on Wednesday, a child asked Jeb Bush what it’s like to be the son of a president.
He said: “I disagree with his characterisation of what was going on”. Meacham will also appear to discuss his book’s findings. “I didn’t get the memo”.
Fox News adds what it wrongly calls a “recent revelation – so recent it’s not included in the Meacham biography”.
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Personally, I still believe in traditional marriage, Mr. Bush wrote. “Perhaps as the days go by it will all change and I will be able to look upon it in a different light”.
