It wasn’t only those kids, it was kids all over the country and everyone else in the country.
I agree the president’s reaction is open to a good healthy discussion. The mistake is giving a ridiculous leftist trumped up controversey one second of your time.
Bush made a decision, the idea he was too dumb to know what to do is preposterous. All evidence is Bush and Cheney took kick ass charge that day and after.
Among the state level Republican party staff I was part of on 9/11, we saw two politically consequential errors by Bush the first day: (1) the failure to react promptly and appropriately before the kiddie class; and (2) the failure to immediately and directly fly back to Washington, a failure fortunately remedied by the close of the day.
As to 9/11, two more issues remain for history to examine and likely hold against Bush: the nature and depth of official Saudi and Pakistani connections to the 9/11 plot; and the Bush administration's catering to Muslim sentiment after 9/11. Not only is there reason to suspect that the Bush administration knew of and suppressed evidence of substantial involvement in 9/11 by Saudi and Pakistani intelligence agencies, but after 9/11, even Muslim extremists were embraced by the Bush administration as part of a misguided hug-a-Muslim policy.
Meanwhile, due to open borders and lack of effective immigration enforcement -- more Bush security lapses -- we remain vulnerable to major terrorist attacks.