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.
You can be among all the state level GOP leaders you want, the country was under attack and Washington DC specifically so, and the secret service made the correct decision (IMHO) to take the president elsewhere.
Once again people fall for an inappropriate reaction by the left wing democrat phonies. All GOPers should have been busy smashing any such “political” criticism in the democrats’ faces. But republicans are feckless.
That is the GOP’s “political error”.
We don’t use teleporters on planet earth yet, landing the President at a city under attack and then using a helicopter to transport him across that city in combative air space, to get him to his known address, seems pretty stupid to me when we think he is being targeted in a massive national commando mission.
Suffice it to say that the vast majority of sane Americans will find not fault with his reaction that day. Most of us really don't require the calm ministrations of our Supreme Leader to help us through difficult times. I'm not surprised that idiot leftists always seek an authoritative father figure to help make sense of things.
Obviously this is something you feel pretty strongly about.