Opinion
Bush has retirement on his mind
By: Jeff Dufour
Editor at Large/Columnist, "Yeas & Nays"
01/05/09 12:05 AM EST
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By now, we’re all familiar with Bush’s Dec. 19 crack at the National Portrait Gallery (“I suspected there would be a good-size crowd once the word got out about my hanging”), but President Bush has been talking about the end of days for a while now.
While speaking at the U.S. Army War College (which used to be across from the White House), Bush quipped: “I was interested to learn that the school was originally located across the street from the White House. Apparently after a few years on Pennsylvania Avenue, it was time to pack up your bags. Laura and I know the feeling.”
Indeed, Bush has started to make retirement comments a regular part of his stump speech. He said he’s “headed for retirement” at the APEC Summit in Lima, Peru. He told Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper he too hopes to see him before his “forced retirement.”
He told President Antonio Saca of El Salvador, “You may have heard that I’m about to retire.”
When honoring a man with the President’s Citizens Medal for training public servants to replace retiring librarians, he said, “I know of such person preparing to retire.”
At the American Enterprise Institute, Bush said, “I thought I’d share some thoughts about the presidency — you could call it ‘reflections by a guy who’s headed out of town.’ ”
A looming retirement already has Bush thinking about Christmas in 2009. At the National Tree Lighting Ceremony, Bush told Santa he would return the favor of him traveling all the way down from the North Pole by making a visit up with Laura because they would “have plenty of time next year.” He took the played-out “free time” joke one step further by asking Santa for a favor. “The problem is, we’re going to be short an airplane. Have you got an extra sleigh?”
