OPINION: Mr. Bush's astonishing speech

Sep. 19—Without question the big story to come out of the 20th anniversary remembrance of the 9/11 attacks was George W. Bush.

The former president gave an address that ought to go into the record books as one of the great speeches of the early part of this century.

Certainly, it is the finest speech I have heard or read (I recommend doing both) in a very long time.

It was strong, clear, and eloquent.

And it came from a man seemingly long discredited and forgotten.

Mr. Bush has not sought the limelight since leaving office 12-plus years ago. And nobody much has sought him out.

But, on that somber day, near Shanksville, Pa., Mr. Bush managed to do several things at once: He paid tribute to the brave helpers among us. He spoke some truths. And he articulated a sort of common prayer for the country: Let us be both tougher and kinder. And united on the big stuff.

He said of that day so long past, though it seems like yesterday: "We saw that Americans were vulnerable but not fragile."

He said of the brave civilians who brought down the terrorists in Stonycreek Township and gave their lives to prevent an attack on the Capitol or White House: "The terrorists soon discovered that a random group of Americans is an exceptional group of people."

He said of our countrymen and women in uniform these past 20 years: "You have shielded your fellow citizens from danger. You have defended the beliefs of your country and advanced the rights of the downtrodden. You have been the face of hope and mercy in dark places. ... Nothing that has followed — nothing — can tarnish your honor."

He also spoke honestly.

He acknowledged "the randomness of death" on Sept. 11, 2001. He said: "All that many could feel was unearned suffering. All that many could hear was God's terrible silence."

And, in the most quoted part of the speech, he said: "There is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home. But in their disdain for pluralism, in their disrespect for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit. And it is our continuing duty to confront them."

Wow.

He's talking about the American far right.

And, no, he is not saying that every Trump supporter is like the terrorists who destroyed the Twin Towers and attacked the Pentagon and hijacked Flight 93. He is not suggesting a broad moral equivalency, but asserting, instead, that all destructive radicals drink from the same fountain of intolerance.

They have The Truth, and they do not believe in several or many truths, or in a plurality of people pursuing competing and differing goals and truths — pluralism. Or, the open society.

Thus, Mr. Bush seems to agree with Joe Biden on one very important thing: Some (many?) people in our society no longer believe in a society of mutually accepted rules of debate, and competition for power, because they do not believe in pluralism.

The current President calls this a crisis of democracy. The open society, the liberal society in the broad historical sense, is in peril. The open society is a place where, among other things, facts can be established, science is respected, election results are honored. All this and more is no longer universally agreed upon or assured.

Ours is really, at bottom, a human crisis — a crisis of lack of mutual acceptance and respect. And it has been brewing for a long time. Some would argue since the Enlightenment. But surely it has been brewing since the 1960s.

And the assault on tolerance comes from the left and the right, though the right is currently worse. Burning police cars and police stations is dangerous and ignorant nihilism. Storming the Capitol, with murderous appetite, and for some perhaps intent, is an attack on the republic.

Mr. Bush is right: Yes, we must confront the war on pluralism and respect.

We are not a Christian, or a Catholic, or a born-again, or an agnostic, or a pro-life, or a pro-choice nation. We are many peoples from many races and places and of many faiths and belief systems.

And we must relearn living together, which is, ironically, a religious problem.

We need to honor each other's individual beliefs, character, and privacy and even each other's foibles and follies.

Mr. Bush spoke of how millions of Americans "instinctively grabbed for a neighbor's hand" on 9/11. One does not apply a political litmus test before offering a hand, or taking it.

He spoke of "the mutual aid of strangers in the solidarity of grief and grace."

He said, "I come without explanations or solutions, I can only tell you what I have seen."

Maybe that's the first step — a little humility and some open-heartedness.

Some people — look for them, they are there, and there are more of them than you think — will surprise us with their decency.

And history is constantly surprising us and rewriting and renewing itself.

Read or listen to the Bush speech, and remember that the man who gave it is the man so many of us dismissed and scorned and even reviled, not so long ago, as an oaf, an incompetent, a clueless foil of the war machine.

There is nothing simple about a country, its people, nor its history.

Keith C. Burris is the former editor, vice president and editorial director of Block Newspapers (burriscolumn@gmail.com).