Doyle McManus: George H.W. Bush and the last gasp of moderation
George H.W. Bush, who lived a long life of public service, embodied a lost virtue in American politics: the idea of restraint. Bush was a man of modest goals whose often-ridiculed lodestar was prudence, the determination not to make things worse.
Moderation was part of his appeal, and it helped the former congressman, diplomat, CIA director and Reagan vice president to win the presidential election of 1988. But it was also clearly one of his flaws, and in 1992, it pushed him toward defeat.
The lesson to most of his successors, including his own
