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.@SenatorDole pays respects as President George H.W. Bush Lies in State t.co/FQ1dJwqquv #Bush41
Former presidents, members of Congress, and others have been paying their final respects to President George H.W. Bush. The former president was lying in state in the US Capitol Rotunda for the second day on Tuesday, December 4. The former president’s funeral will take place on Wednesday at the National Csthedral in Washington, DC.
On Tuesday afternoon, former senator Bob Dole came to offer a final salute to President Bush. Senator Dole, 95, approached the president’s coffin slowly in his wheelchair. He had to be helped up so that he could stand up and pay his final respects. Once standing, the former senator offered a salute in tribute to his longtime political rival. You can watch the whole thing here:
.@SenatorDole pays respects as President George H.W. Bush Lies in State t.co/FQ1dJwqquv #Bush41
Dole & Bush Were Once Bitter Rivals, With Dole Once Calling Bush a ‘F***ing Nazi
Dole’s salute to Bush was all the more moving because the two men had a long a bitter rivalry. Nobody knows for certain when the rivalry began, but it first started to get attention back in 1976, when Dole beat out Bush to be President Ford’s running mate. The feud continued when Bush and Dole were competing for the Republican presidential nomination in 1980.
In 1980, after a debate between George Bush and Ronald Reagan, Dole was furious that he had been left out and that Regan had been allowed to dominate the debate. Dole blamed Bush — so he reportedly walked up to Bush and hissed, “I’ll get you someday, you f—— Nazi.”
The rivalry between Dole and Bush probably hit a peak when Bush won the presidential election in 1988 and passed over Dole to pick the Young, relatively inexperienced Dan Quayle as his Vice President.
Dole and Bush came from very different backgrounds: Dole was the son of a grain elevator operator, while Bush was the son of a senator. But by the end of Bush’s life, the two men had managed to put aside their differences and ha drealized that as elder statesmen they had more similarities than differences.