Dallas is all atwitter about Thursday’s opening of the $250 million George W. Bush Presidential Center. Five living presidents will be on hand. Luncheons will be had, money will be raised and roads will be closed. Heck, we may even see a terrorist attack, if Channel 8 and its air-quote source are to be believed. Big week!

So big, a Dallas Morning News reporter wrote an entire blog post just pointing to all the George W. Bush coverage from the past few days. And why not? Ol’ George hasn’t been this popular in seven years. History has spoken, and history has found him a good man, because he writes kind notes. So let’s praise him and his new library/think tank/archive/bowling center. What’s the harm?

Let’s revel in the moment with Dubya himself. Let’s backslap and make up nicknames for each other. Let’s celebrate the man’s clarity. Let’s visit the Decision Points Theater, the “interactive exhibit that allows visitors to explore key decisions of the Bush presidency.” Exciting!

Perhaps we’ll get to see him leading a meeting in a Tupac-like hologram, just as former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill remembers him: telling Colin Powell the Arab-Israeli conflict, “Looked real bad down there. I don't see much we can do over there at this point.” That way, Bush noted, we could focus on Iraq and its weapons of mass destruction. West Wing-ish!

Oh, but let’s not get hung up on the past. This is about the now, the present. Creating a torture state, leading the world into war because of a cartoonish worldview that an “axis of evil” exists, creating more terrorists with indiscriminate bombing of anyone brown who moves — rear-window dressing for namby-pamby whiners! (Although, don’t think Bush won’t share a chuckle with Obama over drones. Lucky dog!)

Let’s talk about the center itself. That’s the real focus this week.

Well, I think it is. Going back through that blog post, I see a link to interviews with 43 and Laura Bush and a story about how the former president paints puppies. I see a link to an entire section about the GWBPC. But nowhere do I see a notice about Sunday’s front-page review of the center by the paper’s new architecture critic, Mark Lamster.

Oh! There’s a video on the page that talks about it. And I can find the story online if I search for it.

I wonder why it’s so hard to find. It’s a spectacular review: confident, authoritative, insightful, layered, beautifully written. Here’s a sample:

Hey! Wait a just a minute. I just noticed something. This guy sounds like a Negative Nellie. Like a New Yorker. [Googles furiously.] Well. Of course he is.

Thank goodness we have a true Texan like Bill McKenzie to set that Yankee straight:

Suck it, intellectual and cultural capital of the country! Yeehah!

God, I love it when people misunderestimate George W. Bush. He wanted the center that bears his name to be just Oklahoma. (That’s “OK” to you and me.)

Why? Let me quote the man: "I'm the commander — see, I don't need to explain — I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being president."

Retweets

I highly recommend this follow.

What? Hypocrisy? But he went to Harvard.

The $250 million George W. Bush Presidential Center opens this week.

  

Photo courtesy of George W. Bush Presidential Center

The $250 million George W. Bush Presidential Center opens this week.