A poster with a picture of former South African President Nelson Mandela in Bloemfontein, South Africa. Photo: Themba Hadebe/Associated Press
Likewise, it is difficult to watch them fade into old age with the same human frailties that befall even the most un-noteworthy among us.
In recent days, we’ve followed with trepidation the health of two noteworthy persons: former President George H.W. Bush and former South African President Nelson Mandela.
Bush is 88, suffers from Parkinson’s Disease and is hospitalized in Houston with a form of bronchitis.
Mandela is 94 and is recovering slowly in Johannesburg from a lung infection and the removal of gallstones.
We wish them both well.
What’s more, we wish that their legacies — Bush as the one-time leader of the free world, Mandela as a cultivator of equality — will not be minimized in the larger discussions of world history.
