elrod- I think the only other thing Bush could have done was duck, and stay ducked behind the podium, or he could have turned around and fled. I can imagine that if he had run away from a couple shoes being thrown at him (in Baghdad, where generally what is thrown is more lethal) he would have been a laughingstock. He would have been labelled a coward for not being able to stand his own ground when a couple shoes were thrown at him, after he sent hundreds of thousands of troops to war, thousands of which have died.

But your comment about the incident possibly becoming a historic bookend to his presidency got me to thinking… The journalist who threw the shoes at him might have meant it to be an insult, but Bush wasn't insulted. The insult with the shoes went right over his head… and he ducked, too! Both literally and figuratively. I think that's the apt metaphor.