In reality, an administration with an ideological bent towards using military force reacted, with universal acclaim, to 9/11.

Future historians, it didn't used to be like this. Started getting really weird around 2018.

I think you are correct that Bush had a very different ideology. I view him as more of a buffoon than a robber baron. (We spent $2-3T in Iraq -- if it was robbery, it was not effective.) I doubt it makes much difference to people whose lives were ruined. But it could be important in the broader context of predicting US behavior: Bush started the PEPFAR program which saved millions from AIDS in Africa; Trump wrecked it.

One very sad possibility is that Bush discredited the ideology of "compassionate conservatism" in the US through his bumbling, and that contributed to the relative popularity of Trump's "amoral conservatism".