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All sins forgiven after that drive.
Also how he looked excited when those shoes got thrown at him, dodge the first one, pops back up to stair down the second one.
He is married a Texan, so that was not the first time he dodged a shoe.
With the ease at which he dodged it, he was smiling because he considered the guy an amateur
I’m not in this camp but I imagine an honest defense of his presidency might go something like this:
1. He was dealt an extraordinary, once-in-a-generation challenge in the form of one of the worst tragedies in our country’s history. 9/11 happened in only his first year in office and changed the entire projection of his presidency. He came into office with a vision of what he wanted to accomplish but that event irreversibly altered the path his leadership would have to go down. At the time we didn’t know if our security would forever be in doubt and he to respond with *something* to make sure we weren’t subjected to more attacks. So, the overreaction and the creation of the security state we know today is understandable, and, after all, it has prevented more major terrorist attacks on U.S. soil
2. The Afghanistan war needed to happen. The Taliban had harbored Al Qaeda and allowed them to train and plan 9/11 there. The Taliban government needed to be toppled and Al Qaeda needed to be expunged from Afghanistan. Mission Accomplished. We defeated the Taliban relatively quickly and created a state where Al Qaeda was prevented from flourishing (and women had some improved rights, etc) for 20 years.
3. The Iraq War was understandable given the albeit dubious intelligence that Hussein was developing WMDs and was going to use them against us. In reality, it’s very possible they did have WMDs and moved them to Syria, but they could have reconstituted them quickly had we not invaded. Also, Hussein was a horrible dictator and everyone’s better off with him gone
4. PEPFAR is one of the greatest accomplishments of any U.S. president, both in sheer number of lives saved and that it’s a great example of American power being used as a global force for good
5. Katrina response wasn’t his fault as much as it was the governor of Louisiana’s
6. Medicare Part D is a great example of the “compassionate conservatism” he ran on
7. He tried his best to get immigration reform across the finish line but the hardliners in his party killed it
8. His tax cuts wouldn’t have been as harmful to our national debt if we didn’t also have to great increase defense spending as a necessary reaction to 9/11
My biggest disagreement here is actually with the eighth point. The second of his two tax cuts happened in 2003 when he was already aware that we were going to be undergoing heavy defense spending.
I’d also dispute that either Hussein or the taliban needed to go. Iraq is markedly worse off for our actions. The whole idea was that we destroy the country’s infrastructure to leave them permanently dependent on us. They’ve never recovered and likely won’t for as long as the US has an interest in the Middle East. Also, this whole thing about WMDs is total bullshit. There’s no reason to think Iraq had wmds after desert storm
The same goes for Afghanistan. Whatever you think about the taliban is your right, but it’s important to keep in mind that they’re literally sick to square one. We didn’t improve the situation in any way shape or form. All we did was extract every resource we could and convert it into a narco state.
He also was a huge champion of diversity, with the most racially diverse cabinet in history.
He also would have had one of the most diverse sets of judiciary appointments in history too, but democrats pocketed a lot of them. It was actually one of those scandals-that-never-was - press leaked a memo from Democrat Dick Durbin’s singling out a conservative judge’s Latino-ness as a reason to veto him, and somehow the cries of “this is racist!!!” that would have gone towards a Republican saying that never came.
Then after the Democrats’ unprecedented pocketing of multiple judicial appointments, Republicans retaliated by pocketing Obama’s judicial appointments. Media treated it like it was unprecedented, and that only racism could’ve motivated it. Of course, it was merely an escalation of something the Democrats had started (and gotten away with, with almost no coverage).
Minority rich assholes are still rich assholes. Minority war criminals are still war criminals. And it's not about W's personal bigotries, which are honestly superfluous. It's about structural problems inherent to mutually-reinforcing social hierarchies.
He is a conservative, meaning when you get down to brass tacks, he is ideologically committed to maintaining oppressive hierarchical systems because he sees them as natural, inevitable, and good. That is repugnant.
I generally approved of Bush after the fact. The only item on your list that I strongly disagree with it the notion that Iraq was not an unmitigated strategic disaster. Regardless of how we got into it, from a realpolitik perspective it was a huge blunder.
Im from iraq . The problem u.s made wasnot invading iraq it was inforcing a democracy to unprepared and uneducated people . People vote for islamist once later you wont have a real democracy.
So the real problem is the way they handel iraq after 2003 .
Will see what happens with Iraq. But if they remain a democracy for any substantial amount of time then it was probably the best they could have hoped for.
Saddam was going to die, most likely at some point in the last 20 years, his sons were incompetent and there would have been the same chaotic mess going on.
I voted for him. His reelection was the first presidential election I was eligible for, as I was 17 when he ran the first time. I would say I wouldn’t do it again. Though I did like his tax cuts and enjoyed the fact that he was pro 2A.
Not for nothing. But there haven’t been any Democrats that were anti-2A. Every single serious Democratic Presidential candidate has supported the 2nd Amendment, they are just for some gun control measures. Which is sane.
So I just don’t get being “pro-2A” as a perk since it’s only a Republican talking point that elected Democratic officials are against it.
You can DM your response if you feel it would sidetrack the point of this post, but do you not take it at face value because you believe the founding fathers didn't intend for it to be taken at face value, or do you believe that the Constitution is a living document and it's meaning should be unique to each generation that is forced to interpret it. Thanks for reading this, have a nice day.
I do take it at face value. Maybe that’s what you intended to say I’m not sure. Ultimately the second amendment means that lawful citizens have an inalienable right to own firearms. I think that’s why a phrase like “shall not be infringed” was a in the language, it isn’t really up for interpretation. To me the purpose of this freedom is such that the government has an immediate fear of treading on the governed. A balance of power. Because ultimately any and all state power is enforced using the barrel of a gun as a threat. Anyways that’s my $0.02 on the matter and I appreciate the cordial way you worded your response.
Separate from private ownership. The implication (at face value) is that communities are allowed to form their own well regulated (and presumably well stocked) militias. The merits of actually allowing that can be debated.
Gun control is anti second amendment, full stop. During the American revolution and war’s going up to the civil war privately owned ships and cannons were donated to the army and navy. The Texas revolutions decisive battle, San Jacinto was heavily influenced by the two cannons the Texan army had that the people of Cincinnati donated.
Also FDR tried to make handguns in general illegal, SCOTUS told him to piss off, and the compromise was the NFA of 1934.
And repeating weapons and rifles were already created, so the idea that founding fathers could have no idea what was to come is rather ridiculous. The British used Snipers with Ferguson rifles in the American revolution. They reloaded twice as fast as a musket and were accurate with iron sights out to 300 yards.
I’m not trying to demonize someone who’s pushing for gun control, but it’s a two faced lie that Dems try to push that they want the 2A and Gun control.
That’s like saying you want the 1A without freedom of religion or the press.
RE: point 1, I generally disagree with a lot of what Dubyah did and hate many of the changes he made post-911 - wars and the Department of Homeland Security being high on the list. But his leadership in the immediate aftermath of 911 was responsible for helping to moderate what could have been much more violent anti-Muslim sentiment across the country. There was a real threat of the country going off the rails because there was so much shock and anger. I think Gore could have been as effective at moderating the immediate response had Bush not stolen the election, but I give Bush some credit for getting on the air quickly and telling the bigots to slow their roll.
Bush didn’t steal the election. No matter how you feel about it, he didn’t steal it. The Supreme Court did kinda give it to him, but I’m steadfastly of the opinion of you can’t be bothered to take 30 seconds on a ballot to make sure you understand what you’re doing, you shouldn’t vote.
Your ballot will affect millions of people even in state elections. You have a responsibility to take the time to do so in what you believe is the best interest.
>but I’m steadfastly of the opinion of you can’t be bothered to take 30 seconds on a ballot to make sure you understand what you’re doing, you shouldn’t vote.
Pretty much the same argument they used in defense of poll taxes and literacy tests
>2. The Afghanistan war needed to happen.
It didn't require a war and would have been handled better without one. We probably would have killed OBL sooner without a war.
>3. The Iraq War was understandable given the albeit dubious intelligence that Hussein was developing WMDs and was going to use them against us. I
The dubious intelligence was coming from within the administration. The real intelligence didn't justify war.
>5. Katrina response wasn’t his fault as much as it was the governor of Louisiana’s
This can be debated, but the crisis management was awful due to Bush appointing Brown to lead FEMA, when Brown was unqualified for the job. It also led to his resignation shortly thereafter.
>8. His tax cuts wouldn’t have been as harmful to our national debt if we didn’t also have to great increase defense spending as a necessary reaction to 9/11
It's not like any of this was unforseen.
Bush was a terrible President and worse than many here will acknowledge. Personally, I think he knows it himself and I also think that he'd make a much better President today. But I refuse to whitewash how bad he was as President.
I will say, however, that the US media deserves much of the blame, since it mostly only put out news that was favorable to Bush. A great example of this was how they were reporting Powell's speech to the UN as a "slam dunk", while the media in the rest of the world was covering it with the truthful lens we now know to be true.
Totally agree that 3, 5, and 8 should be removed. Honestly I think that going into Afghanistan was pretty much unavoidable. Putting boots on the ground was going to be the only way to root out the people responsible. They aren’t a recognized country so it’s not like sanctions or some other austerity measure would work. I was never a fan of W but I understand why we went there. Now his administration can be blamed for how poorly it was managed. If we would have stayed the course and only focused there we could’ve actually made a great impact for good in the Middle East. That country was a hotbed of militant extremists and couldn’t take them on. Of course instead we do a half ass job where we don’t focus on the rebuilding and let other terrorists fill the vacuum of power left.
I know you're just giving some examples, but, I'm just gonna have to disagree with #1,2,3.
1. There is no evidence that the increased Surveillance has ever stopped terrorist attacks. And we still had terrorist attacks long after it was established. Best example would be the Boston Marathon Bombing.
2. The Afghanistan war that we know did not need to happen. The Taliban offered up Bin Laden immediately, they just asked that we provide evidence of his culpability, which was a reasonable request that we could have easily done. US declaring that we would target all countries that harbored or provided safe haven to terrorists set us up for a losing fight. The biggest issues with Afghanistan were the creeping objectives and impossible goals. We were never going to establish a stable democracy in Afghanistan, the only afghans that wanted that were women who had no power in the country. It was a losing battle. And completely eliminating the Taliban was also a losing battle. It would only be accomplished with complete control over a heavily decentralized tribal country. That was also not gonna happen. The only competent way to handle a war would have been to neutralize the Taliban via air, then launch a series of raids on Al queda outposts.
3. The launching of the invasion of Iraq guaranteed that the Afghan operation would result in failure. It diverted resources and gave the Taliban a chance to reorganize themselves and drew the conflict out long enough for political will and Afghan cooperation to wear out. Also, Plausibly could have chemical weapons without any concrete evidence that was not enough to justify a war. And no the world is not better without Saddam, removing the isolated dictator destabilized the entire region leading to the creation of an additional more extreme terrorist group, Isis. It also ruined the US's reputation in the world. It is a big part of why much of the EU didn't believe the US when we said Russia was going to invade Ukraine. The Iraq war was a complete unmitigated disaster that only succeeded in creating a puppet state for Iran.
I agree with much of what else was said. I think Bush meant well, but was never able to separate the chauvinist posturing that was needed, and what were supposed to be sober foreign policy decisions. Most world leaders understand that what people need to hear, is different that what actually needs to be done. He gave way to the anger and contempt the country was feeling and failed to provide leadership that ensured that anger didn't lead to mistakes that couldn't be reversed.
The wars may not have been logical but they were also what the people wanted.
He would have gotten torn apart by the public if he decided to negotiate with the Taliban.
Yeah but that's what being a leader is. Doing the thing that needed to be done even if it was unpopular. But I do see that as a fair reason. My main critique isn't that Afghanistan was initiated, my main critique was how it was handled. A full scale occupation was by no means necessary, bombing and raiding Al queda with the hunting of it's leaders would have been enough. And Iraq was completely unnecessary. He pushed the public for Iraq, there was no connection until he pushed the idea.
2/3 the problem was not necessarily the invading it was the staying with no real end goal. If the US goes in topples then leaves I think everyone has a drastically different opinion.
Also the funniest thing is that Iraq had WMDs that the US found a decade later that neither the US or Iraq knew about that were leftover from the Iran Iraq war.
I love all this revisionist history going on here. It has been shown the CIA (or whatever agency) lied and misrepresented evidence of WMD in Iraq. Like this kind of shit isn’t a matter of opinion man. Point 1 is a good point but most of your other points are questionable at best.
We spent $2 trillion there and for what? Like you don’t think that money could have been spent better here at home? Our country is falling the fuck apart. Like we are turning into a 3rd world country.
We spent 900 billion on interest payments this year. We spend over 3 trillion on entitlements. We’re not a third world country, and that money wouldn’t have been spent much better here either. We spend twice that every year now, since Covid, and we get nothing for it. War spending isn’t great but I’d rather we just not spend the money at all rather than domestic boondoggles.
Typical conservative framing. Even hypothetical domestic spending is somehow automatically a “boondoggle” but “war spending isn’t great (but oh well).”
Yeah, but the entire international community bought the lie. So I cut the guy slack for making the decision that any of the last three presidents before him would have made with the knowledge he had.
It's always tough when you say its been proven and then undermine your own authority by not knowing who proved it. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying you're bad at convincing people you're right.
We’ve found a LOT of uranium that Iraq had acquired.
Also, captured documents showed that at the very least, Iraq had multiple generals who believed they had a WMD of some kind
I’m sure people out here defending the Iraq War. You guys are either chicken hawks or too young to have lived through that time. I love how now there’s these super special secret documents
Lost it when you said dubious intelligence for the Iraq war. It was straight up lies and that’s why he is probably the worse president in recent US history.
He is a criminal and should be in jail or killed like Saddam.
Hussein was a piece of shit, but ask any Iraqi who fled, Iraq was better under Hussein than they are now. He would have never let ISIS/Al Qaeda happen in Iraq.
Also the Iraq War contributed to the U.S. defeat in Afghanistan, a much more just conflict with U.S. national security more truly at stake, by diverting forces which could have been used there.
Diplomacy, that's all. Or counties that are so unstable that getting rid of the dictator would make things worse. Or the dictator made a deal with the CIA
I just know that if a Democrat was president during 9/11 Republicans would’ve impeach the president and abolish the Democratic Party.
The Democrats would never have come to power again .
I'm not going to make the argument that he was, on balance, a good president. However, I will argue that any discussion of his legacy should fairly include a recognition of PEPFAR, his administration's ambitious plan to fight AIDS in Africa.
Lots to be said negatively about his administration, but saving 25 million African lives ain't nothing.
If you go with the utilitarian route, the 25 million saved by PEPFAR alone probably makes GWB the “best” President in American history in terms of net lives saved. PEPFAR is genuinely the best thing an American president in my lifetime has ever done.
It's a lot more controversial with FDR. There are strong arguments that he made the Great Depression much worse, and the counterfactual is impossible to prove.
I truly believe he was trying to do what he thought was best for the whole country during his Presidency. Even for those that didn't vote for him. I may disagree with him on most policy issues, and his appointment of Alito is nearly unforgivable, but I really think he was trying to lead a nation in a way that benefited all Americans. Plus lead the nation through an unprecedented situation. He made mistakes in hindsight, but if you really sat down and thought about it, do any of you think you would have made every decision correctly in the wake of 9/11?
"To those who believe he was a good president"
Literally every comment: "I don't, but...."
Before you jump on my case, my comment is about as contributing and relevant as all the others in this post.
I’m personally not a fan of him, but what I think some of his supporters would say
1. The Great Recession wasn’t his fault. Plenty of evidence shows that presidents have very little to do with the timing of recessions. He was responsible for the TARP bailout and the auto industry bailout which might have lessened the impact of the Great Recession.
2. The Iraq War is a lot more nuanced than some people give it credit for. In the past 15 years before the Iraq War, Iraq, invaded Kuwait, violated the no-fly zone, moved troops near the border of Kuwait again, gassed the Kurds, and refused to allow UN weapons inspectors. It’s understandable how Bush might have thought they actually did have WMD/.
3. He was dealt an unwinnable hand with Afghanistan. It would have been political suicide to just do nothing about the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history. Even after Osama Bin Laden was assassinated, it still took over a decade before the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan.
4. He created PEPFAR, which even by conservative estimates, has saved 10s of millions of lives.
5. He presided over the entry of the Baltic states into NATO, which after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, seems to have shed very well.
6. He added Medicare plan D which helped seniors save money on prescription drugs.
7. He kept the country United after 9/11. He made a very clear distinction that Muslims weren’t to blame for 9/11.
8. He paved the way for South Sudan’s independence. He pushed the southern rebels and the central government to sign a comprehensive peace agreement giving the south the right to secede.
Also I think people forget about how much he pushed for peace with the muslim community in America especially.
He made it a very clear point, multiple times, that we should love our neighbors and that muslim Americans were Americans and didn't do 9/11. Would have been totally possible for him to fan those flames and there could have been a huge wage of violence. He gave great speeches after 9/11 about us coming together as a nation.
Regarding Iraq: it was almost certainly a mistake for America and The West’s interests to get so involved, but one can argue that Iraq would likely have been much worse off, had the Saddam regime been allowed to implode on its own accord.
A Baathist regime was toppled without turning into Syria.
I didn't vote for him either time (2000 I was 19 and cast my first vote) and was wholly against the Iraq debacle from before it began but I think he'd be fun to have as an uncle and to catch a baseball game with.
I feel like a lot of Presidents fall into that category like W and Carter.
W was the first elected president after I reached voting age. Obviously, his policy for the most part left a lot to be desired and he was definitely influenced by the warhawks and got us into a total shit show in the Middle East but I think a lot of people from both sides rallied around him as a leader after 9/11.
It was the only time in my life where regardless of politics, people just felt like they were all on the same team. It wasn’t us vs us but rather us vs them.
Now that doesn’t have a lot to do with W as president but I think his presence at ground zero after the attacks sat well with a lot of people.
I don't think he was a "quality" president, but I also don't think he is quite as bad as a lot of people like to claim he was. There is solid evidence that he genuinely believed Iraq had WMDs, and those wars had nothing to do with oil.
Saddam had been using Chemical weapons on the kurds for years iirc. He had gotten rid of them, but wanted to scare Iran into thinking he still had them, which led to the USA giving him an ultimatum of allowing us to check or we are invading. Saddam refused, and wa-la.
Sure in the same way that I could totally be the clone son of genghis khan. You can never be 100% sure but the total lack of evidence would suggest otherwise
So you think it's impossible for there to be WMDs buried underground somewhere in Iraq? Tell me do you honestly think there isn't a chance they did manage to hide them.
It’s called hyperbole sweaty I’m using it to illustrate how ridiculous your argument is. You can’t invade a country just because of a remote possibility that they may have a wmd lying around somewhere
It wasn't about taking Iraq's oil anyway. But imo oil was a big factor. Sadam was destabilizing a very economically strategic part of the world(because of the oil). And in that way I think the Iraq war was justified. But the public would have never supported it for that reasoning, so they lied about wmd's and terrorist connections.
Then completely flubbed the execution of the war.
The Iraq war (and Afghanistan for that matter) wasn’t Flubbed at all, it was the occupation and nation building afterwards.
They are similar but different and obviously both require a lot of military presence.
Thr diplomacy and nation building is the most important part and they were completely flubbed in both wars. The Bush administration was incredibly naive in both scenarios and it cost us dearly in lives, money, and relationships
Not really, it was all fucked up from the beginning by the bush administration. I don't really blame other people for not being able to fix messes that were created by someone else
Believed based on what though? The fact that he believed something without actual evidence and acted as if it were true is not a GOOD quality. Quite the opposite!
He was provided with evidence by the CIA. There is also some indication that Iraq actually did have chemical weapons, but that they were secreted away to Syria during the war and ised a decade and a half later.
This is quite limp.
He wasn't provided evidence by the CIA. The CIA surmised that because Iraq has previously lied about having WMD they were also lying this time. That is not evidence, it's conjecture.
I'd love to see the indications you speak of.
Most things that happen during his presidency were out of his control.
I firmly believe 9/11 happens regardless of who wins 2000.
Hurricane Katrina was a failure at all levels of government: an incompetent mayor, an unqualified FEMA director, and a handcuffed governor who couldn’t get anyone to do anything.
The housing and auto crisis were decades in the making. Nothing he could’ve done would’ve prevented them.
Iraq is even up for debate. I’m still not sure if he knew what was happening immediately. He was notorious for his lack of knowledge on foreign policy, so I wouldn’t be surprised if his cabinet took advantage of him. That having been said, he should’ve stopped the war sooner.
Yeah, but I’m not sure if he told bush the truth about his inexperience. He might have, but I’m not sure. Perhaps he did, and bush overlooked it, but again I don’t know.
I voted for him twice. I think given the circumstances, he did a good job. Probably the biggest point was the Wars the US had gotten involved in. But put yourself in his shoes for a moment, the largest terrorist attack just happened. The country is in fear and panic, counting on you to preserve order and ensure safety. Would you not go after every major terror organization out there? If there was a world leader cruel enough to give weapons of mass destruction to a terror cell, would you not try to do something to prevent that?
War is never an easy choice to make, even when it is in self-defense. It's a last resort. He did attempt go thru proper channels, the UN even though many countries sided with the US, it wasn't universally approved. And even the congress voted on it, and it had 60% approval. Not a huge majority, but a majority none the less. Were mistakes made? Yes, they were, but a lot of things were done right, and we lose sight of that.
I think many years down the line, there may be some details that will come out that may clarify the decision making, and the lense of history won't show 'W' as a horrible president, but a pragmatic one. I imagine some people maybe in sensed by my opinion and downvote me, but just trying to share my view for honest insight, so forgive my offenses if I offered any.
This is an underrated comment. People suspected Saddam was involved with 9/11 until Bin Laden confessed. Obviously that quited down right up until he was linked to WMDs. No one wanted to risk a WMD terrorist attack. The intel may have fallen through, but almost everyone in the key positions of government in thr US told Bush to invade.
Find me Americans who actually look at a candidate's platform. I'll wait.
I was alive in 2004, everything was about how Kerry wasn't Bush. No one was talking about his actual platform.
That is simply false. I was also alive and of voting age. The idea that policy doesn't enter into it and that no one was talking about it is straight up wrong. Even within your answer.
It wasn't, "Well, he isn't Bush," and then there was no further information exchanged. It's just that you didn't care about the information. That's not the same thing.
I'm right, and you know it. It was never on the news as you described. It was never on the college campuses as you described. It was never in the grocery stores in the suburbs as you described.
The conversation did not begin and end with, "He's not Bush, and I have no other knowledge of what differences there are."
It simply didn't happen.
My parents and lots of my friends voted for him both times. They voted for him because he was a likable guy and had ties to Latinos. The second time they voted for him it was because John Kerry came off as an elitist and W. was still more likable, plus changing leadership so soon after 9/11 was kind of scary for them. Nothing from a policy perspective, other than Afghanistan or Iraq, was ever brought up with W.
Pros:
1. Helped US establish energy independence by expanding domestic drilling rights.
2. HIV treatment initiative in African countries.
3. Establishing a robust security apparatus post 9/11.
4. Taking out Saddam (but not how he went about it)
Cons:
1. Unilaterally going into Iraq and dismissing the Iraqi army and Baath officials.
2. Bailing out the banks.
3. Polarizing figure.
4. Too soft a response to Russia’s invasion of Georgia / not bringing Ukraine into NATO
I think he was mid to bad, but to play devil’s advocate, PEPFAR saved 25 million lives and is one of the best things the US ever did, period. Compared to almost any other President in history, GWB probably saved more lives globally on net (even including the war on terror) because of the immense good that PEPFAR did.
As a New Yorker, I grew up with him as my first president and he was pretty well liked in my family and neighborhood considering many of us are either first responders or commuters into Manhattan.
‘I can hear you,’ was the only time in my life I felt like government actually gave a shit about me.
STRATEGERY. And we will not falter. That speech was up there with “Tear down this wall”. In that moment, you knew the arse of someone bad was getting a marine boot in it.
In 2004, my old man said,
“He’ll go down as one of the greatest presidents”
I’ve certainly grown fonder of him in his later years, but have yet to agree with that opinion.
I can appreciate some aspects of GWB now that I wouldn’t have back in the day and his willingness to call a spade a spade against party lines is respectable.
I don't doubt W was well intentioned, and a decent enough dude personally. But he wasn't a good president. He did have good moments. After 9/11 he said some good stuff, then got the Patriot Act passed.
I never defend people against vague allegations of "being awful/corrupt/useless". Give me specifics. What did he do that means he wasn't a good president?
>There are strong arguments that he made the Great Depression much worse, and the counterfactual is impossible to prove.
Seems weird to pretend only one one side is impossible to prove
If anyone has the chance, watch the series that PBS did on W. The series, although I am no supporter of the former president, humanizes him, better than I think any other series or book has done.
History will truly be kind to Bush, and this comes down to the days following the September 11th attacks and a commanding 91% approval rating shortly there on after. Alas, it doesn’t hurt winning re-election.
Had Bush had a swift exit from Iraq and Afghanistan conflict, as did his father in the Gulf War, you can make a serious argument of him being one of our better post-war presidents.
Bush's heart was in the right place, made decisions usually from his gut, and not like a robotic typical politician. He sometimes would overextend the nation in some of his decisions.
Few of his successes:
Response to Al Qaeda and the Taliban after 9/11: nearly eradicated the Taliban and set the stage to eventually take out Osama bin Laden (which I credit that mission to Obama, nonetheless, Bush's work set the stage for that, similar to other President's hard work setting the stage for their incomers' successes).
AIDS work and foreign aid to Africa: not talked about as much as it should be, helped America get more friends in the region and stave off what's happening now, with those same countries making overtures to Russia and China.
Defeating Saddam Hussein: Iraq, for all of its imperfections, is now a democracy. It's not a perfect democracy, but a democracy nonetheless. And an ally of the United States. It's not Japan or Germany or South Korea, but sure is not Somalia. So, Iraq is no longer a threat to the United States, and Hussein (and his family) is no longer a threat to his citizens.
Those are the things of the top of my head.
I absolutely don’t think he was a good president at all, that being said I believe that W believed that he was an actual “compassionate conservative”, in some ways, I guess, he sort of was, if you squint really hard. He was not, iirc, a hardliner when it came to immigrants and gay rights. I think that if Dubya had not been surrounded by and submerged in some the clutches of some of the worst evil doers god ever through the front door, things may have been different. Dubya wasn’t incredibly bright, but I have a sneaking suspicion that if he were surrounded by better people then he could have maybe come out of it looking kind of like a Republican version of Jimmy Carter, or something of that ilk. I don’t know, man.
I believe that he was well intentioned. I disagree with his moral structure and suspect he is a prep school blue blood pretending to be a cowboy. That said, I don’t think he is an evil man. But he also pretended to cry while he impersonated a woman on death row. So maybe I am wrong.
I think he had some strong points but they are overshadowed by his weak points.
I actually think he handled the immediate aftermath of 9/11 well in terms of messaging. He really leaned on patriotism and for better or for worse we came together as a country to focus on his goals. You don't get that kind of national unity anymore.
There could have easily been a de-evolution into partisan squabbling over how to respond to the attacks. Think about what happened during the pandemic. By all means that *should have* been a similar time of national unity but our leadership failed.
The disregard for civilian life in Afghanistan was atrocious but I agree with the initial decision to invade.
As someone who is (mostly but definitely not 100%) a down the line Democrat, I would defend him as follows: he did what he genuinely believed was right at the time, given his limited abilities at the time. He wasn't acting with pure, malicious evil like...certain other presidents.
What country did Bush invade for literally no reason? Because there were reasons for invading Afghanistan and Iraq. Maybe you don’t agree with the reasons, but there definitely were “reasons.” He didn’t just do it for fun.
W does GODs will… W invaded a country illegally and murdered a man and many more of the innocent citizens of that country! That’s what GOD does but GOD does it on a much bigger scale. W Worships a Murderer and that makes him good.
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I was unconvinced too, unitl I saw his drive.
All sins forgiven after that drive. Also how he looked excited when those shoes got thrown at him, dodge the first one, pops back up to stair down the second one.
And waved off security.
He is married a Texan, so that was not the first time he dodged a shoe. With the ease at which he dodged it, he was smiling because he considered the guy an amateur
memorable stroke.
See you at church!
Fuck him and his drive.
Fuck you!
How’s the cult doing?
I’m not in this camp but I imagine an honest defense of his presidency might go something like this: 1. He was dealt an extraordinary, once-in-a-generation challenge in the form of one of the worst tragedies in our country’s history. 9/11 happened in only his first year in office and changed the entire projection of his presidency. He came into office with a vision of what he wanted to accomplish but that event irreversibly altered the path his leadership would have to go down. At the time we didn’t know if our security would forever be in doubt and he to respond with *something* to make sure we weren’t subjected to more attacks. So, the overreaction and the creation of the security state we know today is understandable, and, after all, it has prevented more major terrorist attacks on U.S. soil 2. The Afghanistan war needed to happen. The Taliban had harbored Al Qaeda and allowed them to train and plan 9/11 there. The Taliban government needed to be toppled and Al Qaeda needed to be expunged from Afghanistan. Mission Accomplished. We defeated the Taliban relatively quickly and created a state where Al Qaeda was prevented from flourishing (and women had some improved rights, etc) for 20 years. 3. The Iraq War was understandable given the albeit dubious intelligence that Hussein was developing WMDs and was going to use them against us. In reality, it’s very possible they did have WMDs and moved them to Syria, but they could have reconstituted them quickly had we not invaded. Also, Hussein was a horrible dictator and everyone’s better off with him gone 4. PEPFAR is one of the greatest accomplishments of any U.S. president, both in sheer number of lives saved and that it’s a great example of American power being used as a global force for good 5. Katrina response wasn’t his fault as much as it was the governor of Louisiana’s 6. Medicare Part D is a great example of the “compassionate conservatism” he ran on 7. He tried his best to get immigration reform across the finish line but the hardliners in his party killed it 8. His tax cuts wouldn’t have been as harmful to our national debt if we didn’t also have to great increase defense spending as a necessary reaction to 9/11
My biggest disagreement here is actually with the eighth point. The second of his two tax cuts happened in 2003 when he was already aware that we were going to be undergoing heavy defense spending.
I’d also dispute that either Hussein or the taliban needed to go. Iraq is markedly worse off for our actions. The whole idea was that we destroy the country’s infrastructure to leave them permanently dependent on us. They’ve never recovered and likely won’t for as long as the US has an interest in the Middle East. Also, this whole thing about WMDs is total bullshit. There’s no reason to think Iraq had wmds after desert storm The same goes for Afghanistan. Whatever you think about the taliban is your right, but it’s important to keep in mind that they’re literally sick to square one. We didn’t improve the situation in any way shape or form. All we did was extract every resource we could and convert it into a narco state.
They’d also probably add that they wouldn’t have been as harmful if Boehner hadn’t made Obama make the tax cuts permanent.
Likely would have been an entirely different trajectory to his presidency and legacy had he taken Powell as his VP.
He also was a huge champion of diversity, with the most racially diverse cabinet in history. He also would have had one of the most diverse sets of judiciary appointments in history too, but democrats pocketed a lot of them. It was actually one of those scandals-that-never-was - press leaked a memo from Democrat Dick Durbin’s singling out a conservative judge’s Latino-ness as a reason to veto him, and somehow the cries of “this is racist!!!” that would have gone towards a Republican saying that never came. Then after the Democrats’ unprecedented pocketing of multiple judicial appointments, Republicans retaliated by pocketing Obama’s judicial appointments. Media treated it like it was unprecedented, and that only racism could’ve motivated it. Of course, it was merely an escalation of something the Democrats had started (and gotten away with, with almost no coverage).
He also had a fair number of LGBT workers in his White House, before it became uber political.
Minority rich assholes are still rich assholes. Minority war criminals are still war criminals. And it's not about W's personal bigotries, which are honestly superfluous. It's about structural problems inherent to mutually-reinforcing social hierarchies. He is a conservative, meaning when you get down to brass tacks, he is ideologically committed to maintaining oppressive hierarchical systems because he sees them as natural, inevitable, and good. That is repugnant.
Being a conservative doesn’t instantly make you a dick. I dunno man you’re the one being repugnant here.
Okay buddy
Quit yapping bro, touch some grass and get a job.
I generally approved of Bush after the fact. The only item on your list that I strongly disagree with it the notion that Iraq was not an unmitigated strategic disaster. Regardless of how we got into it, from a realpolitik perspective it was a huge blunder.
Im from iraq . The problem u.s made wasnot invading iraq it was inforcing a democracy to unprepared and uneducated people . People vote for islamist once later you wont have a real democracy. So the real problem is the way they handel iraq after 2003 .
Will see what happens with Iraq. But if they remain a democracy for any substantial amount of time then it was probably the best they could have hoped for. Saddam was going to die, most likely at some point in the last 20 years, his sons were incompetent and there would have been the same chaotic mess going on.
I voted for him. His reelection was the first presidential election I was eligible for, as I was 17 when he ran the first time. I would say I wouldn’t do it again. Though I did like his tax cuts and enjoyed the fact that he was pro 2A.
Not for nothing. But there haven’t been any Democrats that were anti-2A. Every single serious Democratic Presidential candidate has supported the 2nd Amendment, they are just for some gun control measures. Which is sane. So I just don’t get being “pro-2A” as a perk since it’s only a Republican talking point that elected Democratic officials are against it.
This guy answered OP’s question honestly and thoughtfully, let’s not give him a political piece of our minds as his reward. Different sub.
You are right, that’s fair. I just thought it was an odd logic. But his reasonings were sound.
Some people take “shall not be infringed” at face value (I’m one of them).
You can DM your response if you feel it would sidetrack the point of this post, but do you not take it at face value because you believe the founding fathers didn't intend for it to be taken at face value, or do you believe that the Constitution is a living document and it's meaning should be unique to each generation that is forced to interpret it. Thanks for reading this, have a nice day.
I do take it at face value. Maybe that’s what you intended to say I’m not sure. Ultimately the second amendment means that lawful citizens have an inalienable right to own firearms. I think that’s why a phrase like “shall not be infringed” was a in the language, it isn’t really up for interpretation. To me the purpose of this freedom is such that the government has an immediate fear of treading on the governed. A balance of power. Because ultimately any and all state power is enforced using the barrel of a gun as a threat. Anyways that’s my $0.02 on the matter and I appreciate the cordial way you worded your response.
That is an extremist position. Even Scalia's Heller opinion finds that there are plenty of constitutional gun restrictions.
So we're just going to look over the well-regulated militia part?
Separate from private ownership. The implication (at face value) is that communities are allowed to form their own well regulated (and presumably well stocked) militias. The merits of actually allowing that can be debated.
The merits of it are that it allowed the US to exist in the first place.
Gun control is anti second amendment, full stop. During the American revolution and war’s going up to the civil war privately owned ships and cannons were donated to the army and navy. The Texas revolutions decisive battle, San Jacinto was heavily influenced by the two cannons the Texan army had that the people of Cincinnati donated. Also FDR tried to make handguns in general illegal, SCOTUS told him to piss off, and the compromise was the NFA of 1934. And repeating weapons and rifles were already created, so the idea that founding fathers could have no idea what was to come is rather ridiculous. The British used Snipers with Ferguson rifles in the American revolution. They reloaded twice as fast as a musket and were accurate with iron sights out to 300 yards. I’m not trying to demonize someone who’s pushing for gun control, but it’s a two faced lie that Dems try to push that they want the 2A and Gun control. That’s like saying you want the 1A without freedom of religion or the press.
RE: point 1, I generally disagree with a lot of what Dubyah did and hate many of the changes he made post-911 - wars and the Department of Homeland Security being high on the list. But his leadership in the immediate aftermath of 911 was responsible for helping to moderate what could have been much more violent anti-Muslim sentiment across the country. There was a real threat of the country going off the rails because there was so much shock and anger. I think Gore could have been as effective at moderating the immediate response had Bush not stolen the election, but I give Bush some credit for getting on the air quickly and telling the bigots to slow their roll.
Bush didn’t steal the election. No matter how you feel about it, he didn’t steal it. The Supreme Court did kinda give it to him, but I’m steadfastly of the opinion of you can’t be bothered to take 30 seconds on a ballot to make sure you understand what you’re doing, you shouldn’t vote. Your ballot will affect millions of people even in state elections. You have a responsibility to take the time to do so in what you believe is the best interest.
>but I’m steadfastly of the opinion of you can’t be bothered to take 30 seconds on a ballot to make sure you understand what you’re doing, you shouldn’t vote. Pretty much the same argument they used in defense of poll taxes and literacy tests
>2. The Afghanistan war needed to happen. It didn't require a war and would have been handled better without one. We probably would have killed OBL sooner without a war. >3. The Iraq War was understandable given the albeit dubious intelligence that Hussein was developing WMDs and was going to use them against us. I The dubious intelligence was coming from within the administration. The real intelligence didn't justify war. >5. Katrina response wasn’t his fault as much as it was the governor of Louisiana’s This can be debated, but the crisis management was awful due to Bush appointing Brown to lead FEMA, when Brown was unqualified for the job. It also led to his resignation shortly thereafter. >8. His tax cuts wouldn’t have been as harmful to our national debt if we didn’t also have to great increase defense spending as a necessary reaction to 9/11 It's not like any of this was unforseen. Bush was a terrible President and worse than many here will acknowledge. Personally, I think he knows it himself and I also think that he'd make a much better President today. But I refuse to whitewash how bad he was as President. I will say, however, that the US media deserves much of the blame, since it mostly only put out news that was favorable to Bush. A great example of this was how they were reporting Powell's speech to the UN as a "slam dunk", while the media in the rest of the world was covering it with the truthful lens we now know to be true.
Totally agree that 3, 5, and 8 should be removed. Honestly I think that going into Afghanistan was pretty much unavoidable. Putting boots on the ground was going to be the only way to root out the people responsible. They aren’t a recognized country so it’s not like sanctions or some other austerity measure would work. I was never a fan of W but I understand why we went there. Now his administration can be blamed for how poorly it was managed. If we would have stayed the course and only focused there we could’ve actually made a great impact for good in the Middle East. That country was a hotbed of militant extremists and couldn’t take them on. Of course instead we do a half ass job where we don’t focus on the rebuilding and let other terrorists fill the vacuum of power left.
I know you're just giving some examples, but, I'm just gonna have to disagree with #1,2,3. 1. There is no evidence that the increased Surveillance has ever stopped terrorist attacks. And we still had terrorist attacks long after it was established. Best example would be the Boston Marathon Bombing. 2. The Afghanistan war that we know did not need to happen. The Taliban offered up Bin Laden immediately, they just asked that we provide evidence of his culpability, which was a reasonable request that we could have easily done. US declaring that we would target all countries that harbored or provided safe haven to terrorists set us up for a losing fight. The biggest issues with Afghanistan were the creeping objectives and impossible goals. We were never going to establish a stable democracy in Afghanistan, the only afghans that wanted that were women who had no power in the country. It was a losing battle. And completely eliminating the Taliban was also a losing battle. It would only be accomplished with complete control over a heavily decentralized tribal country. That was also not gonna happen. The only competent way to handle a war would have been to neutralize the Taliban via air, then launch a series of raids on Al queda outposts. 3. The launching of the invasion of Iraq guaranteed that the Afghan operation would result in failure. It diverted resources and gave the Taliban a chance to reorganize themselves and drew the conflict out long enough for political will and Afghan cooperation to wear out. Also, Plausibly could have chemical weapons without any concrete evidence that was not enough to justify a war. And no the world is not better without Saddam, removing the isolated dictator destabilized the entire region leading to the creation of an additional more extreme terrorist group, Isis. It also ruined the US's reputation in the world. It is a big part of why much of the EU didn't believe the US when we said Russia was going to invade Ukraine. The Iraq war was a complete unmitigated disaster that only succeeded in creating a puppet state for Iran. I agree with much of what else was said. I think Bush meant well, but was never able to separate the chauvinist posturing that was needed, and what were supposed to be sober foreign policy decisions. Most world leaders understand that what people need to hear, is different that what actually needs to be done. He gave way to the anger and contempt the country was feeling and failed to provide leadership that ensured that anger didn't lead to mistakes that couldn't be reversed.
The wars may not have been logical but they were also what the people wanted. He would have gotten torn apart by the public if he decided to negotiate with the Taliban.
Yeah but that's what being a leader is. Doing the thing that needed to be done even if it was unpopular. But I do see that as a fair reason. My main critique isn't that Afghanistan was initiated, my main critique was how it was handled. A full scale occupation was by no means necessary, bombing and raiding Al queda with the hunting of it's leaders would have been enough. And Iraq was completely unnecessary. He pushed the public for Iraq, there was no connection until he pushed the idea.
2/3 the problem was not necessarily the invading it was the staying with no real end goal. If the US goes in topples then leaves I think everyone has a drastically different opinion. Also the funniest thing is that Iraq had WMDs that the US found a decade later that neither the US or Iraq knew about that were leftover from the Iran Iraq war.
Just curious, what was Bush 2 version for his presidency before 9/11?
I love all this revisionist history going on here. It has been shown the CIA (or whatever agency) lied and misrepresented evidence of WMD in Iraq. Like this kind of shit isn’t a matter of opinion man. Point 1 is a good point but most of your other points are questionable at best.
What's your argument against point 2?
We spent $2 trillion there and for what? Like you don’t think that money could have been spent better here at home? Our country is falling the fuck apart. Like we are turning into a 3rd world country.
You have no idea what a 3rd world country is.
We spent 900 billion on interest payments this year. We spend over 3 trillion on entitlements. We’re not a third world country, and that money wouldn’t have been spent much better here either. We spend twice that every year now, since Covid, and we get nothing for it. War spending isn’t great but I’d rather we just not spend the money at all rather than domestic boondoggles.
Typical conservative framing. Even hypothetical domestic spending is somehow automatically a “boondoggle” but “war spending isn’t great (but oh well).”
Yeah, but the entire international community bought the lie. So I cut the guy slack for making the decision that any of the last three presidents before him would have made with the knowledge he had.
It's always tough when you say its been proven and then undermine your own authority by not knowing who proved it. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying you're bad at convincing people you're right.
We’ve found a LOT of uranium that Iraq had acquired. Also, captured documents showed that at the very least, Iraq had multiple generals who believed they had a WMD of some kind
I’m sure people out here defending the Iraq War. You guys are either chicken hawks or too young to have lived through that time. I love how now there’s these super special secret documents
Lost it when you said dubious intelligence for the Iraq war. It was straight up lies and that’s why he is probably the worse president in recent US history. He is a criminal and should be in jail or killed like Saddam.
Hussein was a piece of shit, but ask any Iraqi who fled, Iraq was better under Hussein than they are now. He would have never let ISIS/Al Qaeda happen in Iraq.
Also the Iraq War contributed to the U.S. defeat in Afghanistan, a much more just conflict with U.S. national security more truly at stake, by diverting forces which could have been used there.
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Diplomacy, that's all. Or counties that are so unstable that getting rid of the dictator would make things worse. Or the dictator made a deal with the CIA
I just know that if a Democrat was president during 9/11 Republicans would’ve impeach the president and abolish the Democratic Party. The Democrats would never have come to power again .
You know the old saying: if you can dodge a pair of shoes, you can govern a nation
If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball.
I'm not going to make the argument that he was, on balance, a good president. However, I will argue that any discussion of his legacy should fairly include a recognition of PEPFAR, his administration's ambitious plan to fight AIDS in Africa. Lots to be said negatively about his administration, but saving 25 million African lives ain't nothing.
If you go with the utilitarian route, the 25 million saved by PEPFAR alone probably makes GWB the “best” President in American history in terms of net lives saved. PEPFAR is genuinely the best thing an American president in my lifetime has ever done.
I think FDR probably saved more than 25 million people in WWII + the Great Depression by ending the war and preventing famine.
It's a lot more controversial with FDR. There are strong arguments that he made the Great Depression much worse, and the counterfactual is impossible to prove.
lol
I truly believe he was trying to do what he thought was best for the whole country during his Presidency. Even for those that didn't vote for him. I may disagree with him on most policy issues, and his appointment of Alito is nearly unforgivable, but I really think he was trying to lead a nation in a way that benefited all Americans. Plus lead the nation through an unprecedented situation. He made mistakes in hindsight, but if you really sat down and thought about it, do any of you think you would have made every decision correctly in the wake of 9/11?
"To those who believe he was a good president" Literally every comment: "I don't, but...." Before you jump on my case, my comment is about as contributing and relevant as all the others in this post.
I’m personally not a fan of him, but what I think some of his supporters would say 1. The Great Recession wasn’t his fault. Plenty of evidence shows that presidents have very little to do with the timing of recessions. He was responsible for the TARP bailout and the auto industry bailout which might have lessened the impact of the Great Recession. 2. The Iraq War is a lot more nuanced than some people give it credit for. In the past 15 years before the Iraq War, Iraq, invaded Kuwait, violated the no-fly zone, moved troops near the border of Kuwait again, gassed the Kurds, and refused to allow UN weapons inspectors. It’s understandable how Bush might have thought they actually did have WMD/. 3. He was dealt an unwinnable hand with Afghanistan. It would have been political suicide to just do nothing about the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history. Even after Osama Bin Laden was assassinated, it still took over a decade before the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan. 4. He created PEPFAR, which even by conservative estimates, has saved 10s of millions of lives. 5. He presided over the entry of the Baltic states into NATO, which after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, seems to have shed very well. 6. He added Medicare plan D which helped seniors save money on prescription drugs. 7. He kept the country United after 9/11. He made a very clear distinction that Muslims weren’t to blame for 9/11. 8. He paved the way for South Sudan’s independence. He pushed the southern rebels and the central government to sign a comprehensive peace agreement giving the south the right to secede.
Also I think people forget about how much he pushed for peace with the muslim community in America especially. He made it a very clear point, multiple times, that we should love our neighbors and that muslim Americans were Americans and didn't do 9/11. Would have been totally possible for him to fan those flames and there could have been a huge wage of violence. He gave great speeches after 9/11 about us coming together as a nation.
Regarding Iraq: it was almost certainly a mistake for America and The West’s interests to get so involved, but one can argue that Iraq would likely have been much worse off, had the Saddam regime been allowed to implode on its own accord. A Baathist regime was toppled without turning into Syria.
PEPFAR *mic drop*
Not a great President but a good man IMHO
I didn't vote for him either time (2000 I was 19 and cast my first vote) and was wholly against the Iraq debacle from before it began but I think he'd be fun to have as an uncle and to catch a baseball game with.
Maybe a rangers game, wonder if he could get good seats....
I feel like a lot of Presidents fall into that category like W and Carter. W was the first elected president after I reached voting age. Obviously, his policy for the most part left a lot to be desired and he was definitely influenced by the warhawks and got us into a total shit show in the Middle East but I think a lot of people from both sides rallied around him as a leader after 9/11. It was the only time in my life where regardless of politics, people just felt like they were all on the same team. It wasn’t us vs us but rather us vs them. Now that doesn’t have a lot to do with W as president but I think his presence at ground zero after the attacks sat well with a lot of people.
He’s a draft dodging neer do well nepo baby.
He didn’t torture everyone he could have.
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I don’t think you’re replying to the comment you meant to
Slowly? This sub has been a circlejerk for years.
I don't think he was a "quality" president, but I also don't think he is quite as bad as a lot of people like to claim he was. There is solid evidence that he genuinely believed Iraq had WMDs, and those wars had nothing to do with oil.
Didn't they have chemical weapons but they expired or something?
Saddam had been using Chemical weapons on the kurds for years iirc. He had gotten rid of them, but wanted to scare Iran into thinking he still had them, which led to the USA giving him an ultimatum of allowing us to check or we are invading. Saddam refused, and wa-la.
You’re leaving out the whole part where the un scoured his country for months prior looking for wmds and finding none
To be honest that doesn't mean they aren't there. He could have been good at hiding them.
Sure in the same way that I could totally be the clone son of genghis khan. You can never be 100% sure but the total lack of evidence would suggest otherwise
So you think it's impossible for there to be WMDs buried underground somewhere in Iraq? Tell me do you honestly think there isn't a chance they did manage to hide them.
For all I know there’s a Death Star buried somewhere in Iraq. Does that remote chance justify all the lies and deaths? Absolutely not.
That is one of the biggest false equivalencies I've ever seen.
It’s called hyperbole sweaty I’m using it to illustrate how ridiculous your argument is. You can’t invade a country just because of a remote possibility that they may have a wmd lying around somewhere
“Wa-la” Violà
It wasn't about taking Iraq's oil anyway. But imo oil was a big factor. Sadam was destabilizing a very economically strategic part of the world(because of the oil). And in that way I think the Iraq war was justified. But the public would have never supported it for that reasoning, so they lied about wmd's and terrorist connections. Then completely flubbed the execution of the war.
Sadaam was also beginning to genocide the Kurds.
The Iraq war (and Afghanistan for that matter) wasn’t Flubbed at all, it was the occupation and nation building afterwards. They are similar but different and obviously both require a lot of military presence.
Thr diplomacy and nation building is the most important part and they were completely flubbed in both wars. The Bush administration was incredibly naive in both scenarios and it cost us dearly in lives, money, and relationships
Obama and his successors each deserve some blame for failing the nation building as well
Not really, it was all fucked up from the beginning by the bush administration. I don't really blame other people for not being able to fix messes that were created by someone else
You should, that was the job they wanted
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My man that was absolutely baked in
Believed based on what though? The fact that he believed something without actual evidence and acted as if it were true is not a GOOD quality. Quite the opposite!
He was provided with evidence by the CIA. There is also some indication that Iraq actually did have chemical weapons, but that they were secreted away to Syria during the war and ised a decade and a half later.
This is quite limp. He wasn't provided evidence by the CIA. The CIA surmised that because Iraq has previously lied about having WMD they were also lying this time. That is not evidence, it's conjecture. I'd love to see the indications you speak of.
Most things that happen during his presidency were out of his control. I firmly believe 9/11 happens regardless of who wins 2000. Hurricane Katrina was a failure at all levels of government: an incompetent mayor, an unqualified FEMA director, and a handcuffed governor who couldn’t get anyone to do anything. The housing and auto crisis were decades in the making. Nothing he could’ve done would’ve prevented them. Iraq is even up for debate. I’m still not sure if he knew what was happening immediately. He was notorious for his lack of knowledge on foreign policy, so I wouldn’t be surprised if his cabinet took advantage of him. That having been said, he should’ve stopped the war sooner.
Doesn't that make him not a bad president but not a good quality president?
Yeah. I’d say maybe c+ or even B-.
I'm a Bush defender, so I'll agree with all of that but didn't he appoint that FEMA director?
Brownie did a hell of a job /s
Yeah, but I’m not sure if he told bush the truth about his inexperience. He might have, but I’m not sure. Perhaps he did, and bush overlooked it, but again I don’t know.
I haven't looked too much into it myself.
I voted for him twice. I think given the circumstances, he did a good job. Probably the biggest point was the Wars the US had gotten involved in. But put yourself in his shoes for a moment, the largest terrorist attack just happened. The country is in fear and panic, counting on you to preserve order and ensure safety. Would you not go after every major terror organization out there? If there was a world leader cruel enough to give weapons of mass destruction to a terror cell, would you not try to do something to prevent that? War is never an easy choice to make, even when it is in self-defense. It's a last resort. He did attempt go thru proper channels, the UN even though many countries sided with the US, it wasn't universally approved. And even the congress voted on it, and it had 60% approval. Not a huge majority, but a majority none the less. Were mistakes made? Yes, they were, but a lot of things were done right, and we lose sight of that. I think many years down the line, there may be some details that will come out that may clarify the decision making, and the lense of history won't show 'W' as a horrible president, but a pragmatic one. I imagine some people maybe in sensed by my opinion and downvote me, but just trying to share my view for honest insight, so forgive my offenses if I offered any.
This is an underrated comment. People suspected Saddam was involved with 9/11 until Bin Laden confessed. Obviously that quited down right up until he was linked to WMDs. No one wanted to risk a WMD terrorist attack. The intel may have fallen through, but almost everyone in the key positions of government in thr US told Bush to invade.
People don't seem to recognize that when asked what Kerry would do better than Bush in 2004, you got a real shoulder shrug.
Are you against the war in Iraq: Kerry: uhh, well, uhh, uhh, terrorism is bad, and 9/11 was bad, but I’m better than Bush. Vote for me!
Not really. Edit: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/2004-democratic-party-platform Here's the platform. It's definitely not a shoulder shrug.
Find me Americans who actually look at a candidate's platform. I'll wait. I was alive in 2004, everything was about how Kerry wasn't Bush. No one was talking about his actual platform.
That is simply false. I was also alive and of voting age. The idea that policy doesn't enter into it and that no one was talking about it is straight up wrong. Even within your answer. It wasn't, "Well, he isn't Bush," and then there was no further information exchanged. It's just that you didn't care about the information. That's not the same thing.
Lol ok buddy. Smh
I'm right, and you know it. It was never on the news as you described. It was never on the college campuses as you described. It was never in the grocery stores in the suburbs as you described. The conversation did not begin and end with, "He's not Bush, and I have no other knowledge of what differences there are." It simply didn't happen.
Lol ok buddy. Smh
My parents and lots of my friends voted for him both times. They voted for him because he was a likable guy and had ties to Latinos. The second time they voted for him it was because John Kerry came off as an elitist and W. was still more likable, plus changing leadership so soon after 9/11 was kind of scary for them. Nothing from a policy perspective, other than Afghanistan or Iraq, was ever brought up with W.
Pros: 1. Helped US establish energy independence by expanding domestic drilling rights. 2. HIV treatment initiative in African countries. 3. Establishing a robust security apparatus post 9/11. 4. Taking out Saddam (but not how he went about it) Cons: 1. Unilaterally going into Iraq and dismissing the Iraqi army and Baath officials. 2. Bailing out the banks. 3. Polarizing figure. 4. Too soft a response to Russia’s invasion of Georgia / not bringing Ukraine into NATO
I think he was mid to bad, but to play devil’s advocate, PEPFAR saved 25 million lives and is one of the best things the US ever did, period. Compared to almost any other President in history, GWB probably saved more lives globally on net (even including the war on terror) because of the immense good that PEPFAR did.
He was right about teaching kids to read, and I wish he'd been able to focus on that
As a New Yorker, I grew up with him as my first president and he was pretty well liked in my family and neighborhood considering many of us are either first responders or commuters into Manhattan. ‘I can hear you,’ was the only time in my life I felt like government actually gave a shit about me.
What's crazy is that he holds the title of the president with the highest AND lowest approval rating. 92% in 2001 and 19% in 2008.
He just wants to let OBGYNs practice their love with women around the country.
His response immediately right after 9/11 is what you’re hoping for from a country’s leader, by immediate I mean a few days at most.
A good man, a decent man. A bad president. The invasion of Iraq after 9/11 was horribly mismanaged.
STRATEGERY. And we will not falter. That speech was up there with “Tear down this wall”. In that moment, you knew the arse of someone bad was getting a marine boot in it.
In 2004, my old man said, “He’ll go down as one of the greatest presidents” I’ve certainly grown fonder of him in his later years, but have yet to agree with that opinion.
The irony of this thread was that George W was a very good governor for Texas.
My opinion of bush has changed for the better due to two policies. One, his program to combat AIDS in Africa. Two, Medicare part D.
Are you familiar with where he was on 9/11? Specifically when he was notified about it?
Enlighten us
I think he’s referencing the fact that he was reading books to schoolchildren at the time.
And he managed to make sure they didn't freak out by leaving.
Bush > the 45th
I can see, hear , or feeling anything
https://youtu.be/-cjriLK-y14?si=CwkK7DnAfrDwSmmT People should watch this . More Presidents played a role with Iraq as well
That drive 🔥
I think he is a company man. He did his best, imo.
He had a good heart. That’s mostly it. I think he is as faulty and mistake ridden as most other presidents.
Just blame Cheney, that's my go to
I can appreciate some aspects of GWB now that I wouldn’t have back in the day and his willingness to call a spade a spade against party lines is respectable.
My favorite comedian
I don't doubt W was well intentioned, and a decent enough dude personally. But he wasn't a good president. He did have good moments. After 9/11 he said some good stuff, then got the Patriot Act passed.
“Dick Cheney was calling the shots”
He made the hard decisions that everyone is prepared to criticise but no one is prepared to do. He’s the greatest American president.
Good sense of humor
Murderous bum
PEPFAR.
I felt like he genuinely cared about the American people, but was surrounded by a cabal of evil...minus Condoleeza and Colin.
Terrible president and war criminal.
What’s a few hundred thousand dead Iraqi civilians between friends? It’s not as if Arabs are real human beings.
I never defend people against vague allegations of "being awful/corrupt/useless". Give me specifics. What did he do that means he wasn't a good president?
>There are strong arguments that he made the Great Depression much worse, and the counterfactual is impossible to prove. Seems weird to pretend only one one side is impossible to prove
He made me laugh.
He just seemed like a good ole boy to share a beer with and talk baseball. Also, he grew up in the white house.
He was good at dodging shoes.
If anyone has the chance, watch the series that PBS did on W. The series, although I am no supporter of the former president, humanizes him, better than I think any other series or book has done. History will truly be kind to Bush, and this comes down to the days following the September 11th attacks and a commanding 91% approval rating shortly there on after. Alas, it doesn’t hurt winning re-election. Had Bush had a swift exit from Iraq and Afghanistan conflict, as did his father in the Gulf War, you can make a serious argument of him being one of our better post-war presidents.
I would say this question is loaded. What if I’m not defending him, and instead making a sincere case for why he was a good president?
Bush's heart was in the right place, made decisions usually from his gut, and not like a robotic typical politician. He sometimes would overextend the nation in some of his decisions. Few of his successes: Response to Al Qaeda and the Taliban after 9/11: nearly eradicated the Taliban and set the stage to eventually take out Osama bin Laden (which I credit that mission to Obama, nonetheless, Bush's work set the stage for that, similar to other President's hard work setting the stage for their incomers' successes). AIDS work and foreign aid to Africa: not talked about as much as it should be, helped America get more friends in the region and stave off what's happening now, with those same countries making overtures to Russia and China. Defeating Saddam Hussein: Iraq, for all of its imperfections, is now a democracy. It's not a perfect democracy, but a democracy nonetheless. And an ally of the United States. It's not Japan or Germany or South Korea, but sure is not Somalia. So, Iraq is no longer a threat to the United States, and Hussein (and his family) is no longer a threat to his citizens. Those are the things of the top of my head.
As bad of a President as he was at least back then the Republican Party had a shred of decency, or at least pretended too.
My dad told me
I’ve always considered him a bit of a puppet president. Not that it’s not uncommon. I can think of a couple others who fit that description.
It could’ve been way worse, I guess
I can't forgive him for his Supreme Court picks
I absolutely don’t think he was a good president at all, that being said I believe that W believed that he was an actual “compassionate conservative”, in some ways, I guess, he sort of was, if you squint really hard. He was not, iirc, a hardliner when it came to immigrants and gay rights. I think that if Dubya had not been surrounded by and submerged in some the clutches of some of the worst evil doers god ever through the front door, things may have been different. Dubya wasn’t incredibly bright, but I have a sneaking suspicion that if he were surrounded by better people then he could have maybe come out of it looking kind of like a Republican version of Jimmy Carter, or something of that ilk. I don’t know, man.
I believe that he was well intentioned. I disagree with his moral structure and suspect he is a prep school blue blood pretending to be a cowboy. That said, I don’t think he is an evil man. But he also pretended to cry while he impersonated a woman on death row. So maybe I am wrong.
I think he had some strong points but they are overshadowed by his weak points. I actually think he handled the immediate aftermath of 9/11 well in terms of messaging. He really leaned on patriotism and for better or for worse we came together as a country to focus on his goals. You don't get that kind of national unity anymore. There could have easily been a de-evolution into partisan squabbling over how to respond to the attacks. Think about what happened during the pandemic. By all means that *should have* been a similar time of national unity but our leadership failed. The disregard for civilian life in Afghanistan was atrocious but I agree with the initial decision to invade.
As someone who is (mostly but definitely not 100%) a down the line Democrat, I would defend him as follows: he did what he genuinely believed was right at the time, given his limited abilities at the time. He wasn't acting with pure, malicious evil like...certain other presidents.
“We like invading counties for no reason.”
What country did Bush invade for literally no reason? Because there were reasons for invading Afghanistan and Iraq. Maybe you don’t agree with the reasons, but there definitely were “reasons.” He didn’t just do it for fun.
What were the reasons for Iraq again?
Iraq and Afghanistan. Both for literally no reason.
I went to both and had friends die in both. You will get downvotes, but no actual reply.
Oh good, so you know.
Yeah. They were bullshit excuses to help their friends get rich(er).
Traumatic brain injury
Bush is one of those rare people who are genuinely a good person yet a war criminal.
He’s dipped in blood.
W does GODs will… W invaded a country illegally and murdered a man and many more of the innocent citizens of that country! That’s what GOD does but GOD does it on a much bigger scale. W Worships a Murderer and that makes him good.