Critics and pundits alike are already penning the pages of history.
One potential title? "Bush: A Miserable Failure."
Nearly 70% of the United States approves of Obama's work so far and Liberals are especially ecstatic over the change in administration. Mr. Obama has already brought heady, contentious issues to the forefront in his new presidency. While Obama is making a clear case that the country is now in the right hands, and with the lefties agreeing wholeheartedly, there is another vigorous (albeit quiet) supporter of the newly elected President. George W. Bush.
He has to be...his future history is currently being written in the halls of his former home.
Mr. Bush’s legacy seems to be in jeopardy of being catalogued as one of the worst of all time, right up there with Herbert Hoover’s. Under his administration, including a bull-headed push into a unilateral Iraq war, based on a false conclusions of possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction and his drastic and elaborate stretching of both the Geneva Convention and Bill of Rights with Guantanamo Bay and secret CIA prisons scattered across the globe and domestic surveillance and, of course, disastrous economic policies still threatening and crippling the economy, Bush's supporters in the vast minority.
Barack Obama's new direction is already reversing some of these Bush-era policies. Further, Obama carries the burden of structuring Mr. Bush’s legacy.
Right now, Bush stands to benefit only from his own clear message: We haven’t been attacked since 9/11. But, wars end. Recessions rebound. Policies are forgotten. Things improve. If Mr. Obama secures the new, dramatic change he promised to bring to America, it’s not only going to secure his reelection in 2012, it’s going to secure a positive place for Mr. Bush in the history books.
On the other hand, if Mr. Obama falls, so does the former President. If the 16 month withdrawal from Iraq proceeds as planned and subsequently drives the country into bitter fighting and catastrophic chaos, Bush will face the same public gallows as Obama. Similarly, if the proposed stimulus plan does nothing to the economy but create a mess of unfinished infrastructure projects, while increasing lines at the welfare, unemployment and food stamp agencies, Mr. Bush will be again disparaged for his initial hand in the downward spiral.
What do you think about Bush's legacy?
