To mark the opening of the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, we offer you a glimpse back at the greatest triumphs and mistakes of his years on the national stage.
Here are our choices. Feel free to add your own by posting a comment.
TOP SUCCESSES
1. There were no successful terrorist attacks on the U.S. homeland after September 11, 2001.
The president united the nation in the immediate aftermath of the al Qaeda attacks. His administration, working with local law enforcement agencies and other nations, foiled all terrorism plots for the next seven-plus years.
2. Bush became just the fourth Republican president in American history to serve two full terms.
The first three: Ulysses S. Grant, Dwight D. Eisenhower and Ronald W. Reagan. But unlike the other three, who won six landslides, Bush had two close calls. His 2000 victory (while losing the popular vote) will go down as one of the most hotly disputed in U.S. history. His 2004 re-election was by a slim 2.5 percentage point margin.
3. The president won the biggest tax cut in American history.
Candidate Bush promised to cut taxes. President Bush did just that. The income tax rate cuts returned money to all Americans — but particularly the wealthy. Inheritance tax rates also were slashed and the marriage penalty was ended. The biggest victory for Bush came four years after he left the presidency when President Obama agreed to make the Bush tax cuts permanent on all but the top one-half of 1 percent of Americans.
4. Bush signed into law the biggest expansion of an entitlement program since the Great Society: the Medicare drug benefit.
The drug benefit divided Republicans in the House of Representatives but House Majority Whip Tom DeLay of Texas twisted enough arms to give Bush a narrow but historic legislative victory. It was the legislative high point of the Bush presidency.
5. Bush’s administration prevented a calamitous meltdown of the U.S. financial system in the fall of 2008.
Though derided as a “Wall Street bailout,” Bush’s rapid response to the imminent meltdown of the U.S. financial system may have prevented another Great Depression from beginning in the waning days of his presidency. Yes, money was wasted. Yes, “bad guys” got some bailout money. Yes, no banking execs ended up behind bars. But things could have been much, much worse if the president hadn’t convinced Congress to act.
TOP FAILURES
1. Bush led the nation into war with Iraq on incorrect intelligence reports.
Historians are still debating whether the administration deliberately lied or relied on faulty and false intelligence reports in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. There were no weapons of mass destruction, no “mushroom cloud” on the horizon and no al Qaeda tie to Saddam Hussein.
2. U.S. economic performance was its weakest since Herbert Hoover’s presidency.
Bush inherited the largest surplus in American history and left office with the largest deficit (since surpassed by Barack Obama). His overall record of job creation, personal income and stock market performance is the worst since the Hoover presidency, though Richard Nixon and Jimmy Carter are down there with him.
3. Anti-terrorism tactics employed by the Bush administration damaged U.S. standing in the world.
The Global War on Terror (GWOT), as it was named by Bush, featured controversies such as the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where terrorism suspects were held without charges. “Enhanced interrogation” techniques — called torture by most critics — scarred the United States’ reputation around the world. Secret prisons in Eastern Europe were denounced by many nations, including some U.S. allies. Republicans such as Sen. John McCain and Democrats including Sen. Barack Obama called for Bush to shut down Gitmo. He didn’t. Neither has Obama in his first five years as president.
4. The U.S. government failed to capture bin Laden or secure Afghanistan.
Bush promised to take the al Qaeda leader “dead or alive” and famously declared, “Bring ‘em on.” American policymakers, focused on Iraq, allowed bin Laden to escape at Tora Bora, months after the 9/11 attacks. Bin Laden survived Bush’s presidency, but was brought in “dead or alive” by Obama. The Afghanistan war, now winding down, is the longest war in U.S. history. Even now, there is high anxiety about Afghanistan’s future after the departure of U.S. combat troops.
5. The Republican Party suffered major setbacks in Bush’s second term.
Bush was sworn in as president with a Republican House and a Republican Senate. By the time he turned the Oval Office over to Barack Obama, Democrats were in control of both houses of Congress. And while Republicans have regained control of the House, its conservative leaders have used Bush’s record as a case study in what they don’t want: out-of-control federal spending (domestic and military), new federal entitlements (Medicare drug benefit), government bailouts (financial industry, auto industry) and unfunded federal mandates (education reform).
