Archive for the ‘Bush legacy’ Category
George Bush’s legacy
This was cowritten with my colleague, Washington Bureau Chief Adrian Wooldridge
The frat boy ships out
From The Economist print edition
Few people will mourn the departure of the 43rd president
HE LEAVES the White House as one of the least popular and most divisive presidents in American history. At home, his approval rating has been stuck in the 20s for months; abroad, George Bush has presided over the most catastrophic collapse in America’s reputation since the second world war. The American economy is in deep recession, brought on by a crisis that forced Mr Bush to preside over huge and unpopular bail-outs. 
America is embroiled in two wars, one of which Mr Bush launched against the tide of world opinion. The Bush family name, once among the most illustrious in American political life, is now so tainted that Jeb, George’s younger brother, recently decided not to run for the Senate from Florida. A Bush relative describes family gatherings as “funeral wakes”.
Few people would have predicted this litany of disasters when Mr Bush ran for the presidency in 2000. Read the rest of this entry »
