George W. Bush: Still the worst
A new study ranks Bush near the very bottom in history, due to delusional wars, reckless spending and inflexibility.
By Robert Merry
In 2003, President Bush, then two years into his tenure, was asked by journalist Bob Woodward about his place in history. “History,” he replied. “We don’t know. We’ll all be dead.” This is a remarkable statement from any president, suggesting a blithe attitude toward the job’s magnitude and responsibility to posterity. Compare this insouciance, as historian Sean Wilentz did in a searing Rolling Stone piece on the younger Bush, with another president’s observation on the subject. “Fellow citizens,” said Lincoln, “we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation.”
Wilentz’s Rolling Stone piece, appearing in the spring of 2006, with Bush still in office, posed a question: Was this president the worst ever? The Bush presidency, wrote Wilentz, appeared “headed for colossal historical disgrace,” and there didn’t seem to be anything Bush could do to forestall that fate. He added, “And that may be the best-case scenario. Many historians are now wondering whether Bush, in fact, will be remembered as the very worst president in all of American history.”
In the 5,500-word analysis that followed, Wilentz presented a solid case, although some of his arguments and expressions sounded more like they emanated from the Democratic side of the U.S. House floor than from a dispassionate historical examination. Like his good friend Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Wilentz has nurtured a career combining rigorous scholarly pursuits with occasional vectors of partisan advocacy for Democratic causes. But the question deserves attention, and Wilentz poses it with verve and pungency.
Bush began his presidency with a burden — his 2000 victory emerged in the country’s most hotly contested election since 1876, with the final outcome determined by a 5-to-4 Supreme Court decision. This naturally generated some lingering political animosity in the country. It can be argued that in the early months of his administration Bush worked effectively to establish the legitimacy of his presidency. But even early on it sometimes seemed that Bush confronted weighty presidential decisions with the same blithe attitude that characterized his answer about history’s judgment. He often appeared to have his eye fixed more on immediate outcomes than on long-term consequence. In taking his country to war in Iraq, he failed to meet the two fundamental tests of presidential war-making. One was the Polk lesson: Ensure that no one can ever make an accusation that the president dissembled with the American people in order to get permission to spill American blood. The other was the Lyndon Johnson or Harry Truman lesson: Ensure that the country doesn’t get bogged down in a war it can’t win and can’t end. Avoiding these ominous pitfalls would have required a sober and solemn assessment of all the risks and dangers of the enterprise, both military and political. There is little evidence that Bush conducted such an assessment before his war decision.
http://www.salon.com/2012/06/29/george_w_bush_still_the_worst/
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