Jan 06 2008
The Legacy of George Bush
One more year left of George Bush. Can we make it? Well let us take a look back at the last 7 years and see what we have in a leader. First, we take a look at the first election. Bush barely won and in some people’s eyes he was not the real winner. How did Bush handle it? He went on television and claimed that he has the full support of the American People. This was not the true case but in his eyes, a win meant that he was fully supported by all of America.
OK, so let’s look at the first term. Bush passed a great tax refund for the middle class. This was great. The downfall was that the tax refund caused less funding to state and local programs. The fallout was that because of these refunds, our property tax, sales taxes, and state taxes increased much more than the original tax refund.
The second event of his first term was 9/11. This was a disaster that Bush turned into a hunt on terrorist. He had support from almost of all of the American people and Congress. He did do the right thing to go into Afghanistan. Of course then he decided to go into Iraq and piss off a majority of the world leaders and also most of our allies.
Let us not forget the improvement he has made to education. No Child Left Behind, this great program that was going to improve our education system. It was poorly funded, too much pressure put on students, and caused teachers to teach to the test or fear losing federal funding.
In the first term he managed to raise the federal debt and cause are men and women in uniform to be placed in the Iraq. He created a world where we are hated by many parts of the world.
Well along came the second election and again, Bush barely got by and won by a very slim margin. Once again, he went on television to exclaim that he has heard the confidence that the American people has in him. I can not understand who voted for him but I think it was a vote of no confidence in John Kerry more than a vote for Bush.
In the second term, Bush’s cabinet was under attack as with the first and many of his top members fell in the crossfire. We also saw another disaster in America in the form of Hurricane Katrina. We seen the Federal Government under George Bush’s leadership respond in such a slow and poor manner that we looked more like a third world country. Was it because the poor people of New Orleans really did not matter in Bush’s scheme? We will never know for sure but it was a sore stain on American history. FEMA was the last to respond and allowed many deaths to occur.
So after all this, are we Americans better off after seven years of Bush? I say no way. Prices are through the roof for just about everything we purchase. Gas and fuel prices are scary as rich oil companies are making all time high profits. Federal taxes are down but we are paying much more taxes over all. Hopefully the last year will be swift and the end will come soon.
How will history look at the legacy of George Bush? Well, we Americans do not wish to look at our past leaders in the negative so maybe he will look better in the books than he does in the present time. I for one will be glad to see the end of the Bush administration.
What is your opinion of George Bush’s legacy?
I find it interesting that George Bush got more votes and a higher percentage of the votes in both of his elections than Bill Clinton got in either of his elections.
Bill never got close to 50% of the votes in either of his wins.
The Slow response to Katrina could have nothing to do with the fact that the Democratic control of Louisiana was sitting on their a** and playing down the problem.
Your tax numbers are way off also. The drop in rates caused the one of the largest increases in Federal Revenues. I think you are referring to the cuts made to programs in the Clinton administration.
Education is a problem. The sponsor for the no child left behind was non other than Teddy Kennedy. Look it up. Classic Democratic babble. Blame every problem on Bush no matter who caused it.
The best way to eliminate the Budget deficit is to get more Liberals in the cabinet. Two of the biggest Liberal tax cheats in the congress are now in Obama’s Cabinet.
The congress that would not fund the no child left behind happened to be Democratically controlled.
Rick Answer Analyst’s last blog post..Answer Analyst Video Review
He got higher percentage because he had no viable third party candidate that ran to suck votes off either party. Both times Clinton ran he had Perot pulling a good percentage of votes from the election. Even with that, he still beat his opponent by a much larger percentage than Bush who lost the first popular vote and was just over two percent ahead of John Kerry in the second.
I am not sure about how I am off on tax numbers since I did not give any numbers. Facts are what I stated, after the tax rebates/stimulus checks that was suppose to save the economy were sent out, all state and local taxes went up including sales tax in many areas.
No child left behind was proposed by Bush himself when he entered office. It was cosponsored by four people. Representatives John Boehner (R-OH) and George Miller (D-CA) and Senators Judd Gregg (R-NH) and Edward Kennedy (D-MA). It was doomed from teh start and the funding was never there. Look up who pushed for the plan! George Bush. He could have easily defeated the bill and it would never had passed. (Just for the record, not a fan of Kennedy) During this time, the house was controlled by the Republicans and the Senate was split.
No use preaching to me about Obama because if you read the whole blog, I think Obama is no better and a bit worse.
Finally, I knew Katrina was bad the day it happened. Federal intervention is not trumped by a State Government. It was a clear disaster and should have been handled quickly not in the slow motion that FEMA did so.