Bush

Bush – by Jean Edward Smith

"Mr. President, you cannot reverse the Supreme Court." - Condoleezza Rice

Of all the presidential biographies I have read (about 60+), this was by far the saddest. Sad because George W. Bush really was a compassionate president, and truly spearheaded some bipartisan initiatives and did some great things, yet his gaffes were so strong and so detrimental that recent history has judged him to be one of the worst presidents ever.  Author Jean Edward Smith agrees with this assessment and does a very good job explaining why and how he and others have come to that conclusion.

Despite what others have said, I didn’t find this book to be a hate-filled slinger of mud. The author did a very good job convincing me of his conclusions.  He gives credit where credit is due and points out some of the great things that Bush did during his presidency.  It’s just that everything is overshadowed by Iraq. Iraq takes up an awful lot of this book. At times I forgot I was reading a biography and thought I was reading a retrospective of the Iraq war.  It seems like nothing Bush did during the Iraq war worked.  

Contrary to what many left-wing pundits have stated, the author never paints bush as “stupid”, and definitely not “evil”.  The author describes him, in a roundabout way, as being “intellectually lazy”.  There were so many times when Bush refused to listen to anyone else, let alone his advisors and his cabinet, and his lack of knowledge where foreign affairs were related, largely contributed to his doom.  This was ironic because there were plenty of times when Bush did consult experts (stem cell research and the financial collapse of 2008 come to mind) that allowed him to make professional ‘presidential' decisions.  You have to wonder, why, then, was he so obtuse about world affairs? Especially Iraq?

Although this is, in fact, a biography, there’s not a whole lot here pre-presidency. Although Bush definitely was born into a wealthy, well-known family, you get the feeling that he truly was responsible for many of his early successes. True, having money gives you a big leg-up in the world, but why should that matter?  His irresponsible behavior as a young man is covered here, but again, nothing really new nor surprising.  His big break comes when he becomes Managing General Partner of the Texas Rangers baseball club in 1989.  The team's fortune soon changes, and Bush is soon elected Governor of the State, surprisingly beating popular incumbent Anne Richards.  Whispers start that the presidency of the U.S. should be the next step.   After a tumultuous contested election, Bush manages to prevail beating Vice-President Al Gore to become the 43^rd president of the United States pitching something called “Compassionate Conservatism”.  Essentially, he wants to bridge the partisan sides and unite the bickering.  His first several months in office have minor successes and failures. 

Then, 9/11.

The few months that followed the attack essentially defined George W. Bush’s early years in his presidency, yet this is one area where the author simply glosses over without giving the reader the full understanding of the state of the nation. For me, this was the major weakness of this entire book.  You never get the sense of how scared, panicked, and uncertain the country was, and how Bush was able to rise to the challenge and unite the country in the face of uncertainty. Perhaps this is because the author isn’t a native of the United States.  Instead, his overall assessment of this time period was that Bush “overreacted”.  Well, perhaps, but most people, including the majority of Republicans and Democrats in both halls of congress, disagreed.

The best thing Bush did when he became the 43^rd president was put together a stellar cabinet.  The worst thing he did, particularly around this time, was not listen to the advice that many in his cabinet provided.  This seemed to be very obvious with Secretary of State Colin Powell.  In a sense, one has to wonder (and I’m sure Secretary Powell did as well) whether or not Powell’s appointment was simply a token gesture. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney seemed to want to call the majority of the shots themselves.  This led to the Iraq War, which led to Bush’s downfall.

It seems as though all of Bush’s biggest blunders were either directly or indirectly related to Iraq.  Had Bush decided to merely liberate Iraq, a lot of problems could have been avoided.  Bush, however, changes his mind mid-course, and then chooses to occupy Iraq, and tries to install this thing called ‘democracy’.  Several members of his cabinet and the congress then became, obviously, incredulous.  George W. Bush simply couldn’t understand that you couldn’t drop a few bombs on an Islamic theocracy and expect the entire nation to fall in behind you and end up looking like the State of Vermont.  He tries, though, and nothing good comes out of it.  We read about the Patriot Act that violated privacy rights, the torture (“enhanced interrogation procedures”) performed by the CIA on POWs, overseas “black sites”, Abu Ghraib, and the supposed existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction that never materialized. Essentially, an entire crop of failures that could have been circumvented had the Iraq War been avoided.

Had Bush not gone to war with Iraq, would Iraq have implemented terrorist attacks similar to what occurred on 9/11?  We’ll never know for sure.  Supporters of Bush (and Bush himself) would argue ‘yes’, most others became increasingly skeptical as the war dragged on.  Bush thought he was doing the right thing, but when one (along with VP Cheney) digs their heels in and becomes ridiculously obdurate, things can (and did) get messy in a hurry.

It truly is a shame.  The author concludes saying that the last year of Bush’s presidency (2008) was, in fact, his best.  He touches on the economic collapse of the year as an example.  Those who know how the markets work understand that the economy is cyclical, so the recession that happened that year can’t really be blamed on a sitting president.  By pumping over 700 billion dollars into the economy, the author argues that Bush did, in fact, prevent a worldwide depression that could have been much more catastrophic than what occurred in the 1930s.  What makes this achievement even more memorable is that stalwarts in his own Republican party fought him the hardest on this initiative. So Bush proves that there were, in fact, times when he could reach out for help when an issue was beyond his comprehension, and he could also achieve bipartisan support.

I really loved this book.  Had I picked it up over a holiday weekend, I could have devoured the entire 800 pages over a long weekend.  Yes, it is fairly negative, but I didn’t find the writing style to be overly vitriolic.  I’m sure there are much more upbeat reflections of the George W. Bush presidency out there, but the author convinced me of his overall thesis.  (NOTE: For those interested, you can find many online  that debunk many of the author’s convictions, most notably here: https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/08/15/its-impossible-to-count-the-things-wrong-with-the-negligent-spurious-distorted-new-biography-of-george-w-bush/ ). Since this was the first biography I’ve read on the 43^rd president, I’ll definitely try at least one more to see how the events compare.

One final strange, but good, observation: In the hardback format, the book was filled with pictures that were interposed along with the actual words within the chapters.  Most non-fiction books that have pictures/illustrations have one or two supplemental sections stuck together in one or two parts of the book.  It was nice to not have to “flip back and forth” to see the pictures.  More books should try this!