Politics - Grading Bush

Now that the press has stopped its continual hammering of George W. Bush and focused its energy on praising Obama, it gives me an opportunity to collect my thoughts on his presidency. I felt myself defending Bush during the latter part of his presidency because some of the attacks were so extreme and unfounded. Now that I can view him objectively, I would say that of any Administration that began and ended during my life, his is clearly the worst. As I gain focus, I see just how bad he was. His presidency will go a long way to preventing me from ever wanting to officially associate with the Republican Party.

If you have read my political posts, you would know that my primary focus concerning our government is our fiscal stability and responsibility. Bush did an immense amount of damage to both during his tenure. In social issues such as abortion, gun control, same sex marriage, and the death penalty there are points and counterpoints. The issues are not black and white. To me, the deficit spiraling out of control and the numbers that indicate the troubles we are in are not subjective, they are fact. That is why I expend most of my energy in this arena. The single most destructive thing that the Bush administration did was to let paygo lapse. Paygo was established under his father's service as president and basically stated that any increase in spending must be matched by a corresponding increase in revenue (taxes) and any decrease in revenue (taxes) must be matched by a corresponding decrease in spending. This was instrumental in controlling the budget during George H Bush's presidency and Bill Clinton's presidency. George W Bush began manipulating paygo in 2001 in the face of the 9/11 disaster. He skirted the rules while formally complying with them to give his tax cuts. In 2002 paygo needed to be extended. It was not. Since then the budget has gotten out of control. While I believe that Obama is spending excessively, the table was set by Bush for him to do so. Bush had already spent well beyond our country's means, so Obama is just layering on top of that. Plus, Bush's presidency was so poor that it created a situation where a liberal Democrat could beat a moderate Republican for the White House and bring with him dominating control of both the Senate and House of Representatives.

Why did Bush allow the budget to reach such a state? The focus of his presidency was the war on terror. It was a war, by the way, which I opposed from the start. I asked the question at the time, "what do we do when we beat their military?" The answer was not a good one. The war following the defeat of the Iraq military was poorly managed and it was one that had very long odds to win. A democracy cannot be handed to a group of people. They have to want and be willing to fight for it. Over the next few decades Iraq, if left on its own, will have a controlling person or party similar to Sadam. He may be "elected", but it will not be a true democracy or republic. Bush did keep us safe from another terrorist strike, though, and that seemed to be his only objective. As more people became impatient with the war he turned to political tricks. He gave more and more tax cuts, reducing the burden of the rich and the middle class and poor to make everyone happy. He refused to veto spending bills put forth by his Republican congress no matter how obscene. He then signed the prescription drug bill that added a large burden to federal budget. Every action he took, whether militarily, tax, or spending grew the nation's deficit. We saw runaway deficits in times when the economy was stable and then when we were faced with a crisis he turned over leadership to a liberal free spender. If you just look at their attitude towards our deficit, Bush and Obama have much more in common than they have differences. Both pay it lip service but leave it for somebody else to deal with.

So, Bush receives poor marks on the war, on the budget, on his Medicare prescription bill, and (I'll throw this one in without comment) on No Child Left Behind. It's pretty easy to grade his presidency from my perspective, very poor. Did he do anything right? He kept us safe and he appointed Judge Roberts to the supreme court which seems like a decent choice. However, that was not his first choice. His first choice was somebody in his own personal circle that was not qualified. Would we have been better off with Gore? With Kerry? I don't think so. Politics is about now not the future. To satisfy the people you have to reduce taxes (revenue) and at the same time give them more benefits (increase expenses). This creates a huge deficit for which we will eventually pay. This does not excuse Bush. He did a great deal of damage to his party. He also did no favors for the long term health of this country, which should be put above everything else.

As a note, fiscally there were great times during the Clinton administration. I give little credit to him for those good times. He was restricted by paygo and a Republican controlled congress. He would have loved to spend lavishly on such things as universal health care, but his hands were tied. He also benefited from the technology boom that created large revenues for the government. A boom that busted at the end of his presidency.