The Bush Years In Retrospect

After eight years of President Bush, he leaves office with little recognition for the good things that he has done and with a "high disapproval rating" based on every thing that went wrong during his time in office. In his case, the bad, at this juncture in time, is definitely outweighing the good. Some of that has a lot to do with the bias of the news media in this country. They have punished him dearly for having beaten their favored son, Al Gore, in the 2000 election. Today, many on the left, including the left-biased news media, believes Bush to have stolen that election.

History will ultimately judge George Bush. And, only history, in hindsight and without the politics of the moment, can appropriately pass judgment on Bush. Some of that judgment will be based in comparison with other Presidents that came before him and will come after him. Some of those things that may be considered poor decisions, today, might be reversed by the effects of time and the consequences of future events. Similarly, things that may have been seen, by some, as being good practices and policies by the Bush Administration may fail the test of time.

I know one thing that has hurt Bush more than anything. That was his feeble attempts at public relations over the last 8 years. He just didn't keep people informed and he didn't get out and ahead of problems. In the business world, you can avoid a lot of after-the-fact problems by being 'proactive' from the very start of any project or program. Being proactive is a well-worn business philosophy of the 1970's and 1980's that is still the foundation of good management techniques, today. Bush just wasn't proactive. In the case of the Fannie Mae and the Freddie Mac problems and the ultimate meltdown of our economy, he clearly knew that these pseudo-governmental agencies were going to eventually fail; going back to his and his cabinet member's speeches, starting in 2001. But, he didn't hit hard enough on that issue and bring the problem to the people before it blew up in his face.

The same was true with Katrina. He would have best served himself and the occupants of the Gulf Coast cities if he had been up front with the people that this was a seriously large and powerful hurricane. Afterall, it was a Cat 5 just days before it hit. He could have avoided a lot of problems and the blame after the fact if he had hit the airways with a press conferences to warn people and to advise them of what steps the government was taking in the event of a major disaster. Certainly, as the President of the United States, he had access to the best weather information in the world. FEMA was actually mobilized to handle Katrina but, based on Bush's lack of taking it to the people, no one ever really knew that to be the case. There was a lot failure on the local levels, that got transferred to Bush, because he wasn't seen as working with those local governments.

Similarly, the biggest P.R. failure, either before and after the fact, was the Iraq War. There was no clarity of facts being given to the people on why we should invade Iraq. Bush would have been best served by having a series of speeches in order to keep people informed as to what was going on in the Security Council prior to the run up to the war. People, today, seem to blame Bush for "going it alone". But, does anyone realize that we were put in that position by the French, Germans, and the Russians and their veto powers in the U. N. Security Council? Those three countries used the threat of vetoes because they had such cozy trading commitments with Saddam. They put business concerns well ahead of anything else. Certainly, human rights.

That's my biggest problem with Bush. For that, I would think he will be judged more harshly than the reality justifies. Just my opinion.