George W Bush: I want to be remembered for liberating fifty million people

In an end-of-presidency interview, George W Bush has recorded some of the things he hopes to be remembered for:

Iraq and Afghanistan: "I'd like to be a president (known) as somebody who liberated 50 million people and helped achieve peace."

Compassionate conservatism: "He also said he wanted to be seen as a president who helped individuals, "that rallied people to serve their neighbor; that led an effort to help relieve HIV/AIDS and malaria on places like the continent of Africa; that helped elderly people get prescription drugs and Medicare as a part of the basic package."" (Breitbart).

Education: "I think the No Child Left Behind Act is one of the significant achievements of my administration because we said loud and clear to educators, parents and children that we expect the best for every child, that we believe every child can learn, and that in return for Federal money we expect there to be an accountability system in place to determine whether every child is learning to read, write, and add and subtract."

First Lady Laura Bush spoke specifically about women's rights:

"It's certainly been very rewarding to look at Afghanistan and both know that the president and the United States military liberated women there; that women and girls can be in school now; that women can walk outside their doors without a male escort," the first lady said, according to White House excerpts. "I worry about Afghanistan, but I will always have a special place in my heart for the women that I've met there," she said. "I think as we look all around the Middle East, we'll see that women can be the ones who really lead the freedom movement, and that American women are standing so strongly, I think, with the women in Afghanistan and other places."

In the video below Laura Bush talks to Meet The Press about women's issues in Afghanistan:

Comments

[Malcolm Dunn]

I don't think history will be kind to him, he's leaving the USA in a lot worse state than when he became president.
Having said that,I always thought he was a decent man certainly much better than the man he succeeded, sadly in politics you need more qualities than to just be decent. Bush,in my opinion ,lacked them.

[Tony Makara]

Mr Bush, you will be remembered, along with Mr Blair, for murdering Iraqi children as they slept peacefully in their beds. You lied when you said Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. As a result many are now dead. Your political epitaph is written in the blood of the innocent, you have brought shame to the people of America.

[Tim Montgomerie]

Many more people have died when the "civilised" world has walked away from disaster, eg Rwanda and Darfur, than when we have acted. I will remember George W Bush fondly. History will also be kinder than current opinion polls.

[Tony Makara]

Editor, I agree that the world should not have allowed the carnage in Rwanda. However there is a difference between intervention on humanitarian grounds and intervention on a false premise to gain access to oil reserves.

We all know that it was Saddam's desire to have oil priced in Euro's which ultimately put a noose around Saddam's neck.

[Martin Sewell]

Tony, you are utterly wrong in your suggestion that the Iraq war was about access to oil for the US. When it was launched, Canada had just located massive oil reserves and West Africa was another easy place for access. The President could have simply accepted the status quo and bought the oil off Saddam for a whole lot less than the cost of the war.

The liberal media decided at an early stage to ascribe not one virtue to President Bush and too many Brits just bought it. It became cooler to giggle at tired jokes than to think.

In fact George Bush was a far more decent and intelligent man than the majority of his critics - few of whom could match his Harvard MBA and fewer still realised that his academic scores were superior to those of supposedly "intelligent" Al Gore.

Over Iraq you overlook two important points.

First the reason that the UN was completely useless as a forum was that France and Russia were heavily invested in the Saddam oil industry and were never going to allow a UN sanction for intervention, no matter what. ( It WAS a crisis, partly about oil- but rather the Russian/French interests in holdng up an utter tyrant).

Second the security information was shared with almost every senior US political figure of note. Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Teddy Kennedy, John Kerry - you name them - they were all privileged members of the Security committee that received the same intelligence material avaialble to the President. Not a single one of them made a different judgement than that made by the President.

You speak of the civilian casualties. If you have any familiarity with the history of the liberation of Europe you will know that that noble enterprise had its full measure of civilian casualties; that was not a reason for leaving Hitler in power.

George Bush had three major problems in his Presidency. 9/11, the Dot/Com bubble, and the Sub-Prime Mortgage debacle. All had their origins in the Clinton years and now we are seeing the same figures being re-appointed by the media darling, Obama. Some change.

Incidentally Dubya also had a superb record for making ethnic minority appointments both in Texas and Nationally - something we have yet to see from the great White/Black /"whatever" hope.

[Tony Makara]

"The President could have simply accepted the status quo and bought the oil off Saddam for a whole lot less than the cost of the war."

Martin, George Bush and others counted on a quick surgical victory followed by a puppet regime that could keep order. Neither have happened. Perhaps it came as a surprise t Bush that if you invade and occupy a county its inhabitants are going to regroup and start shooting back at you.

Your attempt to equate the removal of Hitler with that of Saddam is a complete non sequitur. The circumstances are entirely different even if the underlying causes were more about regime change than the dispute of the day.

It is great tragedy for the world that US/UK foreign policy has fallen into disrepute because of events in Iraq. This makes it far more difficult for the West to occupy the moral high ground when trying to hold a resurgent and hegemonistic Russia to account.

Those who want a safer world need first to understand that a safer world cannot be imposed by force but can only come to fruition through building consensus. This is the only way to build a popular global front against rogue states and despotic leaders. Unilateralism is a one-way ticket to a divided and more dangerous world.

[Raj]

I want never gets.

[Conservative Friend of Palestine]

When debating the morality of Iraq we just need to ask ourselves one question:

Did Saddam Hussein have weapons of mass destruction that could kill us all in 45 minutes?

That was why we were told we were going into Iraq; not to "bring democracy", spread human rights, "liberate" the Iraqis or any other reason.

If the answer to the question is no, then the war was illegal and immoral and Bush, Blair, et al, lied to us. For that reason, they and all the other politicians who lied and lied and lied to us about the reasons for invading Iraq deserve to meet the same fate as Milosevic in the International War Crimes Tribunal. They are criminals, traitors and liars, every one of them.

[Martin Sewell]

Tony
I think you overlook the problem that some countries are so driven by self interest - and Russia and France are notably more inclined that way than the USA - that the search for consensus is a paralysing process. You only have to look at Darfur and the delay of the Clinton Administration over the Balkans to see the obvious examples.

In contrast there are three successes of the President's administration. First Libya that was driven out of support for terrorism because its leader was bright enough to read the writing on the wall.

Second Noth Korea which - although still a work in progress - is following a similar path.

Third Northern Ireland.

For nearly a century the US administration had been soft on Irish terrorism. The Kennedies and the Boston/New York Democrats
were the main apologists.

With the advent of the southerner George Bush, the White House suddenly had an incumbent that had a straightforward approach to such matters. After 9/11 he announced a "War on Terror" - and meant it. All Terror - no exceptions.

Thus he was prepared to work with Yassar Arafat and became the first American President to call for an Independent Palestinian homeland but when Arafat resorted to type and was caught smuggling Iranian arms, Dubya ostracised him once and for all. If you give your word you keep it - its part of the Texan culture and Arafat and the European sophisticates found it beyond them.

Similarly with the IRA. the war on terror meant that Gerry Adams could not longer expect easy access to the White House ( cf Clinton) and terror was taken off the agenda by a President who would have dried up their funding because he was that rare thing - A consistent politician.

And just by the by, who on 9/11 would have laid money on the President being able to keep the USA free of a similar attack for the rest of his terms?

As the bumper sticker says,Tony, Dubya has been busy "saving your sorry **** whether you like it or not". You may not appreciate him yet, but history will provide a much fairer judgement.

[Martin Sewell]

Conservative Friend of Palestine

Those of you that continue to assert and declare the war "Illegal" ( which I regard as a relatively meaningless term in the world of realpolitik) do have the problem on Overthrow Day Plus 1 of necessarily requiring the return of the former regime.

I am comfortable with the proposition that the currently elected government of Iraq is the legitimate choice of the people - for all its difficulties and division.

Hitler was the elected leader of Germany and was similarly overthrown and a new Constitutional settlement imposed by the victors. We could have defeated him, restored the borders and left him in situ. We do not keep hearing a clamour against that "illegal regime change". There comes a time to move on.

If you are not willing to do this then who exactly do you say is the lawful Government of Iraq?

I suspect you prefer the outcome we have, but like too many, wish the outcome without taking the responsibility for making the grown up decisions that have to be made to bring it about.

[Umbrella man]

Bush should also be remembered for improving US relations with India and China.

He also invested hugely in fighting AIDS and malaria in Africa.

[Tony Makara]

Martin, you make many points, but really you need to focus on the main point. Did George Bush lie to the world when he said that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction? If so then he should be remembered by history as a man who launched a war under a false pretext.

We can't airbrush away the fact that the leader of the free world acted in such an irresponsible way. The lies of George Bush and the support of adherents like Tony Blair and some Conservatives have made the world a far more dangerous place today. After Bush has gone there will be much work to be done in building bridges and gaining the trust of the international community once again.

[Malcolm Dunn]

If I remember correctly it was Blair rather than Bush who told most of the lies regarding WMD's (dodgy dossier et al).

[martin sewell]

Tony

I answer you directly as you ask. The President did not lie.

He made a judgement based upon the best available evidence and the not unreasonable ( but erroneous) assumption that Saddam would not be so stupid as to provoke an inevitable invasion unless he had something to hide.

There is a world of difference between a lie and a wrong judgement based upon the best available evidence.

A jury that honestly convicts an innocent man makes a mistake; it does not "lie" .

I do not personally attack you Tony ( you often post seriously and interestingly) but I do get rather tired of the lack of attention paid by the anti war lobby to the basic meaning of words. You are far too bright to continue to get sucked along into that empty unsustainable rhetoric.

I have already stressed that under the American system the evidence was made available on a cross party basis to the seniors of both parties and they all called it the same way. There is no reason for anyone to believe that those senior politicians would not have taken a different view if that was how the evidence came out. None of them, as far as I am aware, accuses the President of lying and the President elect does not seem to hold it against Hillary Clinton that she made the same honest judgement as the President. Presumably if he thought she was a party to the same "lie" it would have come out in the campaign and he would not be appointing her. Or are we going into a 'cover up" conspiracy much beloved of the left?

You and many others also forget that at the time the UN investigator Hans Blick's position was supported by the usual anti war lobby when he asked for more time because he thought that given that time he would find the weapons of mass distruction.. What he was plainly saying by this was that he too believed they existed...... and he was supposed to be the impartial expert.

Let's be absolutely clear on this, the guy the anti war people supported to be given more time was saying that he WOULD FIND THEM. This rather suggests that he too, with on the ground experience was of similar mind to the President.

The difference was that after 9/11 the President took his duty to protect his homeland seriously. The earnest Swede could afford to
take his time and be wrong. The President had no such luxury

[Andrew S]

Not likely I'm afraid, George. But keep hoping.

[Tony Makara]

Martin, it would be a good thing if more Conservatives like David Davis were open about the fact that they were misled into supporting war with Iraq by the presentation of fake evidence. I fail to see what can be gained by Conservative MPs sticking to the line that the war was justified, even if like myself they are repulsed by what Saddam did to Iraq.

The fact that regime change occured as a result of falsehoods presented about WMDs does not justify the original and determining case for war presented before Parliament.

There are many theories about how and why the Iraq war occured, most of which can be discounted and as you say most of the fantastic stories put out by the left-led anti-war lobby about Zionist plots are a nonsense. Israel benefit from Saddam's demise though they certainly didn't orchestrate it, no matter how powerful the Jewish lobby in Washington.

The reality is much more simple and brutal, America did not want Saddam to price oil in Euro's rather than Dollar's, this is also behind much of the vitriol aimed at Iran today. Although I concede that the world should aim to prevent the proliferation of nuclear technolgy, and Iran should be persuaded to rein in its ambitions.

People will argue that Bush didn't lie but acted on bad intelligence, however its hard to believe that a man who is intelligent enough to become president of the United States, surrounded by other men and women of high intellect, could be duped by fake intelligence time after time. The more likely reality is that Bush, and those close to him, accepted any inaccurate/loaded intelligence or information from Iraqi opposition dissidents with an opportunistic eye and acted accordingly to promte what they saw as America's best interests. Sadly that one-dimensional worldview has been very costly.

[Steevo]

"The reality is much more simple and brutal, America did not want Saddam to price oil in Euro's rather than Dollar's, this is also behind much of the vitriol aimed at Iran today."

You need to contact our hard Left as they've pretty much abandoned the "blood for oil" thing. Your's is an angle I think will be so different to most it might give new life to an old mantra even tho their O will be in soon.

The big lie many here have seen in all these years is the claim, as a matter of "principle" that US troops should have left in the midst of the war. Like a mentally-ill callousness willing to accept genocide-like death, massive terror bases and the probability for major war with surrounding nations, but, just never talked about.

Not much talk about the recipients of the real oil scandal either, benefiting from the UN's "oil for food" and, voting against the US intervention.

[Denise]

If we went to war for Iraq's oil, then why the heck are we having the debate about off shore drilling? The answer is simple. We didn't TAKE Iraq's oil.

[garrett]

I think that george bush is doing a fine job.....i me if u think u can do a better job get off ur ass and run for president

[Andy]

Tony Makara

There’s been no breaking of laws or impeachable offenses during GB's tenure.

We face real threats in the world. Don’t give us this ‘blood for oil’ thing.
If the USA were trading blood for oil they would’ve already seized Iraq’s oil fields and let the rest of the country go to hell.

And don’t give us this ‘Bush Lied…People Died’ kind of crap either. If GWB was the liar that many left wing morons take him for, he could’ve EASILY had chemical weapons planted in Iraq, to be ‘discovered’ at a later date.

No. Instead, he didn't lie, he owned up to the fact that the intelligence was faulty.

The rest of the world thought Saddam had the goods, same as me. Let me also remind you that regime change in Iraq was official US policy before GWB came into office.

Some guy named ‘Clinton‘ established that policy.

Bet you didn’t know that, did you?