In final press conference, Bush defends his legacy
 

WASHINGTON – In a nostalgic final news conference, President George W. Bush defended his record vigorously and at times sentimentally Monday — and admitted mistakes, too, including his optimistic Iraq speech before a giant "Mission Accomplished" banner in 2003.

After starting what he called "the ultimate exit interview" with a lengthy and personalized thank-you to the reporters in the room who have covered him over the eight years of his presidency, Bush showed anger at times when presented with some of the main criticisms of his time in office.

He particularly became indignant when asked about America's bruised image overseas.

"I disagree with this assessment that, you know, that people view America in a dim light," he said.

With the Iraq war in its sixth year, he most aggressively defended his decisions on that issue, which will define his presidency like no other. There have been over 4,000 U.S. deaths since the invasion and toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003.

He said that "not finding weapons of mass destruction was a significant disappointment." The accusation that Saddam had and was pursuing weapons of mass destruction was Bush's main initial justification for going to war.

Bush admitted another miscalculation: Eager to report quick progress after U.S. troops ousted Saddam's government, he claimed less than two months after the war started that "in the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed," a claim made under a "Mission Accomplished" banner that turned out to be wildly optimistic. "Clearly, putting `Mission Accomplished' on an aircraft carrier was a mistake," he said Monday.

He also defended his decision in 2007 to send an additional 30,000 American troops to Iraq to knock down violence levels and stabilize life there.

"The question is, in the long run, will this democracy survive, and that's going to be a question for future presidents," he said.

On another issue destined to figure prominently in his legacy, Bush said he disagrees with those who say the federal response to Hurricane Katrina was slow.

"Don't tell me the federal response was slow when there were 30,000 people pulled off roofs right after the storm passed. ... Could things been done better? Absolutely. But when I hear people say the federal response was slow, what are they going to say to those chopper drivers or the 30,000 who got pulled off the roof?" he said.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090112/...ews_conference

I wish I had seen it. I bet it was as absurd as this.

I enjoyed the press conference. Straight and to the point. A little humor but kind of sad.

People can criticize Bush's legacy all they want to but they need to remember that a lot goes on that the president doesn't initiate or have complete control over. The president is the "fall guy" for many decisions and the target of domestic and international hatred when things fail. That makes sense because populations are at the whim of their governments and those in power. You verbally (or, unfortunately physically) attack the visible target because that's the only target you know about/have access to.

I hope that Obama has a successful presidency. However, I won't give him full credit for most of the successes and failures that occur in the next 4 years. A lot of it won't be of his doing. He will, however, bore the hell out of me with his speaking style. Hopefully he'll get over the "charismatic speaker" gig soon enough. I'll try to stomach him enough to enjoy his historic inauguration speech. Afterall, I did vote for him.

LOL.

It wasn't absurd.

I know what it means to miss New Orleans.
 

Okay, so people were pulled off roofs. Eventually.

What about the REST of the FEMA response? AND . . . how about that botched response to Ike?!

I still say - Federal response to Katrina was slow. It still IS slow - there are too many people still not able to return home, still too much to be done. Some of it may be laid at the feet of the government, some at insurance companies. But still - to be as righteously indignant as he was about the response to Katrina is a bit much.

Bush was a big disappointment.

The response was slow in comparison to . . . the other time we had a catastrophic flooding of the 9th Ward?

Everything is relative, and without any sort of basis for comparison, it sounds like the last line ("Bush was a disappointment") is informing everything before it, instead of the other way around.

It was slow in comparison to what would be an appropriate reaction to ANY national disaster. And that isn't even going into the role the failure of the levees (thanks, Army COE!) played in that. My point is Bush has nerve acting indignant that his administration has been criticized for their handling of Katrina. If it makes you feel any better, I think democrat Ray Nagin blew it on a city level, too.

I only commented on that part of the press conference because I saw that part.

As for the disappointment - that is a general observation about his entire two terms. I voted for him the first time, didn't the second. I expected much better from him, and am afraid he was not able to rise to the office.

Well said

This is completely meaningless tripe, and borderline tautological - it's like saying "Bush's response was inadequate because it was not enough" or something similar.

Remember - you're using a personal definition of "slow" or "appropriate" that is based in, as far as I know, absolutely zero professional or specialized knowledge. Bush is disagreeing, based on both professional/specialized knowledge, and an offsetting personal bias. Which one is showing more "nerve"? Or are they basically doing the same thing?

I mean, feel free to judge the man's actions from afar, but it's kind of silly to act like he has "some nerve" when you're assigning to him actions/results/etc. that are, as DrPhil has noted, only marginally within his control (or are largely out of his control). That seems awkward to me.

I really appreciate KSig RC.

So you believe and Brownie and his minions did a great job with Katrina? Adequate job? What? And that only those with professional/specialized knowledge are entitled to an opinion which is not "meaningless tripe"? As far as I know, you have no professional/specialized knowledge in this area, so does your response now count as nothing? I would be interested in what criteria you are using in defending the response to Katrina. Maybe you have some information I do not, and that would inform my opinion. I doubt it, but am always open to having to change my opinion. We are perhaps using a different definition of "adequate" for the federal response.

Bush specified one very isolated aspect of the federal response to the disaster, and wants us to believe that it is representative. Given the reams of coverage of Katrina - before, during and after - I'd say that anyone who wanted to judge the federal government's response has plenty of information with which to make an informed decision. The most telling fact is that here we are, years later, and the levees are still in danger of failing again, residents are still not able to return, and the city is still suffering. No, Bush is not responsible in the sense that he made every decision, but he is in the sense that he appointed those who were. The buck stops with him. He was certainly ready to take credit for the response to 9/11.

As to whether or not professional/specialized knowledge is required to judge the federal government's actions, I'd have to defer to C.S. Lewis, who famously said that the problem with allowing only those in a field to judge is that you then have to decide the criteria for who is entitled to an opinion. I don't have specialized/professional knowledge in foreign affairs, or finance, or a host of other aspects of the government. That does not mean I am not fully able to judge the actions of my elected representatives. Using your logic, almost none of us should be able to have an opinion regarding almost anything other than our limited professional/specialized field of knowledge.

eta - back on topic, at least somewhat - what do you think will be the final overall verdict on Bush? I'd predict it will be a mixed bag - that history will give him credit for some things he did well that are currently not being discussed much, but his handling of Iraq will be negatively viewed. That's my meaningless, tripey opinion.

Agreed - I'll also add that no responsible historian would judge a Presidency, or the actions during that presidency, so soon after it ended (or so close to the end of the Presidency). It is only after the passage of a number of years (decades even), when you look at the long-term affects, that you can fairly examine a Presidency.

I think you're largely misinterpreting RC's statement, and getting at two different issues. No one is saying that you can't make your own judgments about decisions made during the Presidency. The fact is, though, that many of these judgments are outside the grasp and understanding of the average voter, or, even the average college graduate. The simple fact is that most of us don't have that expertise, and that most of us don't have the (largely classified) information on which those decisions were based. Most of us have to understand our own limitations (both intellectually and professionally), and realize that we may not understand everything there is to know about governance.

As American citizens, we have the right to hold our elected officials accountable through our votes and through referenda. That doesn't mean we have the expertise necessary to completely understand these decisions, or that we know the whole story.

"Why did the financial collapse HAVE TO HAPPEN ON MY WATCH?! Pathetic!!"

LOL...Bush is a riot.

Oh, I don't pretend to "completely understand" any aspect of politics - like every other average citizen, I have to make my judgements using the information that is out there. My husband is a political columnist, so I do have an opportunity to access some information that maybe isn't out in the mainstream media. But in this day and age, I'd say the average citizen can access, with a little work, plenty of information regarding the issues of the day.

The success or failure of a political action is the ultimate deciding factor. You don't have to have all the classified information regarding Katrina to be able to look at New Orleans and decide whether or not the city, state and federal responses were effective. The proof of the pudding is in the eating.

The whole concept of being a good president or a bad president is rubbish and it's especially unfair to judge a president based on things that are out of his control. I think that Bush was a solid president, I agree with his foreign policy decisions and feel that while the Fed could have done a few things differently, the economic collapse was inevitable. Its very easy to blame him but not necessarily correct to do so.

I'll leave the first paragraph alone, because that can be a whole different thread (how relevant information is analyzed by the media, and what information is actually released to the media), but I will say that your second paragraph takes an interesting view.

Going by your second paragraph, that all you have to do is "taste the pudding", would mean that you knew exactly how things should have turned out, given the finances available, the issues with local authorities, and every other factor. No one on this thread is saying that everything was done correctly in this Presidency - but by the same token, I think it's quite a logical leap (including making a lot of assumptions about the process) to say that you can look solely at the results of a decision and know how things should have been handled.

I don't think you can decide whether or not every individual decision was correct, but you can decide if all of the decisions together equaled a successful outcome. That doesn't mean that you can decide how "things should have been handled" (although close analysis may indeed suggest ways things could have been done differently) , but you can decide if the way they WERE was ultimately effective.

I am intrigued by the idea that there are no good or bad presidents, and that we are "incorrect" if we criticize a president. I consider moral relativism to be a very, VERY slippery slope. I always think of the sociology experiment where college students were asked if Hitler was evil, and the number who made relativist arguments that no, he wasn't evil, there were extenuating circumstances. :rolleyes:

I think you're overstating things again. No one is saying that "there are no good or bad presidents," or that you're "incorrect" if you criticize a president. What we are saying, or at least what I'm saying, is that it's far too early to make some of these judgments.

Really? I thought he said it here.

An overall judgment? Perhaps - but I do think it is possible to have an opinion regarding certain actions taken by his administration at this "early" date.

I understand that's your opinion - while the news media and political pundits do make these types of observations during and soon after the end of someone's term. I just don't agree with the wisdom of it from my point of view as a history major and someone with a rather broad base of knowledge in Presidential politics (and politics as a whole).

History may say that Bush's presidency was a success or that it was a failure, or that it was something in between, but I don't agree with these final judgments so early, whether it's a negative judgment or a positive judgment. Once the Presidential papers are released, and more information is available, then I'll be more comfortable making a judgment one way or another.

By definition you won't have a "final" judgment until . . .well, I guess you never really do have a final judgment. I think political judgments regarding officials and their actions are in a constant state of flux. As more is known, as time passes, often that initial judgment will change. It doesn't mean that officials should somehow avoid having their actions discussed and analyzed - it just means that we should all realize nothing is written in stone.

This is actually exactly what I'm railing against. Maybe I'm not being clear, so I'll explain further.

My basic point is twofold:

1 - You're assigning massive blame to Bush for something that was nearly entirely out of his control (in multiple senses, including: act of God, literally singular in nature/scope/scale, actions of others overrode his actual role, etc.); and

2 - You're hand-wringing without giving any context, which because of #1 brings us the problem with tautology (by this I mean, I'd prefer if we got into specifics instead of saying "too slow" or similar).


My comparison was between your opinion and Bush's stated opinion, which you seem to feel rather strongly about. My opinion of your opinion (LOL) is based in an education in formal logic, etc., so I would hardly call it "uninformed" but yes, my opinion of Katrina would largely be regurgitated from media reports and my own biases, and wouldn't add much to the conversation. Hence, I didn't give it.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't give yours - feel free.

I mean, this is what I'm getting at - I'm sure there were mistakes made, and clearly it doesn't appear to be the most efficient from the outside, but I'm not sure why we expected a seamless operation out of a.) the Federal Government and b.) something that's never really happened before, ever.

In that regard, it seems silly to make sweeping judgment of the man.

It's fair if you feel like this, but I respectfully think it's pie-in-the sky and not really true.

I'm really not interested in telling you NOT to have an opinion, and if that's what you got from my previous post, well we're not really rowing the same boat.

No, you graciously allowed me to have an opinion, although you have tagged it as "meaningless tripe", but also made it quite clear that you regarded only opinions which come from those with professional/specialized knowledge as being worthwhile. I respectfully disagree.

I'm not going to hijack the thread with a discussion of Bush's role in the handling of Katrina, other than to say that my opinion is not an isolated one, and even some with professional/specialized knowlege have been critical of it. Bush directly addressed only one aspect of the federal response - the helicopters rescuing residents after the storm - and asked us to take that isolated aspect and let it be representative of the whole federal response. Is Bush trying to use synecdoche? I don't know. But if it is not fair to judge Bush for actions over which he did not have direct control, it is not fair for him to take credit for the same. That is one reason why I think he was "nervy".

eta - to get back on topic. Those of you who saw the press conference - what do you think of Bush's "defense"?

Your sentence was meaningless because it lacked any substance, not because you're a layperson or whatever.

Your condemnation of Bush's statements is ironic given the lack of expertise - he's "nervy" for defending himself, but you're fine judging from afar, that was my point.

I found it refreshing to see an elected official have a sort of comfort with speaking from the hip - we don't often see these guys "unplugged" and given that Bush is an unusually poor public speaker for a President, he seemed markedly more comfortable than I would have expected.

Now, it was still awkward - obviously nowhere near 30,000 people were pulled off roofs, so he's still not exactly factually correct - but it kind of reinforced my image of Bush as a guy who I'd probably want to drink a beer with, someone who is most likely a Peter Principle victim to a certain extent but likely not the functional retard he's been portrayed as in certain places. Maybe that's how low the bar has been set, but I enjoyed it much more than I expected. It's not 'normal' charisma, but there's still a little there for GW, at least enough to see how he got where he is now.

I think that approachable, guy I'd like to have a beer with vibe is a big part of Bush's appeal. I know that in the Texas gubernatorial race he came off as Joe Six-Pack, which is quite a trick when you are born into the kind of privilege he was. He was a good governor, but the thing most of America does not know is that the governor of Texas is not a powerful position. I don't know that it is a sufficient indicator of executive ability. (Warning - personal general opinion follows) I initially was impressed by the team he assembled, but I fear that some of them did not live up to their potential. It may be that events did not play to his strengths.


I will be interested in hearing his final speech, when he gets to control his message more than in a press conference.

Most politicians do this to some extent, especially at the higher levels of office. If you're in a position to run for the Presidency, you're probably not a "Joe Six-Pack," either because of your intelligence, your wealth, or both.

President-Elect Obama did a fantastic job of it during the election; he's a reasonably-wealthy, well-educated person who went to a private high school, and to talk to some people, they would tell you he's Joe Everyman. McCain did it as well during his campaign, trying to play down his wife's wealth. The fact is that there are very few people in the country who could truly relate to someone who is running for that high of an office.

Some do it better than others - I think Hillary faltered some (I'm thinking of the drinking beer incident- AWKWARD), and McCain TRIED to do it, but I don't know that he was successful. The whole "How many houses do you have" thing turned many off. Palin was masterful at it, but couldn't convince voters that hey, she's just like you, but she could be president. Palin and Obama have the advantage of having had middle-class upbringings. It's an interesting dilemma - to come off as approachable and human, but also competent and, for lack of a better word, presidential. Of course, it's all a matter of perception, and being able to get your image across through the media.