Call me crazy, but I think a small part of us is going to miss George W. Bush.
Not so much the “Bombs for democracy!” aspects of his presidency, nor the “Science is for gay people” current than ran through it all. Not even the “Heckuva job letting thousands of Americans drown in the streets of a major city, Brownie” side of things. But you know, the good times: The choking on pretzels. The massaging German chancellors. The speeches about how, “Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country.”
I was 18 when W. was sworn in as the king of ‘merica. Not a girl, not yet a woman. In the eight years since - in no particular order - I’ve graduated from college, traveled around Europe, lost my virginity, discovered my favorite band, turned 21, developed a short-lived affinity for Camel Reds, lived in sin, gotten my first fulltime job, moved across the country, and most important of all, started a blog. And through it all, there has one been constant: the monkey-faced cowboy in the Oval Office making "decisions" and taking hilarious photos.
I never voted for G. Dubs, and disagreed with most of his policies, but still, in the maelstrom of late adolescences/early-mid 20s, it's nice to have some kind of constant. In a lot of ways, Georgie was mine. So, with the advice of Thumper in mind, I’ve decided to come up with Five Good things about the George W. Bush Presidency, as a way to send the old boy off:
1) We never did get attacked again. Sure 9/11 happened on his watch in the first place, and you could argue Iraq and Afghanistan did more harm than good, but the fact remains that American soil has been a safe haven from radical Islamic terrorism ever since W. promised to make it so. Now, radical hurricane terrorism and gun and drug violence are another story … but I digress.
2) He didn’t actually take away that many of our civil liberties. And considering the climate after 9/11, he could have. A lot of people liked to say the US "became like Nazi Germany” under Bush. These people have clearly never actually studied Nazi Germany.
3) The Daily Show got 1,000 times better under Bush. Honestly, both Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert should offer to walk Barney and Miss Beazley for the next five years. W’s many pratfalls made their careers.
4) AIDS in Africa. I’m too lazy to look up actual information on this, but I’ve read from various sources, both right and left, that Bush did more than any of his predecessors to help stop this epidemic.
5) We get to have Barack Obama now. W. messed things up so bad, America was willing to elect a black man president. I don’t know if Barry's going to be great, but I'd bet actual US dollars (now worth almost one Canadian dollar and a quarter of a British pound!) that he’ll be better. Was this last one kind of a back-handed compliment? Sure, but so were the last eight years.
Not so much the “Bombs for democracy!” aspects of his presidency, nor the “Science is for gay people” current than ran through it all. Not even the “Heckuva job letting thousands of Americans drown in the streets of a major city, Brownie” side of things. But you know, the good times: The choking on pretzels. The massaging German chancellors. The speeches about how, “Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country.”
I was 18 when W. was sworn in as the king of ‘merica. Not a girl, not yet a woman. In the eight years since - in no particular order - I’ve graduated from college, traveled around Europe, lost my virginity, discovered my favorite band, turned 21, developed a short-lived affinity for Camel Reds, lived in sin, gotten my first fulltime job, moved across the country, and most important of all, started a blog. And through it all, there has one been constant: the monkey-faced cowboy in the Oval Office making "decisions" and taking hilarious photos.
I never voted for G. Dubs, and disagreed with most of his policies, but still, in the maelstrom of late adolescences/early-mid 20s, it's nice to have some kind of constant. In a lot of ways, Georgie was mine. So, with the advice of Thumper in mind, I’ve decided to come up with Five Good things about the George W. Bush Presidency, as a way to send the old boy off:
1) We never did get attacked again. Sure 9/11 happened on his watch in the first place, and you could argue Iraq and Afghanistan did more harm than good, but the fact remains that American soil has been a safe haven from radical Islamic terrorism ever since W. promised to make it so. Now, radical hurricane terrorism and gun and drug violence are another story … but I digress.
2) He didn’t actually take away that many of our civil liberties. And considering the climate after 9/11, he could have. A lot of people liked to say the US "became like Nazi Germany” under Bush. These people have clearly never actually studied Nazi Germany.
3) The Daily Show got 1,000 times better under Bush. Honestly, both Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert should offer to walk Barney and Miss Beazley for the next five years. W’s many pratfalls made their careers.
4) AIDS in Africa. I’m too lazy to look up actual information on this, but I’ve read from various sources, both right and left, that Bush did more than any of his predecessors to help stop this epidemic.
5) We get to have Barack Obama now. W. messed things up so bad, America was willing to elect a black man president. I don’t know if Barry's going to be great, but I'd bet actual US dollars (now worth almost one Canadian dollar and a quarter of a British pound!) that he’ll be better. Was this last one kind of a back-handed compliment? Sure, but so were the last eight years.
God bless, George. Don’t let the door hit ya!
6 comments:
Very very nice, I don't think I could have come up with 1 good thing about G dub but there you go, you rock! BTW, if you ask any of these here Texans their answer is always the same when you say he's form Texas. No he's not, he's from some damn place in New England or somesuch. You know it's bad when the Texans won't admit to owning your sorry ass...
BTW, I gave you guys an award on my blog, go check it out!
Not only did he do a lot for helping the fight against AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa, he was about the only one willing to fight it.
He challenge Europe to do the same, and they ignored it. It's not like they mucked the whole political thing in Africa up in the first place, but hey, what are you going to do, right Europe?
We've also pledged monies to Africa for helping to reduce malaria and--I think, if I remember the numbers correctly--that he helped get more money pointed toward neglected diseases in Africa as well as South and Central Americas than has been pledged before by other governments.
The best thing about W's presidency? He turned Will Ferrell into a star.
What? Bush did more than Reagan - whose administration prevented the then-Surgeon General from letting people know about AIDS (which they steadfastly called "GRID," or "gay-related immuno-deficiency") for years in the early 80s - to combat AIDS?
I don't believe it.
Also, Camel Reds? Did you hate boys who wanted to kiss you?
It was short lived dalliance, Pistols. For many reasons.
To his (sort of) credit, he's also not a racist, despite what Kanye thinks. George is fine with brown people, black people, red people, etc. He just doesn't care about poor people.
I'll bet George is the happiest guy in the country today, too. I'm willing to bet he's as ready to be rid of us as we are to be rid of him.
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