Posted on 08/27/2010 2:31:32 PM PDT by STARWISE
George W. Bush has been the presidential equivalent of a punching bag. Before he left office, he was vilified for the war in the Middle East, the credit crisis and the housing crisis. Democrats ran against his persona and policies in the 2008 election and successfully painted the Republican nominee for President, Arizona Sen. John McCain, as his Doppelganger.
He was radioactive, and even Republicans viewed him as such. But these days, though he's seemingly blamed for everything but bad weather by the left, Bush is making a comeback. As President Obama's approval numbers slide, people are starting to see the man they once laughed at and loathed isn't looking so bad.
Start with the economy. For all the finger-pointing backward, a Rasmussen survey released Aug. 3 shows that slightly more Americans, 48% of voters, now believe that Obama's policies are to blame for the dour economy than the 47% who fault Bush.
Handling of terrorism has also been a factor. Bush may have been stubborn at times, but when it came to hardheadedness on stopping radical suicide bombers in their tracks, it was welcomed - especially after Sept. 11.
Obama, on the other hand, has been slower to respond in many homeland security crises and not as stalwart. From the Times Square bomber to the Fort Hood shooter, to the Christmas Day underwear bomber (and Obama's inaccurate explanation that it was an "isolated incident"), these stumbles hurt the President's credibility and made many of us yearn for Bush's consistent decisiveness.
In fact, many on the left are oddly calling for Bush to weigh in on the Ground Zero mosque, hoping he can shed some wisdom and clarity, since Obama has provided us with exactly the opposite.
When it comes to Iraq, Bush took heat for the surge; however, the visual of troops pulling out of Iraq last week in many ways vindicated his approach. So much, in fact, that Obama is dedicating an entire speech on the subject after his Martha's Vineyard vacation.
It's an opportunity to take credit for a success in a war that he opposed and an exit strategy - the surge - that he voted against. Despite Obama's political posturing, or whether you disagree with the initial invasion or not, a perceived victory in Iraq is because of our troops - and Bush.
Of course, manmade disasters like 9/11 were one thing. Natural disasters were another. Bush's presidency took a turn for the worse after Hurricane Katrina.
He was impugned for his response and arguably never recovered. Until the gulf oil spill, and the bungling by the Obama administration of the response, many didn't believe the government and its leader could react so poorly. Apparently, it's all relative.
In early June, in the midst of the spill, 69% of those surveyed in an ABC News-Washington Post poll rated the federal response to the Deepwater Horizon leak negatively - a higher percentage than faulted the response in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Rest @ link
Maybe something like: “hey Barney, are you glad to see me or is that a banana in your pocket??”
Thank you for posting this. Really enjoyed reading this thread, too.
bttt
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