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On Wednesday’s The O’Reilly Factor, during the show’s regular "Miller Time" segment, Dennis Miller defended the practice of waterboarding terrorists to save the lives of Americans, calling the technique "heaven-sent." Miller: "Something that takes somebody who's willing to strap a bomb on and yet freaks them out to the point where they'll tell you where the next bomb is by pouring water down their nose and they don't even die, I think, wow, this is heaven-sent." He also heaped praise on President Bush for "keeping this country safe in the interim seven years" since the 9/11 attacks. Miller: "That's what...

As I look back over the last eight years, I am filled with pride in my husband and his accomplishments. When George and I met, I fell in love with a man who is gracious, humble and sincere. And the qualities that I liked most in him are the same characteristics that have served our nation well in challenging times. George is a man with a heart for people. He is a loving husband and devoted father. He has great inner strength, which has allowed him to make the difficult decisions a president faces - not because they are popular,...

In one of his final actions in the White House, President Bush on Thursday declared Jan. 18 to be “National Sanctity of Human Life Day.” “All human life is a gift from our creator that is sacred, unique and worthy of protection. On National Sanctity of Human Life Day, our country recognizes that each person, including every person waiting to be born, has a special place and purpose in this world,” reads the presidential proclamation. “The most basic duty of government is to protect the life of the innocent. My administration has been committed to building a culture of life...

As the curtain closes on the presidency of George W. Bush, the one loose end dangling is the pardon of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. In 2007 Mr. Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, was convicted for perjury and obstruction of justice. Let us be clear about the Bush legacy. After September 11, not a year into Mr. Bush's term, his became a war presidency. George Bush's place in history will turn on what becomes of Iraq and al Qaeda. If Iraq fails, history will mark down the Bush presidency. If by fits and starts Iraq grows into the...

President Bush held his last Cabinet Meeting this morning TranscriptPresident Bush met this morning with President Calderón of MexicoTranscriptThis afternoon President Bush honored President Uribe, Prime Minister Howard, and Prime Minister Blair. Transcript Enjoy your visit to Sanity Island

Today the President held his last formal news conference at the White House in Washington DC. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice released the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief 2009 Annual Report to Congress. Pray for President Bush - Day 3036. Enjoy Sanity Island

Leadership: George W. Bush was pegged as a hate figure even before being sworn in. Yet he resisted bitterness, stuck to principle and became what history will judge to be one of our better presidents.We may have witnessed in the last eight the Anti-Watergate. Richard Milhous Nixon never forgot a slight, used federal law enforcement powers against his political enemies and infuriated the Republican Party's conservative base with policies ranging from wage and price controls to detente with communists to Supreme Court appointments. Soon-to-be-ex-President Bush, on the other hand, has taken at least as much personal abuse, yet his graciousness...

**An ongoing collection of quotes from Bush about faith, his relationship with God, religion & politics, gay marriage, and more.** ### President Bush is a Methodist and has been very open about the role of faith in his life. Below are selections from recent speeches and interviews in which he mentions his faith or religious topics. ~~~ On God, War, and Freedom "Freedom is on the march in this world. I believe everybody in the Middle East desires to live in freedom. I believe women in the Middle East want to live in a free society. I believe mothers and...

President George W. Bush will give a farewell address to the nation Thursday night, billed by the administration as a chance to reflect on his tenure and welcome Barack Obama without fighting old battles one last time. Bush will deliver the speech, expected to run 10 to 15 minutes, from the ornate East Room of the White House. He will have a small audience of people in the room, chosen for their stories of personal courage. White House press secretary Dana Perino said Monday that Bush will "uphold the tradition of presidents using farewell addresses to look forward — .......

SAN FRANCISCO — In its waning days, the Bush administration is ushering in last-minute immigration policy changes that could have a major effect on Bay Area courtrooms, workplaces and immigrant communities. U.S. Attorney General Michael Mukasey ruled this week that foreign nationals have no automatic right to a lawyer in deportation cases, overturning a common claim through which immigrants represented by incompetent lawyers could get another hearing before being deported. "This has been entrenched in the law for such a very long time that people have grown to rely on it," said San Francisco immigration lawyer Karl Krooth. "That's perhaps...

President George W. Bush marked the anniversary of his No Child Left Behind law, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2009, during a visit with students, teachers and national educators at the General Philip Kearny School in Philadelphia. Mrs. Laura Bush accompanied her husband. TRANSCRIPT Vice President Dick Cheney presided over a Joint Session of Congress today for the certification of the Electoral College votes. United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice returned to a meeting on the situation in Gaza at United Nations Headquarters in New York.

WASHINGTON – Vice President Dick Cheney said Thursday that he sees no reason for President George W. Bush to pre-emptively pardon anyone at the CIA involved in harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists. "I don't have any reason to believe that anybody in the agency did anything illegal," he said. In an interview with The Associated Press, Cheney also said that Bush has no need to apologize for not foreseeing the economic crisis. "I don't think he needs to apologize. I think what he needed to do is take bold, aggressive action and he has," Cheney said. "I don't think anybody...

President George W. Bush departs with low approval ratings. Appraisals of presidents sometimes change over time, and sometimes they don’t. *snip* No doubt the Internet dervishes will pepper this and other assessments of Bush with their standard displays of anonymous ferocity. There are a lot of 14-year-olds with Internet connections. But when the Jon Meacham of 150 years from now goes about his task with Bush, that historian will have as much material and more, as did the author of “American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House.” And the verdict will be nearly the same: Here was an extraordinary...

“Thank you President Bush God Bless” is what 14-year-old Chrissy Doolittle’s sign read. The Leesburg resident stood holding her sign by the Washington Monument for nearly an hour and a half Saturday afternoon with her mother and grandmother to thank President George W. Bush for his eight years in office. Chrissy’s family was part of a group of around 150 people – the majority of them from Loudoun County – who wanted to make sure that their voices of gratitude were heard, even as Bush’s approval ratings hover around 30 percent and the area and nation turn their focus toward...

President and Mrs. Bush returned to the White House today from Crawford TX where they spent part of the holidays.

Barack Obama is a lock as the Man of the Year. His election to the presidency is the story of the year. If popularity is the measure, those choices are hard to contest. However, if significance is the yardstick, then the 2008 crown goes to Gen. David Petraeus, former commander of coalition forces in Iraq and current head of CENTCOM. Not only is his defeat of the Iraqi insurgency the story of the year, how he achieved it is the most underreported story of the year. I didn't come to this conclusion by comparing achievements. I compared the consequences of...

A federal judge in Washington ruled Tuesday that the government was properly holding two Guantánamo detainees as enemy combatants, the first clear-cut victories for the Bush administration in what are expected to be more than 200 similar cases. The ruling by a federal district judge, Richard J. Leon, followed his decision last month in a separate case declaring that five Algerians had been held unlawfully at the detention camp in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, for nearly seven years and ordering their release.

George W. Bush leaves office with a job-approval rating that once soared to historic highs, then fell slowly but steadily for five years before settling, in the last couple of years, into lows that no president has ever experienced for so long. The president’s final Gallup approval rating of 2008 is 28 percent; a number like that means some core Republicans don’t approve of Bush’s performance, and even among the many in the GOP who still approve, there are a number who are ready to see the president go. Bush knows that. The White House staff knows it. But the...

History should judge President George W. Bush as one of America’s great Presidents. His record of accomplishment in both domestic and foreign policy, his grace in the face of unrivaled malevolence, his courage in the face of dreadful pressure, and his vision of a world made free are the stuff of greatness. Here is an abbreviated catalog of his accomplishments and virtues: President George W. Bush has liberated 50 million people from two of the most ghastly regimes in world history. For those who would minimize those achievements, a comparison with the two other Presidential liberators is appropriate. Abraham Lincoln...

In his weekly radio address today, President Bush discussed the problems of the auto industry and the bailout he has proposed to help them. transcript