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For eight long years, George W. Bush refused to criticize Barack Obama. “I don’t think it’s good for the country to have a former president undermine a current president,” Mr. Bush explained to Fox News’s Sean Hannity in 2014, on why he refused to critique his successor’s policies. “I think it’s bad for the presidency, for that matter.” Yet one month into President Donald Trump’s presidency, Mr. Bush decided it was OK to offer a critique of the former real estate mogul.

Former President George W. Bush said Monday “we all need answers” on the extent of contact between President Donald Trump’s team and the Russian government, and didn’t rule out the idea that a special prosecutor could be necessary to lead an investigation. The Republican also defended the media’s role in keeping world leaders in check, noting that “power can be addictive,” and warned against immigration policies that could alienate Muslims. “I am for an immigration policy that’s welcoming and upholds the law,” Bush told NBC’s “Today” show. Bush’s comments came after a prominent Republican in Congress, Rep. Darrell Issa of...

This is exactly why we need citizen historians. The "real" big time "historians" don't teach history because at the worst they do not want to, or at the best they are incapable of teaching it because they are ignorant of it. Most of the time, historians teach history as a series of unrelated events while memorizing who said what, when what was built, and what year did x happen. Instead of teaching Americans, the people of Liberty, about the story of Liberty that history has to tell. It's the greatest story never told. C-SPAN's list of presidents is getting attention,...

African slaves brought to America were purchased at Muslim slave markets. Over the 1,400 years of Islamic conquest, Muslims enslaved an estimated 180 million Africans. “The Annotated John Quincy Adams – A Bibliography,” compiled by Lynn H. Parsons (Westport, CT, 1993, p. 41, entry#194), contains “Unsigned essays dealing with the Russo-Turkish War and on Greece,” (The American Annual Register for 1827-28-29, NY: 1830): “The natural hatred of the Mussulmen towards the infidels is in just accordance with the precepts of the Koran. … The fundamental doctrine of the Christian religion is the extirpation of hatred from the human heart. It...

<p>As president, he cut a grandiose figure. He was a braggart and a frequent liar. He was suspicious of other countries, frequently saying, “Foreigners are not like the folks I am used to.” He had a reckless disregard for limits. He belittled and browbeat others to intimidate them and give him what he wanted. Historian Robert Dallek said that he “viewed criticism of his policies as personal attacks” and opponents of his policies “as disloyal to him and the country.”</p>

Barack Obama has been whisked to a very good table at the club of former presidents, according to a C-SPAN survey of 91 presidential historians published on Friday. Obama’s 12th-place ranking only a month after leaving office is the best for any president since Ronald Reagan, who ranks ninth in the new survey. The list updates previous C-SPAN surveys compiled in 2009 and 2000.

Dear Mrs. Web Personal Advice Column Our family has had this tradition for many years. We have special meals that we serve one food, often in season, usually connected with a holiday or time of year. It is fun and a treat to focus on one food and one food only. January Hot cocoa and popcorn night, usually after a day of sledding. Don’t forget the marshmallows! February Is the best month for this theme: On February 12 there is Lincoln’s Birthday and we serve cake shaped like a log frosted with a special chocolate butter cream frosting. These were...

Happy Birthday Mr. President. Ronald Reagan was born 106 years ago today in Tampico, IL.

Executive orders are one of a variety of written instruments presidents can use to exercise their authority. They typically contain instructions to federal agencies that presidents oversee on how they should discharge their responsibilities. Although such orders are often viewed as carrying more legal weight than other kinds of presidential directives, experts say there is no substantive difference between them. As long as the directives conform to the Constitution and statutes, they carry the force of the law, but can be revoked by a future president with the stroke of a pen. ... Barack Obama signed nine executive orders during...

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, over 110,000 to 120,000 Japanese-Americans were interred in Prison Camps by President FDR, a Democrat, based his Executive Order. This was done at the start of World War II as an issue of 'National Security'. Were all these American Citizens a threat to the United States in World War II? Obviously not as a group of these Japanese-Americans formed a unit to fight in Italy in World War II. This unit compiled more medals than any other unit of similar size in World War II.

It was in February 2010, on Interstate 35 in Wyoming, Minn., according to Wikipedia, that the billboards first began to appear: “MISS ME YET?” ran the message over a picture of George W. Bush. “Kind of,” say today’s Democrats.

President Trump hung a portrait of Andrew Jackson in the Oval Office on Tuesday, The New York Times reports, an apparent nod to the populist sentiments of the new administration. Trump's rise has often been compared to the populist election of Jackson, including by some of the new president's own team. Chief White House strategist Steve Bannon called Trump’s inauguration speech on Friday “Jacksonian,” saying it struck the populist and patriotic tones Jackson was known for.

Inauguration Day 2017 has placed the U.S. on a new political and economic trajectory. President Donald Trump won the votes of the so-called Rust Belt, where workers and their children and grandchildren, who have been dispossessed and displaced by the economics of globalization, turned blue counties into red counties. Thus, in a legitimate sense, Trump's appeal to the "forgotten man" – so similar to Franklin D. Roosevelt's appeal to the same symbol – is valid. FDR's forgotten man was a composite of all those who were unemployed in the Great Depression who were "forgotten" in the sense that their plight...

“Barbara and I are so sorry we can’t be there for your Inauguration on January 20th,” the former president wrote in a note dated Jan. 10. “My doctor says if I sit outside in January, it will likely put me six feet under. Same for Barbara. So I guess we’re stuck in Texas.” “I want you to know that I wish you the very best as you begin this incredible journey of leading our great country,” he continued. “If I can ever be of help, please let me know.”

George H.W. Bush was just admitted to intensive care unit with pneumonia and his wife, Barbara, was also admitted. H.W.'s office says he's in stable condition, but as a precaution doctors performed some sort of procedure to clear his airway. He received anesthesia and was moved into the intensive care unit. H.W.'s resting comfortably where he will remain, at least for the short term. Meanwhile, Barbara Bush was also admitted to the Houston hospital Wednesday morning after experiencing what H.W.'s office says is fatigue and coughing. Story developing ...

President-elect Donald Trump will swear in as president on a Bible used by Abraham Lincoln during his first inauguration as president. The Lincoln Bible is currently part of the Library of Congress collection and was used by Obama to swear in as president after the 2008 and 2012 elections. Only Obama and Lincoln have used that copy of the Bible to swear the oath of office.

Video. Clinton spoke for 7 minutes, 25 seconds; Reagan spoke for 20 minutes, 42 seconds; and George W. Bush spoke for 13 minutes, 7 seconds. Obama spoke for 51 minutes, 10 seconds, nearly 10 minutes longer than the other three put together. Obama also broke from the tradition of delivering his final speech from the White House. Clinton and Reagan both spoke from the Oval Office, and George W. Bush spoke in front of a small audience in the White House East Room; the Obama administration distributed public tickets for his speech at the McCormick Place convention center in Chicago....

James Madison Drinks, and Writes an ArticlePhilip Freneau had set the deadline for the December 22nd edition of the National Gazette, and James Madison found himself racing the hourglass. Freneau published the newspaper, dedicated to the positions of Thomas Jefferson’s faction within the Congress and the council around His Excellency, while working for the red-haired Secretary of State as a translator. Mr. Jefferson saw neither difficulty nor conflict with this arrangement. Freneau had labeled the men of Alexander Hamilton’s faction as Monarchists, Tories, and Anti-Republicans, claiming their role was to reverse the results of 1776. The Secretary of the Treasury...

Bill and Hillary Clinton haven't committed themselves to attending Donald Trump's inauguration, which looms less than a month away, after a bruising campaign that left the Democratic nominee and her former-president husband with bloodied reputations at Trump's hands. So far Jimmy Carter, age 92, is the only former president who has said he will be there on January 20. George H.W. Bush, just four months younger, has said he will not come to the inauguration, and cites his old age as the reason why, according to Politico. George W. Bush won't make up his mind until January, his spokesman Freddy...

Jimmy Carter is the only former president who has confirmed that he will attend the inauguration of Donald Trump on 20 January 2017. Earlier this month, Carter who had endorsed Hillary Clinton in the race to the White House, said at his Sunday school class in Georgia that he would attend the ceremony. According to Politico, Bill Clinton and George W Bush will decide whether to attend the inauguration in the New Year. A source familiar with Bush told Politico that he is still weighing in on whether to attend the ceremony or not.