July 6th was actually our 43rd president's birthday, but because of things beyond our control, we didn't get to it that day. It's been bugging me to no end that we've had one hanging out there, and I knew as soon as I was done with Gerald Ford's birthday and JQA's birthday I would get to it. But, I haven't been off by more than two days, so I just had a feeling of being behind, and I didn't like it.
Let's face it, this blog doesn't need to be so informative. If you're reading my blog, you lived through George W. Bush's presidency. The recent ones, especially Clinton, George W, and Obama are tricky. You see, despite the fact I almost NEVER talk politics publicly (thank my dad and Uncle Warren and some serious table-fist-pounding and raised voices for my aversion to that), I do have my own preferences. I'll say it right now, I never once voted for George W. Bush. I just didn't. I have my reasons, and that's cool. If you voted for him, then I'm sure you had your reasons. And that's cool. Really. You see, this whole thing has given me a new respect for every. single. president. I read books George W. wrote, I learned about him as a president and as a person. And you know what? Yes, he still did things I didn't agree with. But, he's not a bad guy. Anyone who puts themselves out there to be president, to deal with all the ups and downs, the crap the media throws at them (and the beatings they take on social media), and still comes out with funny, witty jokes and not in a straight jacket crumbling under the pressure most of us could never dream of having to handle? Well, they deserve our respect. Just try and remember that during our upcoming election season. (that's it for me on my soap box).
Regardless of my views, for all I know I could be raising a team of Republicans (which is FINE), and so for the recent guys I am trying to be as objective as I can. Give the facts, and move on. It's not such a worry with the earlier guys. I mean nobody sits around going "You know, I really liked Millard Fillmore's policies, what did you think about them?"
Anyway, because of all of that, what you, my dear, sweet blog viewing followers are going to get is the best unbiased blog I think I can write, trying to just present the facts, and in some situations, the popular view of the country at the time, instead of my own personal opinions. (I probably could have informed you of that in fewer words, but ah well).
So, without further adieu..
George Walker Bush was born on July 6, 1946 in New Haven, Connecticut. (I had always thought he was born in Texas!) Anyway, his dad was attending Yale (a late college bloomer thanks to his time in WWII) and his mom was along for the ride. If you're wondering why George Walker Bush was not George Herbert Walker Bush Junior, it's because Barbara thought it was just too long of a name for all the forms she'd have to fill out in her son's lifetime.
They moved to Midland, Texas when W. was two. They had Robin, but she died a few years later of leukemia, right after John Ellis Bush (Jeb for short, probably because of his initials I assume) was born.
George W's grandfather, Prescott was in Congress in these days, and the Bush family was just getting started in politics.
George W. eventually had a few more siblings: Neil, Marvin and Dorothy, and spent his childhood playing baseball. When he was in 7th grade, the family left the small town of Midland and moved to Houston, where W got to go to a private high school. Despite his average grades, he managed to get into Yale, where we all know he was an average (at best) student, and had more interest in drinking and partying than studying. He apparently played on the rugby team and was on the cheerleading team. He also got arrested twice, but for silly things (once for stealing a wreath out of a hotel lobby).
While he was in college, he did help his dad campaign for the U.S. House of Representatives. (This picture is from H.W.'s birthday in June, I'm missing a few here and there, but luckily I have replacements!)
After graduating from Yale (he got his bachelors in history), he went on to fly planes in the Texas Air National Guard. But, he still liked to push limits, and would often be late, or wouldn't show up at all. (He was even suspended once).
Despite his rebellious streak, he did end up earning a Master's in Business from Harvard.
But by now, George was 30, and even if your dad is the director of the CIA it isn't a good idea to drink and drive. One night, while at the Bush compound in Kennebunkport, Maine, George W did it anyway.
A year later, while at a friend's backyard barbecue in Texas, George met Laura Welch. Laura was a school teacher and a librarian (as such I really wanted to use Belle, you know, the book connection, but we couldn't locate her anywhere. I settled for Cinderella.) He was smitten with her, and three months later, they were married. She really helped him clean up his act, with the drinking and all (eventually, anyway.)
Now married (note, without the beer in his hand), George kept on keeping on in the family oil business.
With his father now done at the CIA and back in Texas, and at a time when it was still difficult for a Republican to win a state-wide election (hard to believe now!), George W. decided to run for the U.S. House of Representatives. But, it was not meant to be. Afterwards, he set his sights back to one of his first loves: baseball, and he became part owner in the Texas Rangers.
1981 was a good year for the family. Ronald Reagan selected George H.W. Bush (over Gerald Ford)as his running mate, and America selected the Republican duo to run the country. Besides that, Laura and W had fraternal twin girls, who they named after their mother's: Barbara and Jenna. (Fun Fact: George W. is the only president to have twins)
After 8 years with Reagan, George W. was out campaigning for his father to be the 41st president of the United States. Despite the "Van Buren Effect" (in which no VP had ascended into the office of the presidency by having been ELECTED since Van Buren at #8), George H.W. was elected.
But four years later, George H.W. was out and Bill Clinton and Al Gore were in. (We decided on Captain Jack for Clinton, you know, going for the charisma/womanizing angle).
With his dad now out of politics, W. decided it was his turn, and as we all know, he became the Governor of Texas, where he was really pretty popular. He cut taxes, and focused on educational and welfare reform.
Then, came the election of 2000. (And Calib!) Again, as we all know (a theme here),the whole election came down to who would win Florida, where Jeb happened to be governor. For 36 days my college roommate and I watched CNN obsessively (remember those days, Emily?) to see who would end up winning Florida and the election.
After the Supreme Court put the kibosh on hanging chads and dimpled chads, and all that other business, George W. Bush was declared the winner. He had won the electoral college, but not the popular vote. This has happened only FOUR times in history. We'll cover Benjamin Harrison in August, and Rutherford Hayes (my home town guy!) in October. But, we should all remember (if we've been paying attention) that JQA won out over Andrew Jackson after not having won the popular vote. Who needs the American people when you have Henry Clay, am I right? Some people called Al Gore a sore loser for not conceding sooner. But hey, at least he didn't say his only regret in life was not killing George W. Bush. The Clinton administration did, however, remove all the W's from all the keyboards in the White House. But, I feel like Andrew Jackson would think that's a pretty lame act of revenge.
However he got there didn't really matter anymore. At age 58, George Walker Bush was sworn in as our 43rd president with his parents looking on, and the two became the second father-son president duo, forever now being known as "41" and "43." 43 called himself a compassionate conservative, and began the work of bringing a very politically divided country together.
George began his presidency governing with a strong sense of religion (which obviously pleased some people and not others.) He limited federal funding of stem-cell research, and offered money to faith-based social programs. He also appointed highly-conservative judges to the Supreme Court.
Besides that, Bill Clinton had seriously taxed the wealthy, and George W. decided to give that money back, and the phrase "the top 1%" was born.
Besides that, the economy was headed for trouble.
But, all those things that seemed so important suddenly got put on the back burner after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Eventually, Osama Bin Laden was named as the person behind the attacks, and as promised, Bush was out for blood.
Afghanistan could hand him over, or we could go to war.
They didn't, and we did. 43's plan to dispose of the Taliban government received international support. Troops were sent in, removed the Taliban from power, and established a new-pro-Western government. But, Osama Bin Laden remained on the run, and many troops lost their lives (the fighting, as we know, raged on for years).
Back at home, the Bush administration began to reorganize around the war on terror, and the Department of Homeland Security was created.
And then the Patriot Act. (Giving the government the power to intercept emails, search financial reports, and detain people without proper search warrants.) Oh boy, the Patriot Act. It's easy to forget back in the early 2000's, Americans were like "that's fine, do what you have to do, catch these guys, they attacked America. I'll take off my shoes at the airport no problem!"
But, with everything, people slowly forget exactly how it felt those days after 9/11, and that "oh yes!" turns into a "wait a minute". And, things like the Patriot Act come under fire. Basically, with American's feeling safer, and the passage of time,whether the act was right or wrong, the Patriot Act lost the support it once had.
Also losing support was George W. Bush. After the fall of the Taliban government, he set his sights on a new target, one his father was familiar with: Saddam Hussein. The war on terror was heading to Iraq, where Hussein was still in power.
Look, everyone in the world was in agreement that this was a bad guy in charge. But, most countries didn't think of him as an immediate threat. The Bush administration believe he had weapons of mass destruction, and they were going to take Hussein down once and for all. With help from the British, we sent over U.S. troops, captured the Iraqi capital of Baghdad and scattered Saddam Hussein's army in about six weeks. Again, Saddam Hussein was on the loose, but at least he was out of power.
Eventually, Saddam would be found hiding in a hole in the ground in a farm in Tikrit. He was charged with the murder of 148 people, torture of woman and children and the illegal arrest of 399 others, and sentenced to death in 2006.
On May 1, 2003, 43 gave a speech with a banner behind him that read "Mission Accomplished."
But, that proved to be the biggest PR blunder of his presidency. The war was not over, thanks to Iraqi resistance fighters. More than 4,000 troops would die after the "mission accomplished" sign debacle, and along with a slumping economy, and the housing market crisis, things were looking bleak for the 43's re-election hopes.
But, history tells us the American people don't like changing presidents in the middle of war, and 43 was back for four more years.
With all of the focus on the war in terror, the Bush administration had to decide where to put all these suspected terrorists. They decided on a detention center in Cuba, called Guantanamo Bay. Being in Cuba allowed them to skirt some of the rights afforded to even the worst criminals in prison. The Supreme Court later ruled otherwise, but Guantanamo Bay remained open anyway.
Something I didn't know before my research of George W. Bush (and despite living through his presidency I did plenty of research-- but trying to find unbiased materials is DIFF-I-CULT.), he was the subject of an assassination attempt. It happened in 2005 when speaking at an event in Georgia. Some guy threw a live grenade into the crowd, but it didn't go off. I don't know if this was publicized much, or if I heard about it and just didn't remember.
2005 was also the year Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and the gulf coast. It became one of the worst natural disasters the U.S had seen, and over 1800 people died. The administration was heavily criticized for an unhurried response, and failing management of emergency services.
By 2006, the was in Iraq was still raging, and Bush felt he had to do something, so sent more troops in the "troop surge". The effects of the surge was mixed. It did help curb the violence in Iraq, but their political powers remained, and our troops still stayed to try and maintain peace.
America showed it's displeasure with the state of things by electing an all Democratic Congress in the midterms.
By 2007 the economy was in it's biggest recession since 2001, and 43 had very low approval ratings. In 2008, when he left office, America switched gears and voted in a Democrat. And as we all know, Barack Obama became the first African American president. (You might not all know that you can buy a Barack Obama finger puppet though!)
George W. retired to Texas (but can often be found in Kennebunkport, Maine), where he spends his time largely out of the public eye. He wrote two books (very well written and good reads!), and took up painting. He also golfs and enjoys an occasional cigar.
We're not going to go into his legacy. You can't do that so soon after someone is done. I mean, Harry Truman left office with some seriously low approval ratings too, but now he's ranked up in the top five. Do I think 43 is a top five president? probably not. But history hasn't really decided how to look at George W. Bush yet, and it's not really fair to say. It's worth noting I also left out the whole 'No Child Left Behind" thing because everyone in my house is very familiar with it, and there are some very strong opinions about it (especially from my middle child.)
Anyway, that was it for 43's timeline, and we added all our props to the last 1/4th of the flag (My goodness, trying to find an unbiased caricature of George W is not easy!)
Some fun facts for you..
His presidential issues..
And his quotes..
While looking for his quotes, I did find some funny ones. The guy does have a sense of humor, you have to give him that. (My favorite is his conversation with Laura he had after he was done being president, it's the last one at the bottom there.)
With all of that finally up there, the July wall is complete. We don't have another birthday until August 6, when we celebrate our current president's birthday. But then, since I'm going to be gone to Ohio for two weeks in August, I have to cram the three we will miss, plus the one on MY birthday in somewhere.
and then made birthday cards!
Since we're celebrating another living president's birthdays, instead of hanging the cards up (and later putting them in his file folder), after making a few grammatical corrections, we are sending them off to hopefully find their way to him.
If you are Facebook friends with me, you already know about our VERY exciting news from yesterday. But, if you somehow missed it, I'm here to fill you in. You might remember on George H.W. Bush's birthday we sent our cards off to him as well. Yesterday, we recieved mail back. Hayden had just asked me if I thought we'd get anything back a couple of days ago, and I said I wasn't sure. If anything, I was thinking we'd be getting a pre-packaged packet on our 41st president. I never EVER would have imagined we got back what we did.
George H.W. Bush wrote the boys a personal letter and signed it himself. How AMAZING is that?!?! We were all beyond excited about it. We took it right over to our neighbors house to show them (they also home school and we thought they'd appreciate it, turns out our neighbor, Shawn, who is a pilot, once flew Mrs. Barbara Bush and had nothing but lovely things to say about her). Anyway, I don't know if we'll ever get anything like this back again from any other president. But, half way through our project (we've now completed 23/43), this was a nice thing for me to get for a little boost. I got complimented by a PRESIDENT! (I will be using this whenever I possibly can).
You might also remember on Calvin Coolidge's birthday on the 5th of July, we outlined some animal stencils in glue. Today, we pulled those out and painted over them to create a cool effect.( It was supposed to be a two-day project one right after each other, but it didn't work out exactly as I planned.) Since retirement, W has taken up painting (though, he uses oils, and we used water colors).
Calib refuses to keep his eyes open when I take pictures.
These actually look way cooler in person than in the pictures.
I also realized I never write about the flip books the boys work on for each president. It's what you see on the "historical hashtag wall". Calib has two parts, both recording dates, Hayden does the page on family, and Peyton does interesting facts.
Our twitter hashtag...
And, dinner. It was supposed to be Huevos Rancheros, but mysteriously our entire dozen of eggs was broken in the refrigerator (Your guess is as good as mine). We improvised with a Tex Mex burger....
....and Tex-Mex potatoes instead.
That is all for the July birthdays. Like I said, 23 done, 20 left to go.
Next Up: Quality time with Calib, he's off to Ohio for nearly two weeks on Tuesday.
No comments:
Post a Comment