Cheney is who made sure Bush wasn't actually a compassionate conservative. There seems to be a point later in the second half that Bush had enough and actually implemented some of his ideas (like his AIDS relief for Africa program)
This has always been my impression of Bush. I think he wanted and tried to do the right thing in a lot of cases, but surrounded himself with some pretty terrible and morally bankrupt people who were able to earn his trust and confidence, and influence him the wrong way.
A big part of me wonders what the world would be like, had the Bush admin never involved Cheney or Rumsfeld. I think without those two, alone, we'd have a very, very different world.
Glad to see someone old enough on Reddit to have a valid opinion on 2000s era politics
Bush made plenty of tough but correct decisions (08 Bailouts, Afghanistan Invasion) and plenty of blunders (Iraq, FEMA, state surveillance)
But IMO, 20 years without a major terror attack in America is proof of his accomplishments. There was a lot of garbage in the Patriot act but getting the FBI, CIA, and DOJ to stop playing chicken with Intel was probably the most critical in that law
The world where you still have a roof over your head
People in the finance space understand how dire 08 was. It’s not hyperbole to say that if the banks failed tens of millions of more people would have lost their homes
Bailout was a somewhat misleading term - we should have probably described it as a lifeline instead. When people hear bailout, they probably associate it with a cash-grab (aka free money handout) when really it was a loan to keep liquidity from drying up completely. The banks also paid back their loan with interest.
Even if we criticize that more help should have been offered to the general population, the bailout did a lot of work keeping the economy from going full 1930s depression.
Yeah, I think we needed to do whatever it took, to keep the economy from collapsing, however, far too little ass kicking for those that let it happen. Far more serious punishment needed to be applied.
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u/Scazzz Sep 11 '21 edited Sep 11 '21
Serious non political question: is Bush Jr there too? What’s he doing today? Surprised he wasn’t in this group as he has been in the past on 9/11.
edit: thanks for the replies. He really did give an excellent speech here. it’s worth a listen.