George Walker Bush

BUSH, GEORGE WALKER

The administration of George Walker Bush, the forty-third president of the United States, has been a study in contrasts. On the one hand, he has shown a fierce determination to protect the interests of the United States and its citizens following the SEPTEMBER 11TH ATTACKS, in which terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in New York City and seriously damaged the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. On the other hand, his administration has been shrouded in controversy, beginning from the day of his election on November 7, 2000, and he has been heavily criticized for a slow economy in the early 2000s.

For years, Bush’s public identity was inextricably
tied to his famous father, GEORGE H.W.
BUSH. They are the first father and son to be
elected presidents since JOHN ADAMS and JOHN
QUINCY ADAMS. In 1994, the son of the former
Republican president established an identity of
his own when he defeated incumbent Ann
Richards in a hotly contested political race to
become the forty-sixth governor of Texas. Convincing
Texas voters that he was a strong politician
in his own right, Bush claimed a victory
that he could call his own. Six years later, he was
part of an extremely controversial presidential
election when he defeated then-Vice-President
ALBERT GORE to win the presidency.
Born in Connecticut on July 6, 1946, and
raised in Texas, George Walker Bush has a welldocumented
lineage. His grandfather, Prescott
Bush, a Connecticut resident who worked on
Wall Street, was elected to the Senate. His father,
George H.W. Bush, earned his fortune as an oilman
in Texas, entered politics, became director
of the CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, and
eventually achieved the country’s highest office
as president. George W. Bush, the oldest of five
Bush children, retraced his father’s early career.
Like his father, he attended Phillips Academy in
Andover, Massachusetts, and Yale University.
After graduating from Yale, the young Bush
continued to be his father’s shadow. He learned
how to fly a combat aircraft and then became an
oilman. He completed a 53-week program with
the Texas Air NATIONAL GUARD, learning to fly
F-102s and earning the rank of lieutenant, and
then he returned home looking for a new challenge
when he was not called to fight in Vietnam.
He spent time in Houston holding various
short-term jobs, including a stint at a program
called Pull for Youth for underprivileged kids.
Possessing his father’s drive and fierce determination
to make something of himself, Bush
attended Harvard Business School, returned to
Texas with an M.B.A., became an oilman, and
ventured into politics. At age 32, he ran for Congress
in west Texas but was defeated by six
points. He was successful in the oil business,
however, and within ten years of working in the
industry earned his first million dollars.
Bush’s biggest oil venture, however, proved
controversial. During the late 1970s, he built a
small, thriving company called Bush Exploration.
When the energy market turned soft in
the early 1980s, Bush Exploration, like many oil
enterprises, floundered. In 1983, Bush merged
his outfit with Spectrum 7; three years later
Spectrum 7 was bought by Harken Energy.
Bush’s supporters said the sale was the work of
a shrewd dealmaker, while others—including
journalists from conservative and liberal publications—
suspected that the deal came about
because of Bush’s father’s political contacts.
“Many oil companies went belly-up during that
time,” reported Stephen Pizzo of Mother Jones.
“But Spectrum 7 had one asset the others
lacked—the son of the vice-president. Rescue came in 1986 in the form of Harken Energy.
Harken absorbed Spectrum, and, in the
process, Bush got $600,000 worth of Harken
stock in return for his Spectrum shares. He also
won a lucrative consulting contract and stock
options. In all, the deal would put well more
than $1 million in his pocket over the next few
years—even though Harken itself lost millions.”
Bush came under fire again in 1990.
Time reported, “about a month before Iraq
invaded Kuwait, young Bush sold 66 percent of
his Harken stake (or 212,140 shares) at the top
of the market for nearly $850,000, which represented
a 200 percent profit on his original
stake.” President Bush balked at the allegations
of impropriety. “The media ought to be
ashamed of itself for what they’re doing,” he
said. Meanwhile, the younger Bush dismissed
the criticism “claiming something close to
penury,” according to Newsweek.
While speculation swirled in the media
about his oil dealings, Bush left business for politics.
He helped manage his father’s 1988 presidential
campaign, moving with his wife and
twin daughters to Washington, where he worked
closely with Lee Atwater. By all accounts, Bush
did not enjoy the experience. “He remembers
finding Washington a ‘hostile environment,’”
reported Time. “The campaign operation was
often a mud wrestle among contending egos.”
Confessed the young Bush, “I was the loyalty
thermometer.” But he gained respect for handling
volatile diplomatic matters, such as the firing
of chief of staff John Sununu, and for swiftly
taking care of business.
After the election, Bush wasted no time getting
back to Texas, where he promptly found a
new venture—BASEBALL. The sport offered
Bush the first honest chance at independence. In
a matter of months, he successfully organized a
coalition of wealthy investors to purchase American
League’s Texas Rangers, and he assumed a
role as managing partner. Not only did Bush
rally support to bring major league baseball to
Dallas, but he helped to promote the team and
boost attendance. Riding the wave of popularity
that arose from his success with the Rangers,
Bush decided it was an ideal time to try his hand
at local politics.
George H.W. and Barbara had both discouraged
their oldest son from entering politics as a
full-time career until he had first secured his
financial future. Even after Bush earned a small
fortune in the oil industry, and with the promise
of more to come from his baseball investments,
his mother remained wary of his chances in the
1994 gubernatorial race. Like other political
observers, Barbara Bush believed that Texans
were not ready to retire their quick-witted
Democratic governor Ann Richards. Nevertheless,
Bush jumped into the race, while his
younger brother, Jeb, did the same in Florida.
The brothers were, of course, highly skilled campaigners,
having served as aides to their father
since the age of 18.
Bush’s strategy was to run an intensely
focused and positive, issue-oriented campaign.
When Richards attacked his credibility with
barbs like “If he didn’t have his daddy’s name, he
wouldn’t amount to anything,” Bush countered
with pleasantries. “I don’t have to erode her likability,”
he told the New York Times. “I have to
erode her electability.”And when Richards called
him “some jerk,” Bush replied, “The last time I
was called a jerk was at Sam Houston Elementary
School in Midland, Texas. I’m not going to
call the Governor names. I’m going to elevate
this debate to a level where Texans want it.” That
debate focused on WELFARE reform, a crackdown
on crime (especially concerning juveniles),
increased autonomy and state financing
for local school districts, and personal responsibility.
As he campaigned, it was clear to
observers that he was not the spitting political image of his father. As he told local audiences,
“Let Texans run Texas.” It was a message that
appealed to the proud Texans. And despite the
popularity Ann Richards had enjoyed during
her reign as governor, Bush, to the surprise of
many, won with 53.5 percent of the vote. Twenty
thousand people attended Bush’s inauguration
in Austin, including the famous preacher Billy
Graham, legendary baseball pitcher Nolan Ryan,
movie star Chuck Norris, and, of course, George
H.W. and Barbara Bush.
After only a year in office, Bush was hailed as
the most popular big-state governor in the
country. In 1998 he won reelection in a landslide.
His vote-getting among minorities
impressed national Republicans. Bush entered
the 2000 presidential election race in 1999, eventually
raising the largest amount of money—
more than $100 million—for any presidential
race in U.S. history. His support largely demoralized
the field of potential Republican candidates.
He later defeated Senator JOHN MCCAIN
in a series of primary elections and became the
GOP’s candidate in 2000.
The race pitted Bush against Al Gore, who
had served as vice president for two terms under
WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON. Bush, who did
not have extensive experience in foreign policy,
chose former Secretary of Defense Richard
Cheney as his running mate. Despite early leads
for the Bush camp, the race was largely deadlocked
as the November 7 election date
approached. On the day of the election, early
results supported Gore, and late in the afternoon
several media outlets pronounced Gore the
probable victor. Late returns, however, supported
Bush, and by the end of the day he had
apparently won the election through the ELECTORAL
COLLEGE, despite the fact that Gore had
won a majority of the popular vote.
Gore immediately contested the results,
requesting a recount of votes in the state of
Florida, where voting procedures caused a great
deal of controversy. For a month after the elections,
the nation observed high profile wrangling
from both sides as politicians and the
courts sought to sort out the election fiasco. The
U.S. Supreme Court in BUSH V. GORE, 531 U.S.
98, 121 S. Ct. 525, 148 L. Ed. 2d 388 (2000) overturned
an order by the Florida Supreme Court
requiring a recounting of ballots in several
counties. The ruling, one of the most controversial
ever, allowed Bush to be certified as the
winner.
Bush’s first nine months in office were
largely unremarkable as he sought to pass education
reform bills and new tax legislation. The
events of September 11, 2001, however, irrevocably
changed the Bush administration and the
public’s perceptions of him. On September 20,
2001, he delivered a speech to Congress regarding
the U.S. response to the terrorist attacks, and
several commentators likened the speech to
President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s speech following
the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.
Months after the attack, U.S. forces, in conjunction
with U.S. allies, toppled the Taliban
regime in Afghanistan, which had been suspected
of harboring terrorists. Bush initiated the
largest reorganization of the federal government
since WORLD WAR II in an effort to allow the
United States to defend itself against terrorist
attacks. In 2002, Congress approved the Homeland
Security Act of 2002, Pub. L. No. 107-296,
116 Stat. 2135 (codified as amended in scattered
sections of 6 U.S.C.A.), which created the HOME-LAND SECURITY DEPARTMENT and reorganized
several existing agencies. Throughout 2002 and
2003, the Bush administration focused much of
its attention on Iraq, which was also at the center
of attention under the administration of the
elder Bush. More than 250,000 troops had been
amassed in the Persian Gulf by March 2003 in
preparation with a possible showdown with
Iraqi president Saddam Hussein. The United
States attacked Iraq on March 19, 2003.
Bush has had less success addressing domestic
issues. The United States had experienced
economic growth under former President Clinton,
but this trend came to an end during the
Bush administration. Whether or not the cause
of the economic problems were his administration’s
problems—his father’s administration
also suffered from a sluggish economy—the economic
outlook of the nation throughout the
early twenty-first century was bleak. Bush
announced in 2003 a FEDERAL BUDGET deficit of
$304 billion, an all-time high. Moreover, he
anticipated a deficit for 2004 of $307 billion.
FURTHER READINGS
Frum, David. 2003. The Right Man: The Surprise Presidency
of George W. Bush. New York: Random House.
Kettl, Donald F. 2003. Team Bush: Leadership Lessons from
the Bush White House. New York: McGraw Hill.
Lind, Michael. 2003. Made in Texas: George W. Bush and the
Southern Takeover of American Politics. New York: Basic
Books.
CROSS-REFERENCES
Bush v. Gore; Homeland Security Department; Terrorism.