President George W. Bush has liberated 50 million people from oppression. But if liberation doesn’t last, it may as well never have happened.
Presidential legacies are like wet paint – you can’t really tell what color they are until you give them time to dry.
It’s almost unfair to write a President’s legacy in the same generation he retired. Those of us who lived through it are apt to remember nuances both good and bad that later generations simply won’t judge.
As time passes issues fall from memory like leaves from a tree; what remains is that one solitary issue – a well-rooted tree trunk issue - that becomes a President’s identity in history.
George Washington led the Revolution.
Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves.
Franklin Roosevelt led us out of Depression.
Ronald Reagan won the Cold War.
Bill Clinton…well…let’s keep this G rated, shall we?
President Bush will be the first President whose legacy will not be judged on how he affected the lives of Americans. His legacy will rise or fall with the fate of people in two countries he invaded.
In Iraq and Afghanistan, 50 million human beings subsisted in careworn lives, beaten and broken by oppressive governments.
Iraqis were raped, tortured, had their eyes gouged out or killed for simply disagreeing with their government. President Saddam Hussein killed more than 50,000 people with chemical weapons and murdered as many as 40 of his own relatives. Children died of malnutrition or disease caused by oppressive policies. Women were beheaded and the government suppressed religion by murdering clerics.
In Afghanistan, those seen as disloyal to the Taliban government were summarily killed and buried in mass graves. Women were denied the most basic of civil rights and were refused education. Punishment was carried out in the streets. Whole families were burned alive. Eight boys were shot to death for laughing too close to soldiers. Entire villages thought to be disloyal were massacred.
It is easy to judge well the man who toppled those governments and freed 50 million people from cruelty and death. That man is American President George W. Bush, and he rightfully deserves the title of “Liberator.”
But only if Liberation lasts.
Like all Presidents, on January 20th President Bush looses the ability to shape his legacy, and it is quite unfinished as Iraq and Afghanistan are not yet confident democracies.
The reasons for invasion were hotly debated in our time, but the invasion debate is now irrelevant. We cannot tell a free Iraqi woman at a polling booth – “We found no weapons of mass destruction, so it’s back to oppression for you.” She is free and must stay that way.
Other leaders are now charged with solidifying Bush’s legacy. They inherit not just the “problem” of Iraqi and Afghan freedom, but the easier to accept “moral obligation” to keep 50 million people free. What world leader dare shrink from that just cause? How badly history will judge them if they do.
President Bush’s legacy is counting most on the people of Iraq and Afghanistan. The President has a core belief he touts as a self-evident truth: Once a person is given a sample of Freedom, they never lose the taste of it. They’ll fight for it.
What though for President Bush’s legacy if Iraq and Afghanistan fall back to tyranny? Probably nothing good.
President Bush has been praised for bringing Americans together following the 9/11 attacks. My American pride assures me we would have come together at that moment without him. He has kept America free from terrorist attacks for 7 years, but that he owes to us – it’s not a favor. Even though that task is or more or less difficult at different times, it remains a requirement of each President, not a discretionary policy.
Scouring the rest of President Bush’s record may reveal accomplishments but none can be categorized as historic. He did not cause the problems with the economy, Hurricane Katrina or illegal immigration, and debate over his responses will likely remain partisan, not decisive. He’ll get no enduring legacy on any issue save the liberation of foreigners.
President Bush holds the legacy building advantage though. Only good people will want the Iraqis and Afghans to be free. Only evil people will wish them enslaved. President Bush leads this issue with morality on his side.
If Iraq and Afghanistan are free he will be George W. Bush “The Liberator;” if they are not free, he won’t be. There is nothing in between for the President’s legacy.