Young Writers Society

Everything that has changed the world is written in history books.
My question to you is, how do you think the history books in the future will write of George Bush and the war in Iraq.

I think it's way too early to judge this. I mean, imagine we asked in the first year of Clinton's second term before anybody knew about Lewinsky.

I think we have to wait at least five years before we know how Iraq will develop.

However, how will history judge George Bush's economic policy? For the sake of the next century, I hope negatively. Running huge budget and trade deficits and advocating a weak dollar are all ingredients for a recession, although none of them, even combined, are necessarily the prelude to a recession. Of course, maybe Bush has access to a time machine and knows that his economic policy will turn out quite alright. Otherwise, his management of the economy is disgraceful.

Yeah, you can't decide yet. However, many history books take a liberal stance, so unless the war ends up good during the Bush administration, they'll probably be somewhat negative to him.

Even if the war ends well, historians will remember him disfavorably. As they've done with Reagan.

i dont remember anything negative coming through with regan when i was growing up. it depends on who writes the book, and what the teachers decide to use. i come from a very conservative area, so the books we get generally are conservative. regan was always looked at favorably.
Bush is still in his term in office, and how history see's him doesnt usually come about until after he's left and all the dirty secrets are allowed to come out. clinton is doin this now. he attended a conferance in sweeden (or somewhere) and was admitting to all this stuff that the white house would never admit to. (nothing to do with lewinsky, dont worry)
bush will probably go down as the most conservative president in history, who brought about social securtiy and welfare reform. the war will be a different page entirely, and bush will probably have little more than a paragraph to his name. it might mention abortion and gay rights, it might mention social security, or it might not. who knows? i won't be reading the things, my kids will, and they'll all have that assignment we all had where we had to go home and ask our parents about a particular time or event, which will probably correspond to 9/11. i remember exactly where i was, and what i was doing when i heard, do you?

I think it's too early to tell, we'll have to see what happens in the future.

Regarding Qi's question, I was just about to get the train home from school, when I saw it on a news broadcast at the station, and just stood there disbelievingly for about tne minutes with hundreds of others.

I definitely remember where I was on 9/11, down to the time and exactly what was going on around me. Events like that are imprinted into your mind.

In regards to Reagan, I think people are beginning to view him very favorably. The New Republic, a liberal magazine, makes favorable mentions of him quite often, and the news nows speak of how great a president he was. In regards to presidents since Reagan, Bush 41 will be kind of forgotten and known only because he was the father of Bush 43, and Clinton will neither be viewed unfavorably nor favorably. Indeed, you can see how the last two are being viewed in the news; Bush 41 is only mentioned along with his son, and Clinton is only mentioned in passing.

Bush 43, though, will definitely go down in the history books, no matter how generations later view him. He already has a tremondous legacy not unlike Truman, and I think historians will be astounded at how the Republicans have continued to gain under him even though that goes against conventional wisdom.

Of course, Bush will be mostly judged on Iraq. The elections the other day went pretty well, and I think that helps him a lot. But, it all depends on where it goes from here and Iraq could certainly still become another Vietnam. Yet, I have to hand it to Bush on Iraq. I doubted the handover last summer would ever happen, and it did, and then I doubted that the election would happen, and then it did. Even once it became clear the election was going to happen, I was convinced it would not happen well, but it did. It looks like Bush finally has a plan in Iraq, and it looks like he's pulling it off.