More Americans like G.W. Bush then hate

[Sea Skimmer]

I recall predicting this would happen a few years ago; Bush being remembered far more fondly then he was in office, but I was thinking at the time it would take at least until whoever came after Obama for it to happen. Guess not.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/20 ... ?hpt=hp_t1
Poll: You're starting to remember Bush fondly

Posted by
CNN's Ashley Killough
(CNN) - For the first time since 2005, more Americans have a favorable view of former President George W. Bush than an unfavorable view.

According to a new Gallup poll released Tuesday, 49% have a positive opinion of the two-term Republican president, while 46% feel the opposite.



The survey was conducted entirely before reports emerged last week of U.S. government surveillance programs, some of which began under the Bush administration.

As time goes by, presidents generally see their numbers improve the longer they are out of office. Gallup numbers show presidents Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton all had favorable ratings over 60% when last measured.

Read more: Most former presidents look better through history's eyes

Bush has largely stayed out of the limelight since leaving the White House, but he gained a more public profile in April and May with the opening of his presidential library in Dallas.

The new Gallup poll results mark a stark contrast from January 2009, when the 43rd president left office with a favorable rating of 40% and an unfavorable rating of 59%. Two months later, the gap widened to 35% favorable and 63% unfavorable.


Since mid-2010, his favorable ratings have hovered around the mid-40s, while his unfavorable rating gradually decreased to 46% from 53%.

Read more: Bush 43: 'History will ultimately judge ... I'm a content man'

Breaking it down further, Bush has seen improvement among independents and both political parties. Twenty-four percent of Democrats view him in a positive light, according to the new survey, compared to 10% in January 2009. Republicans saw a 14 percentage point jump, with 84% now having a positive opinion of Bush.

The biggest increase came among independents. While 29% gave him a favorable rating in 2009, that number now stands at 46%.

The Gallup results fall in line with a CNN/ORC International Poll released in late April, shortly before Bush's library dedication ceremony. Those results indicated the number of people who believed Bush's presidency was a failure had significantly dropped (by 13 percentage points) since he left office.

Gallup surveyed 1,529 adults by telephone from June 1 to June 4. The poll has a sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.

[Gandalf]

Is the invasion of Iraq still seen as his fuckup, or are people attributing that to other factors?

[Thanas]

There is no better indictment of the USA than this poll.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

I'm not too surprised; the day after Obama's inauguration, I noticed I was already no longer disliking Bush on an emotional level, and I have to admit the persona of Bush the painter is weirdly adorable, as dumb and entirely unimportant as that is. Like, he's responsible for the death of hundreds of thousands or even over a million people, and the worsening of lives of millions more, so he's a terrible person whose presidency worsened almost everything, but now that he's out of power it seems harder to have a gut emotional dislike of him. The fact that so much of the narrative since his disappearance from the public eye has been pinning everything wrong on Obama, and thus removing blame from Bush, probably helps a lot, too.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Why that, Thanas? I mean, Obama is exactly the same shit with a double helping of dishonesty, compare that with Bush who was both honest and had more of the ready informality Americans like for totally innocent socio-cultural reasons. Under Obama the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, just like Bush; under Obama you are spied on illegally by your government, just like Bush; under Obama rights are trampled on out of laziness and bureaucratic malaise rather than any real "need" (if it were justifiable at all), just like Bush... Under Obama capitalism runs roughshod over the poorest part of society, just like Bush. Bush told you what he was going to do, and did it, Obama says he won't and does it anyway, and Bush is nicer as well as honest.

[Terralthra]

So, you list off all the reasons why American citizens should dislike both Bush and Obama, then are curious why Thanas calls a positive poll for Bush an indictment of American society?

I mean...you just gave a great list of why we shouldn't like either of them.

[Grandmaster Jogurt]

From what I remember, Thanas isn't exactly the biggest supporter of Obama on the forum, either.

[Gandalf]

So, you list off all the reasons why American citizens should dislike both Bush and Obama, then are curious why Thanas calls a positive poll for Bush an indictment of American society?

I mean...you just gave a great list of why we shouldn't like either of them.

I'm pretty sure she's being sarcastic.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

No, I'm not. Just because it is a logical fallacy to like someone bad more because you've stopped liking another person because they're doing the same thing, doesn't mean that... A great many social interactions work precisely that way and are treated by people as a zero-sum game. "Obama turned out horrible, so I guess Bush wasn't that bad after all" is how a lot of human behaviour works when you strip away the pretences and the particular issues and look at just the train of thought.

[Simon_Jester]

Duchess's point is simple. My take on it:

Obama has turned out to be no better than Bush except that:
1) He's less likely to actively scrap government programs that serve the public interest, and
2) He's less pro-war. Drone bombings are bad for a huge list of reasons, but they at least kill fewer people than, say, invading Iran would.

In all other respects he's functionally very similar, and a good deal less honest and personable about it. Bush at least seemed to sincerely believe and avow that all the stupid shit he was doing was a good idea. Instead of criticizing it on the campaign trail and then proceeding to stand by and let it happen.



Another hidden factor here is that the Bush years were pretty good for most Americans, until the very end. This has nothing to do with whether Bush was a good president or not. By analogy, Coolidge probably was a lot more popular than Hoover in 1935. Even though it's obvious in hindsight that Coolidge-era policies must have contributed to the Depression, and that Hoover himself did a huge number of things to try and fight the Depression.

But Hoover was associated with and thus blamed for the economic crisis, in a way Coolidge was not by virtue of having left office before the worst of the storm hit. Bush gets much the same: in hindsight Americans may feel like they were happier and more secure under Bush than under Obama.

[The Romulan Republic]

Why that, Thanas? I mean, Obama is exactly the same shit with a double helping of dishonesty, compare that with Bush who was both honest and had more of the ready informality Americans like for totally innocent socio-cultural reasons. Under Obama the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, just like Bush; under Obama you are spied on illegally by your government, just like Bush; under Obama rights are trampled on out of laziness and bureaucratic malaise rather than any real "need" (if it were justifiable at all), just like Bush... Under Obama capitalism runs roughshod over the poorest part of society, just like Bush. Bush told you what he was going to do, and did it, Obama says he won't and does it anyway, and Bush is nicer as well as honest.

I'm disturbed, even disgusted by a lot of what Obama has done, but I really hate it when people say he's the same as Bush. He's not. They are similar in some ways, but they are not identical, and calling them the same is a shallow, simplistic, cliche thing to say that makes you look like either an ignoramous or a radical.

And Thanas, we know you loath America. You don't need to go on about it all the time. And you should remember that polls are unreliable.

[Gandalf]

No, I'm not. Just because it is a logical fallacy to like someone bad more because you've stopped liking another person because they're doing the same thing, doesn't mean that... A great many social interactions work precisely that way and are treated by people as a zero-sum game. "Obama turned out horrible, so I guess Bush wasn't that bad after all" is how a lot of human behaviour works when you strip away the pretences and the particular issues and look at just the train of thought.

So your statement is that lots of people are irrational in this way, therefore this poll isn't an indictment of the American people?

[PKRudeBoy]

Looking back on it from the point of view of an average American, life was pretty good under Bush. The economy was doing well, even if we know now that it wasn't sustainable, and the bubble didn't burst until the very end of his presidency. The two wars we had going on really didn't directly affect nearly as many people as other wars have, especially since they were paid for with borrowed money. The erosion of civil liberties hasn't really impacted the lives of most people and makes some feel safer. Sure, his policies led to problems now, but people will compare their life while he was President to now favorably, without considering the root causes of our current problems.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

No, I'm not. Just because it is a logical fallacy to like someone bad more because you've stopped liking another person because they're doing the same thing, doesn't mean that... A great many social interactions work precisely that way and are treated by people as a zero-sum game. "Obama turned out horrible, so I guess Bush wasn't that bad after all" is how a lot of human behaviour works when you strip away the pretences and the particular issues and look at just the train of thought.

So your statement is that lots of people are irrational in this way, therefore this poll isn't an indictment of the American people?

Is widespread belief in a cell-phone spread witchcraft incantation which makes your penis disappear an indictment of all residents of Khartoum?

[Gandalf]

f you want to argue an equivalence between the US and the capital of Sudan, sure.

[General Mung Beans]

Duchess's point is simple. My take on it:

Obama has turned out to be no better than Bush except that:
1) He's less likely to actively scrap government programs that serve the public interest, and
2) He's less pro-war. Drone bombings are bad for a huge list of reasons, but they at least kill fewer people than, say, invading Iran would.

In all other respects he's functionally very similar, and a good deal less honest and personable about it. Bush at least seemed to sincerely believe and avow that all the stupid shit he was doing was a good idea. Instead of criticizing it on the campaign trail and then proceeding to stand by and let it happen.

Few more differences:
1) Obama passed a semi-decent health care reform plan (even if a rather conservative one)
2) Obama ended waterboarding
3) Obama picks rather better Supreme Court justices than Bush the Lesser (John Roberts isn't a complete disaster but the less said about Samuel Alito the better...)

I do think Obama rather more to the left in his personal views than in his actual policy but is overly inclined to compromise or simply faces a brick wall of GOP opposition.

[The Romulan Republic]

Obama's also done more to support gay rights than Bush did.

And those two things Simon_Jester mentioned are pretty big things.

But as far as the spying is concerned, Obama's actions are inexcusable.

[Thanas]

And Thanas, we know you loath America. You don't need to go on about it all the time. And you should remember that polls are unreliable.

I do not loathe the USA. Anybody who says so can go sod off.

Why that, Thanas? I mean, Obama is exactly the same shit with a double helping of dishonesty, compare that with Bush who was both honest and had more of the ready informality Americans like for totally innocent socio-cultural reasons. Under Obama the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, just like Bush; under Obama you are spied on illegally by your government, just like Bush; under Obama rights are trampled on out of laziness and bureaucratic malaise rather than any real "need" (if it were justifiable at all), just like Bush... Under Obama capitalism runs roughshod over the poorest part of society, just like Bush. Bush told you what he was going to do, and did it, Obama says he won't and does it anyway, and Bush is nicer as well as honest.

I don't like Obama that much, so I don't know what you are going on here. The fact that there are no widespread protests against Obama is just as much an indictment of the US populace than the fact that they like Bush again.

[Zaune]

Take a look at the current Republican party and ask yourselves if the Bush administration looks too bad compared to that.

[Channel72]

I still can't understand how anyone can say with a straight face that Obama and Bush are basically the same, or even remotely comparable. They both lie? Really? So what?

Bush launched a multi-trillion dollar war for essentially no justifiable reason (something something... anthrax... something) that cost hundreds of thousands of lives and helped tank the economy. At the same time he amped up Reagan-era deregulation which contributed to an economic meltdown on par with the Great Depression.

Obama simply can't/won't/doesn't-care-to deliver what he promised, and he's continuing/amping up Bush-era highly-questionable human-rights violations. But at least he uses targeted, relatively inexpensive drone strikes (instead of military invasions) to kill people.

Comparing the two is absurd. Bush was an historically unprecedented disaster. Obama is basically just bleh... he's a typical US president who can't deliver what he promises and tends towards secrecy and expediency when there's friction between getting things done and preserving human rights/transparency.

Also... gay rights? Stem cell research? Planned parenthood, etc.

[Channel72]

As a follow-up, whenever this discussion comes up about Obama's presidency, I really have to call into question people's general expectations here. If Obama is such a shitty president, who exactly was a great President? Was it FDR - with his forced-interment of American citizens? Was it Lincoln - who mass-executed hundreds of people? Or are we under the naive delusion that 21st century politicians are held to some "higher" standard?

Seriously, Obama is a mediocre (perhaps better-than-average) President. He improved gay rights, and fought against the imposition of religious nonsense on scientific progress, while continuing to do various shady things that US presidents are prone to do, like ordering secret executions and spying on citizens. Any liberal who says otherwise has unrealistic expectations for a US president.

[Mr. Coffee]

[General Mung Beans]

One factor might have been that there is one group that makes President Bush look better in comparison-namely to-day's Tea Party dominated GOP.

[TheHammer]

I think many people here are perhaps conflating a favorable view of the man, with a favorable view of his Presidency. It is perfectly reasonable to believe that he is a good man and a bad president, etc.

[Flagg]

Alot of the favorability stems from his shutting the fuck up and keeping his mouth shut the fuck up. Which is appreciated.