When historians evaluate the presidency of George W. Bush decades from now, the emphasis of their studies likely won’t focus on whether his policies were a failure or how — with the possible exception of his establishment of Homeland Security — but what Bush’s motivation and guiding philosophy was.
When trying to explain it, the pantheon of presidential administrations provides some hints; Bush obviously idolized Ronald Reagan when it came to fiscal policy and steadfastness (or stubbornness) in the face of foreign aggression. However, his model of governing doesn’t seem to line up with any other American president. He takes after John F. Kennedy in his approach to the transcendent threat of the era — Kennedy tried to fight communism everywhere it existed, whereas Bush at least verbally committed to a “War on Terror” — but certainly doesn’t share his contemplative approach to national crises. His abuse of power is often compared to Richard Nixon, but considering Nixon’s more moderate domestic and foreign policy, they’re polar opposites.
In reality, Bush’s ideological equal isn’t a neo-con, libertarian or even moderate Republican. Instead, it is the essence of a liberal Democrat — more specifically, President Woodrow Wilson. Even before WWI propelled America to the forefront of every foreign policy debate and struggle, Wilson recast America’s initial interventionist spats in East Asia, Mexico and Central America from economic opportunism into a true extension of the American way of life. As far as Wilson was concerned, American exceptionalism was something to be exported to those without the same Democratic ideal. But given Wilson’s imposition of the 14 points following WWI and his military endeavors elsewhere, his goal obviously was not to insert elements of the American way of life into existing structures but to rebuild their systems of government from the ground up, implementing the American brand of democracy.
Those more cynical of Bush’s motives regarding incursions into Afghanistan and Iraq — the majority of the country — may see his move as more of a power grab or legacy-builder, but if we are to take Bush at his word and assume he was using this same rationale for intervention, it perfectly paints the main flaw in his presidency. While the turn of the century brought a change to the order of the world and Sept. 11 gave the U.S. an opportunity to define what that order was, Bush didn’t move with the changing globalized world, but reverted to an ideological tactic of the 1910s to justify his actions. Democracy will prevail, spread and change the culture and tactics of the Middle East.
But he neglected the past 80 years. Wilson was an idealist who had his vision of an “Imperialism of Idealism” — as UW professor William Appleman Williams once called it — carried out by nearly every subsequent president in way or another. When this method of foreign policy arrived at Bush’s feet following Sept. 11, it was a tattered, weathered idea, best encapsulated by the American flag U.S. soldiers draped over the face of a bronze Saddam Hussein. Instead of planting the seeds of American ingenuity and freedom in a fertile soil, we paved over the rubble, erected a symbol and hoped that would work.
But perhaps history will look more sympathetically on Bush for this; if his mistake was a failed idealism, he can at least serve to teach future generations idealism must work hand in hand with pragmatism.
And that may be the one sea change in history’s interpretation of Bush: History will see him as a half-president of sorts. Big on lofty goals, but short on pragmatic ideas.
