The Unfinished Legacy

By a matter of chance I happen to have a subscription to Texas Monthly (yeah Greg, I bet you are JEALOUS). For my friends unfortunate enough not to have inhabited the Lone Star State, Texas Monthly has two to four good articles a month, sandwiched in between irrelevant advertising. It also happens to be one of the few good magazines at the hair shop, which is how I got the subscription to begin with.

This month it happens to feature two articles on the legacy of George W. Bush.

The first article is on the debate over whether or not Southern Methodist University should allow the Bush library and think tank to be built on its campus. Some believe that they should not build a monument, on moral grounds. Such a library would be a monument to "alienation of longtime U.S. allies," "a shameful disrespect for gay persons and their rights," "a preemptive war based on bad intellegence and blind obeisance to ideology."

The author and I though wouldn't see it that way. The Razorbacks did not enshrine sexual transgressions with interns when their library was built. Nor did the University of Texas condone election theft or the deaths of 58,000 men when the LBJ library was built. What begs to be questioned is the access to the historical record, which will be at issue no matter where the library is built.

Since Roosevelt's library was built in Hyde Park, NY presidential papers have been collected and granted to the government at the president's will. I seem to have gone to a lot of these libraries, no doubt they put the president in a favorable light and present their bias. Duh, who is paying for the thing anyway? After Nixon the papers are automatically forfeited to the National Archives, who catalog them and then release them after five years. Kind of, you know, if it isn't restricted. It was 2002 before some of the Nixon tapes were released. Long after Nixon was pardoned (and dead). Historians kinda go crazy over such things, all the sudden they have new evidence in a cold case. Books get published and republished and we understand history a little bit better.

What does this have to do with W?

In 2001 Bush issued an executive order where either the former president or the incumbent president could restrict access to information after the twelve year waiting period. Moreover this power to restrict information can be willed so that a veto might be carried out even after the president's death. Much like the library in Antproof Case, Bush might build a library which would never actually be used.

Question: How can we let history be the judge if we are never actually allowed to see any evidence?

Also in the magazine is an article on what Robert Dallek believes will be the Bush legacy.

(Personal note: Robert Dallek was my American Presidency professor in the Fall of 2001. Class on a certain Tuesday when the rest of the world was watching television was worth going to).

Anyhow, back to the legacy. Bush seems to believe that 30-50 years from now we will look back and thank him for being a visionary. He points to Truman who left office with a 25% approval rating marred by the Korean conflict. Maybe, but Truman had a plan. He and Kennan and Marshall had a plan which other presidents followed. You might have heard of it: containment and the domino theory? In any case the merits of the plan can be questioned, but there's a plan and successor's willing to follow in his stead I think it will be a false start.

The same would be true of George's other legacy, and his dream to be the "Education President." I don't think NCLB will stick, if it is still sticking; that is hard to tell. As Utz said "I've lived through seven administrations and seven educational reforms, and there will be another one, and another one after that. It's our job to teach (or in Utz's case pretend to teach) and give our students the best leg up we can."

The Economist also has an article out on the domestic policies that could give the legacy a boost.