Some snippets of fond farewells. Each has much more at the links provided:
From Bob Herbert in the New York Times, December 30, 2008: (Add Up The Damage):
I don’t think [Bush] should be allowed to slip quietly out of town. There should be a great hue and cry — a loud, collective angry howl, demonstrations with signs and bullhorns and fiery speeches — over the damage he’s done to this country.
This is the man who gave us the war in Iraq and Guantanamo and torture and rendition; who turned the Clinton economy and the budget surplus into fool’s gold; who dithered while New Orleans drowned; who trampled our civil liberties at home and ruined our reputation abroad; who let Dick Cheney run hog wild and thought Brownie was doing a heckuva job.
From Paul Waldman at the American Prospect, November 11, 2008 (Goodbye and Good Riddance):
Goodbye to the rotating cast of butchers manning the White House’s legal abattoir, where the Constitution has been sliced and bled and gutted since September 11. Goodbye to the “unitary executive” theory and its claims that the president can do whatever he wants — even snatch an American citizen off the street and lock him up for life without charge, without legal representation, and without trial. Goodbye to the promiscuous use of “signing statements” (1,100 at last count) to declare that the law is whatever the president says it is, and that he’ll enforce only those laws he likes. Goodbye to an executive branch that treats lawfully issued subpoenas like suggestions that can be ignored.
From Andy Hoffman at The PopTort, January 1, 2009 (So Long Mr. Bush, and Thanks for all the Grief):
As fans of civil justice well know, consumers are kept safe from the havoc inflicted by corporate miscreants by both tough regulations and the deterrent effect of legal liability. Unfortunately, Bush and his cronies have done a lot of damage on both fronts — by turning federal regulatory agencies into apologists for corporate wrongdoing and then trying to use these agencies to immunize corporations from lawsuits.
“There ought to be limits to Freedom.”
— Gov. George W. Bush, May 21, 1999.
My view: he was an awful president. You can’t say enough about some of the mistakes he made. But he showed more interest in Africa probably every American president combined. And he is a decent guy. President Obama (first time I’ve written that – cool) wants to look forward, not backward. So should we.