A couple of others judged him second-worst, after James Buchanan, whose incompetence set the stage for the Civil War. More than 98 percent of the historians viewed Mr. Bush's presidency as a failure. The main factors behind the Bush fiasco are well known: cowboy diplomacy, Iraq, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, corruption, incompetence during Hurricane Katrina and, as if all these were not enough, the worst financial meltdown since the Great Depression to mark the Bush presidency's final months.But for me, it was above all Bush's "mediocrity" that fueled all else. Amazed with the absence of intellect and his embarrassing inability to express himself, I always asked myself, "How could the country elect a president like this man?" It was all the more puzzling since it happened not once, but twice. Because Americans elected him once again in 2004, for me, the Bush administration came to symbolize the disconnect between "the world" and America. I am the first to admit that there is some elitism in my judgment. Bush, after all, was the mirror image of American society. He connected with the "average Joe," who probably saw in him his own failures and deficiencies.
Yet, as the Bush presidency comes to an end, it is not this gloomy image of America but the optimism of "change" that becomes so remarkable about this country. Yes, it is easy to be pessimistic about America and the last eight years. But if you look at the bigger picture, what is about to happen on Tuesday, Nov. 4, will restore America's global credibility on a historic scale. Forget for just one minute that America is about to elect its first black president. This is not the bigger picture. What is really striking about our times is that the sole global superpower, the United States of America, comparable only to the Roman Empire in terms of its global military power, happens to be a democracy. This is no small feat. For the first time in history the superpower is run by a political system where the people vote and where the president's power is confined to term limits of a maximum of eight years. No superpower had this kind of political limitations on its system.
Why is this so important? For a crucial reason: America can self-correct. The democratic limitations of the American political system are also its greatest strength. No other empire in world history managed to combine so great a military power with such great limitations. This is the bigger picture I am talking about. For the very first time in human history the world is run by a hegemonic force that is a democracy.
The bad news is that this democratic behemoth can sometimes elect people like Bush. But the good news is that the damage is limited to eight years. Then comes the quick self-correction. The Pax Romana and Pax Britannica had no such luxury. They were stuck with bad rulers for a generation. And this no doubt played a major role in their demise.
Most remarkable about this election will be the scale and the quality of the self-correction. The scale of the fiasco during the last eight years is proportional to the growing need for radical change now. The Bush legacy has proven so disastrous for the United States that there is an unmistakable desire to radically self-correct. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the legendary leader of the African-American civil rights movement eloquently pointed out this historic need for correction when he spoke of "the fierce urgency of now."
This American ability for self-correction is something that the whole world should be thankful for. America will redeem itself this Tuesday, and it will do so by writing history on an unprecedented scale. Who knows? Maybe historians will end up being grateful for the Bush fiasco. Sometimes you need to hit rock bottom for revolutionary change to happen.
