American presidents (6): George H W Bush

The final session of my City Lit course on post-war US presidents covered two: the elder Bush and Clinton. This session saw a return of the lecturer Paul Hadjipieris who had previously covered Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. He is a personable and able lecturer and we all learned a lot.

George H W Bush was the 41st president and served from 1989-1993.

He came from a wealthy family and became independently rich through an oil venture in Texas. He was the son of a Republican Senator and served two terms in the House of Representatives before losing a bid for the Senate. In spite of this political background, he then did a series of ‘non-political’ jobs on a short-term basis: US Ambassador to the United Nations  (1971-1972),  Envoy to China (1974-1975) and Director of the CIA (1976-1977).

Bush failed to win the Republican nomination for the presidency when Reagan obtained it, but then Reagan made him his Vice-President from 1981-1989. In 1988, he told the Republican Convention that “I want a kinder and a gentler nation”, but his campaign eviscerated his Democratic opponent Michael Dukakis with allegations of being weak on crime. In electoral college terms, his victory was massive.

At the Republican Convention, he famously declared his opposition to any tax increases with the words “Read my lips”, but as President he went on to sanction substantial hikes in taxes which led to a considerable fall in his popularity.

On the foreign fairs front, he is remembered most for putting together the international coalition which freed Kuwait after its invasion by Iraq, but some thought that he should have gone on to depose Saddam Hussein – something his son did later in his own tenure in the White House.

Bush only had one term as president because the Democrat Bill Clinton beat him in the presidential race of 1992. Although Clinton won less than 50% of the popular vote, he took the electoral college by 370 votes to 168.

You can read more about George Bush Sr here.


 




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