George H. W. Bush

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Official portrait. It only looks like a cardboard cutout in front of a backdrop.

George H. W. "Mad Dog" Bush was the 41st President of the United States. He saved Kuwait for despotic monarchy and yellow ribbon manufacturers, and kidnapped another head of state to drag him to trial in Miami for offenses committed in Panama (how the U.S. could claim jurisdiction being anyone's guess), although he admitted to lacking in the "vision" department.

Prior to his presidency, he was Ronald Reagan's vice-president for eight years, ran the CIA, and unlike his boy, was an actual pilot. He got elected over second place finisher Michael Dukakis in 1988 by resorting to moral panics and attack ads, in one of the nastiest one-sided presidential campaigns in recent history. Ironically Bush campaigned on a vague platform of making the U.S. a "kinder, gentler nation." American politics have never really recovered.

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[edit] Things that happened during his reign

The Satanic panic peaked just around the time he was elected. Manuel Noriega, the head of Panama, was ousted by Bush after it became public knowledge that Noriega made drug deals with the US as part of the funding given to the Contras. Bush, as Director of the CIA, blocked investigations into Reagan's Noriega's shadiness.

During his time in government, the checkout scanner/UPC bar code system was widely implemented, but no one told him in an elaborate practical joke to make him look clueless while running for re-election in 1992 against the upstart hillbilly, Bill Clinton, who went on to win, using the slogan "It's ... stupid!"

The Cold War officially ended on his watch, and aside from his "Chicken Kiev" speech the USSR thankfully fell apart with all the nukes in their place. In 1991-1992, a economic recession occurred due to a spike in oil prices post-Gulf War, and the bursting of the Reagan-era housing bubble from the '80s, leading to three million people being unemployed. This gave Clinton the electoral advantage.

[edit] Bigotry

No, I don't know that atheists should be regarded as citizens, nor should they be regarded as patriotic. This is one nation under God...
—George Herbert Walker Bush[1]
His religious fanatic side often goes unnoticed. Among the many things abhorrent about this statement, as President, all people in your country who are, in fact, citizens, should be considered "citizens," not just those who agree with you theologically. However, the above quote has come into dispute, as the conversation was never recorded through video or audio.

A possible explanation to his disdain for atheists is a conflict with Madalyn Murray O'Hair, the chairlady of American Atheists' Association.

He was also the personal lapdog of Unification cult leader Sun Myung Moon, which would explain his odd religious leanings.[2]

[edit] Nicknames

  • "Poppy"
  • "Snugglebutt"
  • "Sqeeckychums"
  • "41" (around the compound at holidays, to distinguish him from "43")
  • "Ticklebickle"
  • "Mad Dog"

[edit] Alma maters

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnotes

  1. New Atheism, The Skeptic's Dictionary
  2. Bush Sr. To Celebrate Rev. Sun Myung Moon - Again, Mother Jones
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