Lyssa Beyer

The end times are here, for George W. Bush at least.

Monday, our esteemed commander in chief delivered his seventh and final State of the Union Address to a packed House Chambers in the U.S. Capitol.

Since the president took the oath of office on that January day in 2000, our nation has been tried, and he has tried our nation. We’ve seen the devastating events of Sept. 11, 2001, which turned our country from the stable, booming nation that it was in the 1990s into the volatile, roller-coaster of a country it is today, not just economically, but also in foreign and domestic policy.

Just in case any of you weren’t able to catch Bush’s nearly one-hour speech, he spoke much about the economy and went in detail about the war in Iraq, highlighting the successes he feels we have had throughout the trying battle. He also talked about his successes domestically as well as with his other foreign policy achievements; nothing too out of the ordinary for a lame-duck president who has an abysmal approval rating.

On the economy, Bush highlighted his $130 billion “stimulus package” he said will boost the nation’s slumping economy, hopefully stopping it from entering the dreaded recession it’s heading toward. He urged Congress to pass the act immediately and warned that any pork barrel projects included in the bill will cause him to veto the plan altogether.

As for Iraq, he spoke of the successes of the surge, which he announced in the 2007 State of the Union Address. He announced that 20,000 U.S. troops would be on their way home without being replaced. He also announced the addition of 3,000 soldiers to the fight in Afghanistan.

On health care, he called Congress not to look for universal health care but instead to allow patients to have more choice in their insurance.

Speaking on education, he touted the bipartisan No Child Left Behind Act and its achievements as well as calling for Congress to pass a proposed $300 million Pell Grants for Kids scholarship for low-income college students.

These few highlights of the many things he hopes to accomplish in 2008 didn’t sound like a call to Congress to act on specific plans as much as it sounded like a commencement speech at a high school graduation. The audience was chanting or yelling much of the time; Bush was constantly smirking, making joking facial expressions, engaging in random eye contacts and half laughs with various members of Congress. It seemed almost as if there was, and there probably is, an inside joke the American people were left out of.

Being that he is in his final year as president, Bush appeared as though he wanted to be the president who sprinted toward the finish line, working hard with his sleeves rolled up, as if he got advice from Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney that doing so really makes you a hard-working American.

Instead, Bush was clearly, and not surprisingly, trying to clear his tarnished record and start adding the final coat of shine to his legacy. Quite the contrary – any shine he tries to apply now will just come out looking like axel grease from the tanks and trucks doing his dirty work in the Middle East.

Bush’s plan for the economy came a little too late. Many Americans are already in enough debt that their bonus-for-being-an-American check will probably go toward, as many economists believe, paying down that debt, not toward buying more stuff. Also, by the time those checks do arrive in the mail, which probably won’t happen for many of us because our parents most likely claim us as dependents on their tax return, the economy would be too far in a recession to stop it.

Another point about his stimulus package is that it will cost roughly $130 billion; where that money is coming from, I don’t know. How it will be paid for, I’m not sure. But it’s there – apparently. But, Bush claims the budget he will send to Congress next week will cut $18 billion of “wasteful and bloated programs” and will put the country on track for a surplus by 2012. One question – how can the country be on track for a surplus in four years by cutting $18 billion if you are going to spend roughly $130 billion on an economic stimulus package at the same time? Throw that on top of all of the other increases in funding and program creations, including the $300 million Pell Grants for Kids project he called for.

When it comes to domestic policy, Bush routinely focuses on the No Child Left Behind Act, which will probably go down as one of his only successful tasks in improving the country at home. But rather than honing in on his weaknesses and deciding how to improve those to better his image, he focuses on the No Child Left Behind Act to carry his legacy, about as much as Rudi Giuliani relies on Sept. 11, 2001 to carry his campaign.

It was also a very political move for Bush to announce the withdrawal of 20,000 troops from Iraq without replacing them. With Iraq being the most unpopular decision of his presidency, it’s very convenient that he starts to shape his legacy by saying, “see, Iraq was a good idea, it worked and now we can come home, right before I leave office.”

However, he once again threatened to use his little red stamp to veto any further withdrawal from the region should it reach his desk.

Throughout the speech, Bush left the American people with some bright plans, which will probably go unfulfilled, such as the creation of a Palestinian state by the end of the year, again another attempt to spit shine his legacy by going down as the president who helped bring peace between Israel and Palestine.

But there is always hope. The multi-billion dollar stimulus package might work, and there might be a Palestinian state, however doubtful it may be, by 2009. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Dostalek is a senior print journalism major and news editor of The Spectator.