George W. Bush: Wartime President

01VOA Learning English presents America's Presidents.

02Today we are talking about George Walker Bush.

03He took office in 2001 as the 43rd president.

04He has a similar name to another president, his father, George Herbert Walker Bush.

05To simplify things, Americans sometimes call the younger Bush 43, or simply W.

06Here we will just call him Bush.

07Because Bush is a recent president, historians have not reached a broad agreement on his time as a leader.

08But he will surely be remembered for facing one of the biggest challenges to any president, the attacks against the U.S.

09on September 11, 2001.

10George Bush was born in the northeast state of Connecticut, but his parents soon moved to the southwest state of Texas.

11George grew up there and considered Texas home.

12The Bush family had a long background in politics.

13Bush's grandfather was a senator.

14His father held many public offices.

15In some ways, George was prepared for a career in politics, too.

16He went to the same private boarding school as his father.

17Then, like his father and grandfather, George went to Yale for college.

18He also worked on several political campaigns.

19But he said he did not consider pursuing politics.

20Instead, he earned a degree in business at Harvard and took a job in an oil company in Texas.

21In time, he founded his own oil business.

22And he married Laura Welch, who was a teacher and librarian in their hometown.

23They had twin daughters named Barbara and Jenna.

24In these years as a young adult, Bush began to make some changes.

25He began attending a Christian church regularly.

26He decided to stop drinking alcohol because it was creating problems in his personal life.

27And he turned his attention to politics.

28Bush lost the first election in which he competed, a race to become a member of Congress.

29So, for a while, he focused on business investments and helping his father's political career.

30But in 1992, his father lost re-election to the presidency.

31And the younger Bush saw a chance to enter politics himself again.

32In 1994, Bush ran for governor of Texas.

33To many people's surprise, he won.

34Four years later, he was overwhelmingly re-elected.

35Many voters liked his image as what he called a compassionate conservative.

36In other words, he wanted to use traditional Republican ideas about government to help society.

37Following two successful terms as governor, Bush turned his attention to the presidency.

38In 2000, he competed against the vice president at the time, Al Gore.

39The winner was not announced until more than a month following the election.

40Usually, the winner is announced within hours.

41Both sides disputed the process of counting votes in the state of Florida.

42Finally, the U.S.

43Supreme Court ruled on the process.

44The court ordered state officials to stop recounting votes.

45Bush's lead stood.

46Bush entered office expecting to bring many of the ideas he pursued in Texas to the entire nation.

47For example, as president, he permitted religious groups to receive government funding and set national standards for public schools.

48These moves were popular with many voters.

49But they also challenged some American traditions.

50The separation of church and state and the ability of public schools to govern themselves.

51For many presidents, these policies might have created a legacy.

52But early in Bush's term, he faced a crisis that defined much of his time in office.

53Hijackers linked to the Al Qaeda group seized four airplanes on September 11, 2001.

54They purposely crashed two planes into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, eventually killing more than 2,700 people.

55Another plane was flown into the Pentagon, the country's military headquarters outside of Washington, D.C.

56About 200 people died there.

57The fourth plane was aimed at another important target.

58But passengers fought the hijackers.

59The plane lost control and crashed in a field in Pennsylvania.

60All 44 people on board died there.

61President Bush was visiting an elementary school in Florida that morning.

62He learned about the attacks while he was reading with the children.

63At the end of the day, Bush spoke to the nation.

64He said, The U.S.

65would answer both the terrorist groups and the countries that permitted terrorist groups to thrive.

66Over the next years, Bush took a number of actions to create a new national security strategy.

67They included creating a Department of Homeland Security, making changes to the country's intelligence operations, and reforming the U.S.

68military.

69He also sent U.S.

70forces into Afghanistan to destroy terrorist networks there.

71Bush was especially targeting the person who had designed the September 11 terrorist attacks, Osama bin Laden.

72The struggle in Afghanistan was successful at first, but continued throughout Bush's time in office.

73And bin Laden was not captured while Bush was president.

74In 2003, Bush opened another front on what some called the War on Terror.

75He and other government officials said the leader of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, was developing weapons that could kill many people.

76They said Hussein, and his connections to terrorist groups, threatened Americans and people in other countries.

77Hussein did not agree to leave Iraq.

78So U.S.

79and British forces launched bombs at targets in the country's capital.

80Additional troops destroyed what was left of the targets.

81Hussein was quickly overthrown.

82But the weapons of mass destruction were not found.

83For the rest of Bush's presidency, U.S.

84forces remained in Iraq.

85Bush promised that Americans would stabilize the country and help Iraqis create a democratic government.

86The presidency of George W.

87Bush is too recent to understand its impact.

88Bush received some of the highest ratings of any president.

89In the weeks following the September 11 attacks, 90% approved of his leadership.

90He was re-elected in 2004.

91But his popularity steadily decreased.

92At the end of his second term, he had one of the lowest public approval ratings of any president, 33%.

93The U.S.

94economy had entered a recession.

95More Americans disagreed, especially with his decision to invade Iraq.

96And some criticized his government for responding too slowly after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and the country's Gulf Coast.

97Since Bush left the White House in 2009, his approval ratings have, like those of many presidents, risen again.

98He has mostly avoided public appearances.

99Instead, he has enjoyed playing sports, helping charities, and reading U.S.

100history.

101He also began a new hobby, painting.

102He has created portraits of dozens of veterans to honor their service in the military.

103I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

104I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

105I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

106I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

107I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

108I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.