The Exhibits You Won't See at the George W. Bush Presidential Library

The mission of the tour was to drive a stake in the heart of failed conservative governance once and for all.

Image from Americans United for Change

(WASHINGTON DC) - Let the Republican white washing of history commence as the public indifferently awaits the doors of the George W. Bush Presidential Library to swing open for business on May Day. With a $250 million price tag, the museum exhibits will surely be state-of-the art and just as surely … selective.

Fortunately, the exhibits that the Bush PR machine will omit were already seen by tens of thousands of Americans in 2008 when Americans United for Change crisscrossed the nation with the Bush Legacy Bus -- a 45-foot long, 28-ton museum-on-wheels documenting how eight years of Bush-conservative governance harmed our national security while sacrificing so many important domestic priorities and setting the economy on a crash course from which we are only beginning to recover.

The Bush Legacy Bus traveled to 42 States, logged 23,549 miles and made 150 stops, mostly in front of the hometown constituent offices of President Bush’s backers in Congress who enabled his disastrous policies, from perpetuating the needless, bloody, $3 trillion war in Iraq, to exacerbating climate change and income inequality, to squandering a budget surplus by doling out irresponsible tax breaks for the rich, to vetoing children’s health care, to attempting to replace Social Security with a risky privatization scheme on Wall Street.

The mission of the tour was to drive a stake in the heart of failed conservative governance once and for all.

Conservatives had it their way in Washington for six years under Bush and a GOP-Congress, and their way led to the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Conservative ideology rails against government, argues that government is the problem, not the solution, and so when a government run by conservatives and is faced with the most important responsibility any government has – to protect its citizens – is it any wonder you wind up with the tragically inept response to Hurricane Katrina?

And today’s Tea Party-driven, GOP-controlled House of Representatives is an incredibly painful reminder of what happens when people not interested in governing get their hands on the levers of power, whether it’s threatening to force the nation to default on its debts and explode interest rates for everyone or cheering for the arbitrary sequester cuts to bring the pain.

SEE HERE FOR VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE BUSH

http://www.americansunitedforchange.org/page/content/exhibits/

*SEE VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS OF THE BUSH LEGACY TOUR EXHIBITS BELOW:

The Bush Legacy on Katrina

The Bush Legacy in Iraq

Bush on Bin Laden, March 13, 2002 – 6 months after 9/11:  “I just don't spend that much time on him... we haven't heard much from him. And I wouldn't necessarily say he's at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don't know where he is. I -- I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him.”

Bush: ‘Mission Accomplished’ in Iraq, May 1, 2003

Bush Vetoed Basic Expansion of Children’s Health Program

Plame-Gate

Warrantless Wiretapping

The Bush Legacy: A Story Told in Headlines

• Los Angeles Times, September 9, 2005: ‘Katrina's Aftermath; Top FEMA Jobs: No Experience Required; Director Brown wasn't the agency's only senior official appointed under Bush with little or no background in dealing with natural disasters’
• Chicago Tribune, Oct. 14, 2009: ‘EPA releases climate report that was suppressed by Bush administration’
• UPI, March 19, 2013: ‘Cost of Iraq War: More than $2.2 trillion, 4,488 U.S. service members’
• Associated Press, April 25, 2005: ‘CIA’s final report: No WMD found in Iraq’
• Los Angeles Times, Oct. 14, 2004: ‘Bush 'Not Concerned' About Bin Laden in '02’
• CNN Money, Jan. 4, 2012: ‘Income inequality driven by Bush tax cuts’
• AFP, Feb. 11, 2006: ‘Ex-CIA Official Says Bush 'Cherry-Picked' Iraq Intelligence’
• New York Times, Dec. 16, 2005: ‘Bush Lets U.S. Spy on Callers Without Courts’
• NPR, Nov. 11, 2004: ‘Bush Eyes Privatizing Social Security in Second Term’
• New York Times, Oct 3, 2007: ‘Bush Vetoes Children's Health Bill’
• New York Times, Feb. 24, 2004: ‘Bush Backs Ban in Constitution on Gay Marriage’
• The Guardian, January 28, 2005: ‘Bush payola scandal deepens as third columnist admits being paid’

• Associated Press, July 28, 2008: ‘Bush Leaving Next President Record Federal Budget Deficit’

FROM: Americans United for Change