this video is brought to you by squarespace whether it's your new profession or just a lifelong passion start your journey to website glory with squarespace check out their awesome all in one platform through the link in the description below more on them in just a bit in all of american history there have only been two men who were both fathers of a president and the president themselves the former was founding father john adams the second was george h.w bush a decorated navy pilot and former head of the cia bush was perhaps the most qualified man to ever occupy the oval office at the moment he was elected president in 1988 he became the first vp to move straight into the job without his predecessor dying or resigning since martin van buren in 1836 for contemporary politics watchers it looked like bush could become a president almost as great as his old boss ronald reagan yet that's not what happened despite approval ratings that peaked at 90 percent bush senior was destined to be a one-term president his name remembered today more in connection with his son than his own time in office even his signature achievement defeating saddam hussein and the gulf war was quickly overshadowed by junior's 2003 invasion of iraq but is this really a fair assessment or was there more to bush 41 than meets the eye if anyone could have seen the boy that morning they would have been certain he was about to die he was sat on a tiny raft to drift in the pacific blood flowed down his face from a nasty gash red welts from jellyfish stings burned his limbs every few minutes the pale shaking boy would vomit bringing up yet more sea water his crewmates were dead killed when the guns brought his plane down and now they were coming for him too as the boy weakly tried to paddle against the tide he could sense them the boats were getting nearer the boats carrying the soldiers who torture him to death like they had the others it was a fight for his very life one any independent observer would have concluded that the boy was destined to lose but destiny had other ideas the pass that led to george herbert walker bush nearly dying that bright pacific morning began two decades earlier on june 12 1924 when he was born into new england royalty and we mean that almost literally his investment banker father prescott sheldon bush claimed he could trace his lineage all the way back to a sister of king henry viii in short the family george became a part of was the epitome of the wealthy east coast elite that meant an early life of privilege of being educated at exclusive boarding schools but this wasn't the kind of brash elitism you might see today the family was old-fashioned rich the type for whom volunteering and charity work were as important as attending the country club as an adult bush would live by the motto that there could be no definition of a successful life that does not include service to others still that didn't mean he couldn't enjoy living in the one percent bush's first 17 years passed in a haze of genteel dances and successes on the sports field so much so that he even considered becoming a professional tennis coach but then something happened that would change not just his life but the lives of everyone in america the bombing of pearl harbor the usa's 1941 entry into world war ii caused an upswell of patriotism that even the ultra wealthy weren't immune to the day he turned 18 bush enlisted to help fight the japanese he'd quickly earn his wings becoming the navy's youngest pilot by now he was an athletic young man with a sweetheart barbara pierce a descendant of the 14th president who had met at a country club dance it was clear that if bush survived the war he was going to come back and marry her sadly that was a pretty big if about a quarter of all u.s fatalities in world war ii were airmen with a hundred thousand losing their lives in the war's inferno george bush was nearly among them on the 2nd of september 1944 the future president was on a bombing run above chichijima when the japanese shot him down he bailed into the ocean cracking his head on the plane's tail as he fell it's here that we found him in our cold open weak and adrift and close to death while the japanese tried to capture him instead after hours at sea he was finally rescued by a u.s submarine of the nine men shot down during the chichijima bombing run bush was the only survivor the other eights were captured tortured to death and beheaded there's even evidence that japanese officers ate parts of their bodies although bush wouldn't find out how close he came to this gruesome fate for decades he still had trouble figuring out why why had he been the only one spared he finally concluded there's got to be some kind of destiny and i was being spared for something on earth in the end george and barbara didn't wait until the war's end to marry four months after his near-death experience bush returned home on leave and married barbara in new york state but although this was just a short break he wouldn't be in the navy much longer the war ended in summer 1945 in september bush was discharged now in possession of a distinguished flying cross medal within days he'd have slotted right back into his privileged old life enrolling at yale on a fast-track economics degree he also pretty quickly became a family man george and barbara's first son was born on july the 6th 1946. they named him george walker bush after his pop many decades later bush jr would grow up to be a president more impactful and more controversial than george could ever dream of but all of that lay in the distant future for now bush graduated from yale then moved the family to texas where he planned to strike it rich in the oil industry it would be in houston that the former pilot finally made his move into politics at the time texas was a mostly democratic state that had nonetheless turned red for eisenhower perhaps sensing an opportunity bush began working for the local branch of the republican party eventually becoming its chairman by 1964 he was popular enough among the grassroots to chance a run at the senate 12 years earlier his dad prescott bush had managed to win a seat as a gop senator for connecticut and it seems likely that bush was trying to match his old man unfortunately he chose the wrong election to start with 1964 was the year the lone star state's own son lyndon b johnson not only ran for president but ran against a weak republican opponent less than a year after the assassination of jfk the democrats absolutely crushed the opposition in texas bush might as well have just spent the entire campaign on the golf course for all the good it did him still bush was a guy who learned from missed opportunities when he ran for the house two years later he ran as a staunch moderate one who highlighted his devotion to texas this time it was enough on january 3rd 1967 george h.w bush entered congress for the first time it was the start of a political career of wild ups and downs while other presidents like lyndon johnson hit the ground running the moment they entered congress bush managed to couple nearly every success with an abysmal failure he won two terms in the house for example but again failed to enter the senate in 1970. on the other hand his reputation as a moderate cause nixon to name him the ambassador to the un on the other hand and yes i'm aware we're up to too many hands now bush would turn out to be a crappy diplomat achieving very little in those three years but the epitome of his seesaw luck came in 1973. that year nixon made bush chairman of the republican national committee a powerful post unfortunately he did so the same year the watergate scandal really broke which meant bush spent his time in the rnc publicly defending a corrupt and vindictive president with dogged loyalty bush went to bat for nixon right up until the smoking gun tape was released by the time he cut nixon off three days before his resignation bush had been so tired by the scandal that he stepped down from his own position it looked like he might never work again but scandals are funny things what seems utterly explosive one year can be completely forgotten by the next by the end of the decade bush wouldn't have just returned to the corridors of power he'd be poised to enter the white house now you might not be poised for a run for president but you could run your own website thanks to our friends at squarespace now more than ever people are getting creative with their time they're reaching deep into their savings accounts to start that new business or launch that new blog to share opinions with friends and neighbors the world really is yours and squarespace is the perfect web tool to help you fashion it into whatever you want it to be it's the platform to use when you're ready to get started on that next web project that you've been thinking about are you looking to get in and out quick without thinking too much 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you're ready to launch go to squarespace.com forward slash biographics to save 10 of your first purchase of a website or a domain and let's get back to washington [Music] the immediate aftermath of nixon's fall saw gerald ford quietly shunt bush off to beijing as envoy to china it was the perfect place for bush to keep his head low do some cycling and try to shake off the stench of tricky dick finally after a year and a half in the wilderness bush was at last asked to come back as the director of the cia although bush held the post less than a year before being forced out after jimmy carter won the 1976 election his name still looms large in the agency's history the cia headquarters today is even named after him but for our story it's the connections he made while director that's really interesting it was while at the cia that bush first came into contact with a shady panamanian operative known as manuel noriega spoiler alert you're going to be hearing that name again after carter dropped him from the cia bush returned to houston to lay the ground for what he felt would be a successful bid for the presidency but we'll never know whether the moderate paternalistic bush could have beaten carter in 1980 because 1980 was the year a certain governor from california also decided he wanted the republican nomination the moment ronald reagan announced his candidacy george bush was doomed although he ran a good campaign memorably calling reagan's policy proposals voodoo economics thus becoming likely the only president ever quoted in a radiohead song he just didn't stand a chance reagan crushed everyone in his path for bush it looked like the only thing to do was head back to houston and stew for four years but then something unexpected happened regan in need of someone who could win over his party's moderate wing asked bush to be his vp bush was as surprised as anyone to get the tickets but he did a good job tirelessly traversing the country drumming up support that turned out to be totally unnecessary on november 4th 1980 the reagan bush ticket won in a landslide when bush was sworn in the following january it was as vp of an america that was about to change forever but while bush would be a part of reagan's transformative white house he'd never actually be a part of it reagan's team never forgave bush for that voodoo economics jibe nor could they forgive his costed upbringing and patrician style bush might have had a front row seat for the reagan revolution but it'd only ever be a spectator one good for sending to meet foreign heads of state but kept firmly away from the levers of power still being out of the loop sometimes had its advantages and if you've not heard of iran contra just know it was the miller investigation of its day and it was a scandal that dragged on and on until it was seemingly all anyone could talk about erupting in reagan's second term the scandal involved white house staff as illegally selling arms to iran and then using the prophets to also illegally fund right-wing contra rebels in nicaragua and no two illegal things do not make a legal thing when the scandal broke a special prosecutor was assigned eventually 11 people close to the white house would be convicted for their roles in it but not george h.w bush just by rumors that the deal had only been possible thanks to his cia connections bush insisted that he'd been out of the loop and knew nothing a not implausible scenario given his unpopularity with reagan's team it was only much later that a diary entry of his was unearthed reading i'm one of the few people that know fully the details of iran contra it is not a subject we can talk about regardless bush survived the scandal to finish his second term as reagan's vp but he wouldn't be content to leave office alongside his old boss back in 1984 the second reagan bush ticket had won one of the greatest landslides in u.s history comparable to fdr's victory in 1936 who was to say that leaving bush on the ticket now as the headline act wouldn't result in another republican win although no vp had gone straight to being elected president since martin van buren in 1836 bush was certain that he could pull it off the only reason the 1988 election isn't commonly remembered as a landslide is because it paled beside reagan's two knockout wins but make no mistake bush won a thumping victory taking 40 states and over 53 percent of the popular vote unfortunately one reason he won so hard was because he made an infamous promise and all together now read my lips no new taxes before long that quote would come back to haunt bush like a badly costumed scooby-doo villain haunting an abandoned arcade still bush entered the white house with a solid mandate even if democratic control of congress meant his agenda would be constantly frustrated which may be why there's little to say about his domestic policies despite talking at his inauguration about the problems of homelessness and drugs bush's term is best seen through the lens of foreign policy the reason the moment he entered the oval office the world went absolutely nuts the first major flare-up came in april of 1989 as protests broke out in china with up to a million students flooding beijing's tiananmen square to demand change on the 4th of june the ccp called in the military who dispersed the crowd dispersed here meaning they murdered hundreds of people as the world condemned china congress demanded action but bush believing a strong relationship with beijing was essential to american prosperity only imposed limited sanctions the weak response was seen as characteristic of the overly cautious president but there'd be nothing overly cautious about his response to the next international crisis since 1983 bush's old cia buddy manuel noriega had ruled panama as an effective dictator with a sideline in drug trafficking initially the u.s tolerated him because he had anti-communist credentials but by 1989 noriega was in business with the sandinistas leading to the cia cutting him loose when noriega annulled panama's election in spring that year they began actively plotting his overthrow then panamanian soldiers killed an off-duty u.s servicemen on december 16th and all hell broke loose bush authorized operation just cause on december 17th three days later the largest u.s troop deployment since vietnam invaded panama in the fighting somewhere between 500 and 1000 panamanians lost their lives mostly civilians against just 26 americans noriega fled into the vatican embassy where u.s forces blasted loud music and flashed bright lights at the windows until the former dictator surrendered on january the 3rd 1990 while the invasion of panama was seen as a victory in the u.s it was globally condemned in panama they're still uncovering mass graves containing civilians killed in the battle but before noriega was even captured bush's attention was being forced elsewhere on november 9 1989 the berlin wall came down the most visible sign of communism's collapse across eastern europe mindful of antagonizing the soviets bush chose to play the event in the most muted way possible merely telling a reporter i'm very pleased at the time this was seen as yet more evidence that bush had a spine as limp as a creepy handshake but today most agree that he played things well rather than gloat and risk a communist backlash bush was content to stand back and watch the whole edifice come tumbling down with just a quiet smile when he did play a part it was often an unglamorous but essential one it was bush for example who's credited with making german reunification a reality in the face of hostility from u.s allies like britain not that his role in the end of european communism was always successful in 1991 bush tried to stop the ussr's republics from becoming new countries culminating in a speech he gave in kiev calling the ukrainian desire for independence suicidal nationalism it was such a tone-deaf wimpy comment that it's gone down in history as the chicken kiev speech by and large though bush handled the soviet collapse well signing a non-aggression pact with gorbachev in november 1990 that effectively ended the cold war yet even this wouldn't be remembered as his signature foreign policy achievement for that we'll have to look to a nation that has spent decades as a thorn in the side of american politics you guessed it it's time for us to talk about iraq unlike the mess that was the 2003 invasion there was a very clear justifiable reason behind the first gulf war on the 2nd of august 1990 saddam hussein attacked the tiny oil-rich nation of kuwait in the face of superior iraqi forces the army disintegrated half a million people including the royal family were forced to flee to saudi arabia and so began the most significant challenge of bush's entire presidency the first thing to do was to stop saddam from rolling his tanks straight in on saudi arabia and annexing their oil fields by august 7 bush had signed an order to launch operation desert shield a massive buildup of force nominally to protect the saudis but already bush was planning the next step as u.s forces raced to the gulf bush began aggressive diplomacy to try and build a coalition force for liberating kuwait unlike his son in 2003 he did this with the support of the united nations before the year was out desert shield had the support of countries from across europe america and the arab world bush even managed to secure an agreement from israel not to join the fighting no matter what this was a clever move bush knew that having israel attack iraq would shatter his coalition sending the arab states running and turning the entire operation into a gigantic mess clearly saddam knew this too when the fighting began he'd fire scud missiles into israel killing civilians and deliberately trying to provoke a response but bush's agreement with israel would hold and saddam's last chance to divide his enemies would evaporate as the clock ticked nearer to the un-imposed deadline for iraqi withdrawal from kuwait bush sought approval from congress to fight a war on january 12 1991 they narrowly voted in favor despite this there was concern that the fighting would kill tens of thousands of americans that saddam would unleash chemical or biological weapons on the invaders instead it was one of the most one-sided wars imaginable the us-led coalition began airstrikes against iraqi targets on january the 16th as saddam lost control of the skies his forces became sitting ducks on february the 24th operation desert storm troops entered kuwait by february 28th it was over as iraqi troops retreated leaving burning oil fields in their wake bush ordered a ceasefire by this time at least 25 000 iraqi troops had died compared to less than 250 coalition soldiers nowadays bush's decisive actions liberating kuwait are seen as his crowning achievement recently he's also gained a lot of respect for refusing to continue the war until saddam was deposed guessing rightly that it would lead to the us getting bogged down in the middle east but this rosy view conveniently forgets the gulf war's aftermath on march the 2nd bush made a televised speech hinting that the u.s would support any homegrown attempt by iraqis to remove saddam from power accordingly dual revolutions erupted in the kurdish north and the shia south instead of u.s support though the revolutionaries got saddam's helicopter gunships gunships the coalition forces authorized saddam to fly a hundred and eighty thousand civilians are thought to have died in the resulting massacre not once did president bush ever dream of intervening in the aftermath of the gulf war it looked like bush might be on course for a second term with just a year and a half till the election his approval ratings were around 90 percent it also had a couple of domestic wins passing the americans with disabilities act outlawing employment discrimination against the disabled and ushering through the clean air act sure there were occasional goofs like that time he passed out and vomited on the japanese prime minister but it wasn't career-ending stuff no it would be a budget act and a recession that did that let's start with the budget in 1990 bush and the democrat-controlled congress worked together to pass the omnibus budget reconciliation act desperate to get the deficit down congress demanded tax hikes which bush reluctantly signed on to at the time it must have seemed like the president could ride out the storm that no matter how annoyed his right wing got that stick with him over any democrat at the next election i mean it wasn't like a common sense populist was about to launch a massively successful third party candidacy disillusioned voters could turn to or anything like that right still it's possible bush could have survived breaking his no new tax's pledge had it not been for the recession although it was technically over by 1992 the early 90s recession resulted in unemployment that was still rising as the election approached combined with the tax hikes it created a perfect storm of discontent among both america's haves and have-nots it was into this storm that george bush's executioner strode william jefferson clinton was an arkansas governor with an available charm and a knack for appealing to blue collar voters who ran a campaign focused on the faltering economy ross perot on the other hand was a brash populist running as an independent and advocating for sweeping change combined they ate away at bush's support from the left and the right until his entire platform came tumbling down on november 3rd 1992 the hammer finally fell bush pulled in an atrocious 37.4 percent of the vote way less than even jimmy carter had managed in 1980 not that clinton did much better though although he dominated the electoral college clinton picked up a mere 43 percent of all votes cast the rest went to ross perot for the rest of his life bush would privately blame a combination of perot and media bias for losing him a second term when he left the oval office in january 1993 bush became one of only three presidents since world war ii not to win re-election although he's since been joined by another it was still a very lonely club one of his last acts before stepping down was to pardon everyone involved in iran contra a hugely controversial decision that pissed a lot of people off that done his single term over bush returned to houston and quietly retired from politics unlike most ex-presidents he didn't do any speaking tours didn't try to stay politically active beyond the odd charity fundraiser for disaster relief even when his son became president in 2000 bush did little beyond note that he was very proud of his boy george h.w bush finally passed away on november 30 2018 just months after his beloved barbara died he was 94. today the 41st president's tenure is probably remembered as little more than a gap fill a breather before the clinton years a reagan tribute act without the great man himself while fans will point to his foreign policy achievements it's worth remembering that even these come with qualifications as the dead in panama and iraq would attest so what then is left to say about the 41st president well he was undeniably a decent person a true gentleman who believed in charity and supporting others perhaps more remarkable from a modern perspective though is that bush is the last president that both sides have considered legitimate think of the 90s republicans who claimed clinton was a murderer who perot swung the election or the 2000 democrats who insisted fox news had rigged florida for bush junior consider the bertha movement obama fate the accusations of russian meddling under trump the stop the steel campaign that physically tried to stop biden's win from being certified since george h.w bush departed office in 1993 american politics has become much more poisonous much more polarized the idea that conservatives and liberals alike could agree a president legitimately won his election seems like a bit of a depressing fairy tale now in the end perhaps that's the most interesting thing about the bush presidency seen today how it represented a different time one in which a decent man could try to do his best as leader and have both sides respect him for it so i really hope you found that video interesting if you did please do hit that thumbs up button below don't forget to subscribe and as always thank you for watching