George W. Bush: The 43rd President, 2001-2009

"You know, it’s funny. I was reading an article just this morning, by somebody very upset about the New York Times coverage of Trump. It ruffles people’s feathers when somebody is neutral about a topic they themselves are not neutral on, right? So if you are an extremist about something, even someone coming on your own side, might seem neutral. But I do think this book is a good, straightforward book. It doesn’t come with some big agenda to tear down or build up George W. Bush. George W. Bush was a pivotal president. We had September 11 on his watch, of course, which was a big moment in our country’s history. Then the immediate response to that, where we had unity as a country: Okay, we’ve been attacked, we’re bonding together. Then we go into Afghanistan, transition into the Iraq initiative, it doesn’t go well and it tears the country apart. In a lot of ways, there’s no precise beginning and no end. It’s all history, marching along. But there are trends underlying things, and in some ways it feels like the beginning of the fracture that we see now, where we are just so polarized. The aftermath of the Iraq War hardened and accelerated America’s dysfunction and partisanship, and it just keeps getting worse. Then Obama inflamed it because he angered a lot of people. A lot of the country wasn’t ready for him to be president, and then, of course, Trump turbocharged it. It’s a mix. Some things are just so out of anybody’s control. And beyond that, there are large trends or surprising shocks. No matter what you do, no matter who you are, the world is an enormous place. Whether you are the president of the United States or the king of a small country in Eastern Europe, history is going to happen. But there are moments and opportunities where individuals can play a real role, and the decision-making is extremely decisive and important. So it’s a mix, and that’s what makes it such a dynamic place, history. You get both. And it’s really fun to read them. Obama’s book in particular I enjoyed. He lays it all out. It’s not perfect—he has the same mixture of motivations that they all do—but it’s really nice to hear what he was thinking. This is his perspective from behind closed doors, for all these events I was watching from the outside."