GEORGE H.W. BUSH (BUSH-41) REST IN PEACE

I have written about the Bush-41 presidency before and will republish my comments herein.  Though I couldn't stand either Jimmy Carter or Bush-41 when they were president, I came to feel they were the best presidents after WW-II.

Here is what I wrote in the item called "Landmines In The Way To Becoming A Great President".*
(http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2012/05/land-mines-in-way-of-becoming-great.html) (published in May of 2012)
Bush-41 (George H.W. Bush) In retrospect, George H.W. Bush had a pretty good record as president. Unfortunately, he raised taxes after famously saying, "Read my lips. No new taxes." This action has caused him to be ignored by his party. He got through the Americans With Disabilities Act and started the ball rolling on NAFTA (North America Free Trade Agreement). After a mistake by his State Department that led to the first Iraq War (Desert Storm), the allies decisively won and freed Kuwait. Furthermore, the U.S. used up existing munitions and other countries contributed to financing the war that cost the U.S. essentially nothing monetarily. Also, he knew when to stop the war. He also conducted a war in Panama (Operation Just Cause) over illicit drugs that captured the dictator Noriega, a task that Reagan was unable to accomplish. Although Republicans give Reagan all the credit, the Berlin Wall fell in 1989 and the Soviet Union dissolved two years later, both while Bush was president. From what I read, getting there took the skills of Bush to complete the fall. Bush consummated the Start Treaty. Bush also started Operation Restore Hope in Somalia that unfortunately came to a disappointing ending in his successor's term. He cut the Federal labor force by several hundred thousand employees. He was never able to obtain his dream of a capital gains rate of 20%. When speaking in public, Bush tended to speak in a rather whiny voice that many found unattractive. Like Carter and Ford before him, Bush was plagued by the perception of rising unemployment running up to election day. I was surprised that in one on one interviews, his voice was quite normal and attractive. Bush was noted as a gentleman in his campaign for reelection that should be a model for others, but, as he pointed out, he lost.

Here is an excerpt from "THE ECONOMY: PART 2:" (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2010/02/federal-economy-part-2.html) (published in Febrayry of 2010)
Bush-41 should get a lot of credit for raising taxes as should Clinton, but it was too late to balance the budget for Bush-41. Contrary to the belief by many, there is little evidence that raising taxes ruins the economy or that lowering taxes helps the economy.* In fact, if Bush-41 and Clinton had not raised taxes, there would probably have been no positive cash flow in the 1990s. Combined they also decreased Federal employment by more than a million.

* The reason that lowering personal income taxes have minimal positive benefits to the economy is that the poor do not pay income taxes, the middle class tends to pay off debts with the new money, and the wealthy buy Treasury bonds, chalets in Switzerland, Bombardier personal jets from Canada, and islands in the Bahamas. Though some of these benefit the global economy, they do not aid the American economy. Alan Greenspan, when he was chairman of the Federal Reserve expressed the worry of the wealthy buying too many Treasury bonds with their tax savings. As I said in the post below, there probably is an optimum tax level to maximize Federal revenues, but I do not know what that level is.