A COLLECTION OF FAMOUS QUOTES BY GEORGE W. BUSH
• Quotes by George W. Bush • Photography by Al Jacobson
11-14-09:
the New $300 million Dollar Presidential Library at SMU.
None of the $212 million raised so far has come from foreign donors. The money has been raised from hundreds of donors, with those in Texas playing a particularly large role.
The foundation has declined to name any of the donors, saying that some prefer anonymity.
The former President gave a keynote speech outlining his vision for the Bush Institute, which will be in the same building as the archive and museum. No other presidential library has an institute, and questions have lingered about the purpose and scope of this one. Critics have worried that it will be a mechanism for reworking Bush's legacy, but supporters have said it will draw scholars and world leaders to campus to focus on global concerns in an academic setting.
BUSHIDOO
“I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I
believe and what I believe — I believe what I believe is right.” —Rome, Italy,
July 22, 2001
“We need to counter the shockwave of the evildoer by having
individual rate cuts accelerated and by thinking about tax rebates.”
—Washington, D.C. Oct. 4, 2001
“People say, how can I help on this war against terror? How can
I fight evil? You can do so by mentoring a child; by going into a shut-in’s
house and say I love you.” —Washington, D.C., Sept. 19, 2002
“The really rich people figure out how to dodge taxes anyway.”
—explaining why high taxes on the rich are a failed strategy, Annandale, Va.,
Aug. 9, 2004
“My plan reduces the national debt, and fast. So fast, in fact,
that economists worry that we’re going to run out of debt to retire.” —radio address, Feb. 24, 2001
“See, free nations are peaceful nations. Free nations
don’t attack each other. Free nations don’t develop weapons of mass
destruction.” —Milwaukee, Wis., Oct. 3, 2003
“The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” —State of the Union Address, Jan. 28, 2003, making a claim
that administration officials knew at the time to be false.
“The
most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one
priority and we will not rest until we find him.” —Washington,
D.C., Sept. 13, 2001
“But all in all, it’s been a fabulous year for Laura and me.”
—summing up his first year in office, three months after the 9/11 attacks,
Washington, D.C., Dec. 20, 2001
“I try to go for longer runs, but it’s tough around here at the
White House on the outdoor track. It’s sad that I can’t run longer. It’s one of
the saddest things about the presidency.” —interview with “Runners World,” Aug.
2002
“I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we’re
really talking about peace.” —Washington, D.C. June 18, 2002
“I trust God speaks through me. Without that, I couldn’t do my
job.” —to a group of Amish he met with privately, July 9, 2004
“Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of
Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.” —speaking underneath a
“Mission Accomplished” banner aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, May 1, 2003
“We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological
laboratories … And we’ll find more weapons as time goes on. But for those who
say we haven’t found the banned manufacturing
devices or banned weapons, they’re wrong, we found them.” —Washington, D.C.,
May 30, 2003
“Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere!”
—President George W. Bush, joking about his administration’s
failure to find WMDs in Iraq as he narrated
a comic slideshow during the Radio & TV Correspondents’ Association dinner,
Washington, D.C., March 24, 2004
“If this were a dictatorship, it’d be a heck of a lot easier,
just so long as I’m the dictator.” —Washington, D.C., Dec. 19, 2000
“There’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas,
probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool
me — you can’t get fooled again.” —Nashville, Tenn.
“Too many good docs are getting out of the
business. Too many OB-GYNs aren’t able to practice their love with women all
across this country.” —Poplar Bluff, Mo., Sept. 6, 2004
“Our
enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking
about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.”
—Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004
“My answer is bring them on.” —on Iraqi insurgents attacking U.S. forces, Washington, D.C., July 3, 2003. They did.
AUTHOR and PHOTOGRAPHER: Al Jacobson, photographs and writes in the Tampa Bay area on a myriad of subjects. He is from NY and occasionally speaks English, preferring Brooklyn based meta-phonetic syllabication (aka Street English). His high school English teacher, once commented to his parents, "He should try learning a foreign language like English... in a foreign country". He retorted, "Shakespeare doth not a genius make, for he spake in terms reminiscent of a flake". She threw him out of the class.