w: why we need change

Since both presidential candidates are stating pretty clearly that their candidacies are all about change, it seems appropriate to reflect on why the need and desire for change is so strong in the United States. From my own point of view I am increasingly overwhelmed by the degree to which our current president, George W. Bush, has already changed our country. Let me count the ways:

1. He has led us into a war that is, in fact, contested on the stage of a civil war between two Islamic factions.
2. He has been an obstacle to any creative response to the present and impending energy crisis.
3. He has presided over almost eight years of avoidance related to climate change.
4. He has presided over a staff that ignored the warning signals related to 9/11, and then avoided the reality that the terrorists were predominately from Saudi Arabia, not Iraq.
5. He will conclude his term overseeing the most precarious economic conditions since the Great Depression.
6. He tacitly approved of torture, something either of his successors has condemned.
7. He will leave our country with an enormous indebtedness, which generations to come will struggle with.
8. He will leave our country undeniably weaker, and our relationships with allies immeasurably fractured.
9. He will leave his own political party in a shambles.
10. He will likely be remembered as the president who squandered resources of every kind, and in the end to no redeeming purpose.

As we enter into the final days of the presidential election, both candidates will make a strong case for change. And yet the haunting truth is that George W. Bush has already changed our country in profound ways over the past eight years.