Americans Critical of the Bush Presidency

A new national poll finds two-thirds of Americans think George Bush's entire eight-year term as president was a failure.

As the final days of George W. Bush's presidency wind down, a new CNN/Opinion Research Corp poll released Sunday shows that 68-percent of those questioned see the eight years as a failure. Forty-four percent say this happened because of Bush's personal shortcomings, and 22 percent blame the failures on circumstances beyond Mr. Bush's control. Thirty-one percent said they would call the Bush presidency a success. In his final TV address to Americans Thursday night, Mr. Bush strongly defended his record in office, saying his administration brought democracy to Iraq and Afghanistan, and had prevented another attack on American soil since 9/11. And he offered that he acted decisively to beat the threat of the nation's financial collapse. Mrs. Bush delivered the address to an audience made up of his friends and family and correspondents say the emotion of the moment could clearly be heard in his voice. Many Americans still think back to that election eight years ago, when Al Gore lost the presidency to George Bush based on the Supreme Court's decision, and not the general election. Half of those polled in this recent poll say the United States could be better off today if Al Gore had been elected president in 2000 rather than Bush, yet 27 percent say the country would be worse off if Gore had won and 22-percent say things would be about the same. CNN polling director Keating Holland says, "Due to the Florida recount, Bush had the misfortune of coming into office under controversial circumstances. A lot of Americans apparently remember those circumstances and now wish things had gone a little differently." Only 3 percent of those questioned say Bush was one of the greatest presidents in the nation's history. Forty-six percent rate him as a poor president. Thirty-one percent approve of Bush's performance in the White House, and that is his final approval rating as president. Researchers say the that 31-percent who like George W. Bush is actually 7 points higher than it was back in November, which they say is a typical nostalgia bump that most outgoing presidents get. The bad news is except for the rating for Richard Nixon, after he resigned in disgrace, this rating for George Bush is the lowest approval of an outgoing presidents in the six decades that scientific public opinion polling has been done. The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll was conducted from January 12 to 15, with 1,245 adult Americans questioned by telephone. The surveys sampling error is plus or minus 3 percentage points for some questions and 4.5 percentage points for others