Friday 29th of March 2024

forwarding address .....

farewell address .....

When Barack Obama met George Bush for the first time four years ago, it proved an unhappy encounter.  

Matters were not helped at the start when a presidential aide squirted sanitiser on George Bush's hands before they shook. 

Yesterday, the 43rd US president met the man who will be the 44th at the White House again in very different circumstances. This time there was to be no sanitiser and none of the condescension that Obama complained of on the first occasion. Obama was at the White House as president-elect to discuss the transfer of power. 

He was there too as the fulfilment of the dream of Americans who lived through segregation and the 1960s civil rights movement. 

Like other African-Americans, he is deeply conscious of the White House's alternative history: built by slaves and staffed by slaves throughout its first 50 years and home of repeated racial slights and snubs that lasted into the 1970s.

43 Meet 44: Mr Obama Goes To Washington

a historical void .....

The George W. Bush Presidential Library is now in the planning stages. The Library will include: 

·                     The Hurricane Katrina Room, which is still under construction.

·                     The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you won't be able to remember anything.

·                     The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you don't even have to show up.

·                     The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don't let you in.

·                     The Guantanamo Bay Room, where they don't let you out.

·                     The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room, which no one has been able to find.

·                     The National Debt Room which is huge and has no ceiling.

·                     The 'Tax Cut' Room with entry only to the wealthy.

·                     The 'Economy Room' which is in the toilet.

·                     The Iraq War Room. After you complete your first tour, they make you go back for a second, third, fourth, and sometimes a fifth time.

·                     The Dick Cheney Room, in the famous undisclosed location, complete with shotgun gallery.

·                     The Environmental Conservation Room, still empty.

·                     The Supreme Court's Gift Shop, where you can buy an election.

·                     The Airport Men's Room, where you can meet some of your favorite Republican Senators.

·                     The 'Decider Room' complete with dart board, Magic 8-ball, Ouija board, dice, coins, and straws. 

The museum will also have an electron microscope to help those keen to locate the President's accomplishments.