Andrew Breitbart has an article thanking George W. Bush on this eve of the election that truly marks the end of his presidency.  I second the sentiments in his article.  I do really like President Bush.  I think he’s a humble man who has been on an almost eight-year mission of protecting the people who elected him (and the ones who didn’t) from more attacks on American soil.

While he has increased the federal budget a whole lot more than any Republican should, it’s all has to do with the war.  Wait, let me explain that.  Yes, I know that if you take out the war spending, he has still had one of the biggest budgets in history.  Why is that related to the war?  Because he believed so passionately in keeping America safe, he had to pretty much allow all kinds of spending to happen in order to continue funding the war.  Especially when it was unpopular. 

He had Republicans and Democrats alike putting in their own personal spending priorities in return for continued funding for the war.  And he had to sign off on the bill or else face a terrible defeat that would have been detrimental to this country. 

He showed his conservative side when he could.  Look at the expanded SCHIP bill.  When held out on its own, Bush vetoed it because it covered children (and young adults) who came from familes very much capable of providing health coverage. 

However, most of these kinds of bills ended up attached to military spending bills that Bush could not veto.  So, the budget ballooned.  I didn’t like it, and neither did many conservatives.  But I firmly believe that Bush will be proven right when, in 25 years, we have a thriving democracy in Iraq that is friendly to our country.  That was only possible to complete by bribing the politically spinless wimps from both sides in D.C.