Bush Legacy Defender: ‘A Lot Has Changed’ Since Bush Was Viewed As The Worst President In History

By Matt Corley As soon as former President Bush left the White House in January 2009, Jeffrey Scott Shapiro launched an effort to “to correct the historical record about President Bush” through an organization called Honor Freedom. “The historical record must be corrected to accurately reflect President Bush’s legacy and for the honor of our country,” wrote Shapiro in a Jan. 22, 2009 Washington Times op-ed.

As Slate’s Jordan Michael Smith noted in April, “Shapiro talks about George W. Bush the way Buddhists talk about the Dalai Lama.” In a Jan. 2010 Big Government column — the website is owned by Honor Freedom’s communications director, Andrew Breitbart — titled “America Betrayed President Bush,” Shaprio wrote that “George W. Bush seemed to have an almost mystical understanding of what the American people needed when we needed it most” after 9/11 On FoxNews.com today, Shapiro wished Bush a happy birthday, suggesting that it will be a good one because “a lot has changed” since Bush was considered the worst president in history:

It looks like President George W. Bush may have a pretty good birthday today. After all, this time last year the liberal media was terming him as “the worst president in American history.”

But a lot has changed since then.

Shapiro based his conclusion on President Obama’s sub-50 percent approval rating, claiming it proves that “the challenges George W. Bush faced during his presidency were a lot more challenging than anyone ever realized.” But unfortunately for Bush and Shapiro, the annual Sienna Research Institute survey of presidential scholars was released last week. It found that Bush is considered the worst president of the modern era and the fifth worst president of all time.

Shapiro’s Honor Freedom “is independent of the George W. Bush Presidential Center” and has no official ties to the former president, but former Bush aide Bradley Blakeman advises the group and Shapiro claims that Bush told him that he’s “doing good work.” Like the man whose legacy he’s working to restore, it appears that Shapiro has prematurely declared “Mission Accomplished.”