I think one of the legacies of Bush would be his adminstration's embrace of India. Clinton started it during his final years, and I thought Bush would be more inclined towards the cold-war stage. After all, India is a socialist country with most parties lauding "samajwadi"(literally socialist) philosophy. But the terrorist attacks of 9/11 altered Bush's approach.
I remember from early 2000, while he was campaigning, Bush was against the more proactive foreign policy. His mantra was that USA was should not and will not police the world. That was too Clintionesque. My, how this has shifted... now the Democrats are against the more proactive US role in the world, while Republicans tend to bring war to the enemies.
I think socialism is past history for India. I have heard Indians say, we know all about socialism. We starved. I think clinton's policeman of the world is very different from what bush has been doing. Clinton dispatched the military on 14 different missions which didn't accomplish much. Bush picked a couple and is seeing them through a la Korea, Japan, and Germany. This article does not get at the main thrust of our economic initiative twoard India and China. It is clean power and water treatment systems. Those big ticket items could balance the trade.
"His mantra was that USA was should not and will not police the world. That was too Clintionesque. "
Umm, the position of believing that the USA should not be the world's policeman is not clintonesque. Actually, it is more paleo-conservative.
Clinton/Gore were in favor of America being the world's policeman. Somalia, Yugoslavia, etc???
Your analysis of the 2000 campaign, and the issue of the US policing the world, is incorrect.