During the first 6 years of the Bush admin, the US had one of the strongest economies ever. The housing/finance debacle was created by Barney Frank and his minions. Bush weakness is that he, nor his staff, did not fight this like they should have. It’s common sense that you don’t give loans to people who can’t afford it and they went along with the plan.
It was a bubble. It was bound to burst. Read “Return of the Great Depression” by Vox Day.
Sadly, no, it wasn’t. The economy from 2003 onwards was fueled by easy credit pouring money into the housing market, coupled with outlandish gains made in the financial sector.
Household income, however, largely stagnated during Bush’s two terms, and we’ve lost more jobs than were created in the post-2002 Recession rebound. In other words, we’ve unwound economic progress in this country by more than 10 years. After Obama/Congress allows the Bush tax cuts to expire, the US economy will be fully regressed back to a point before Bush even considered running for office.
This happened largely because Bush was unwilling to take on the problems in the economy and deal with them. He had two SecTreas men who told him the truth of the economy - and Bush rewarded their truth by firing them and installing the world’s most gifted grifter, Hank Paulson.