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Former President George W. Bush has successfully had a partial knee replacement in Chicago. Bush spokesman Freddy Ford says Bush had the procedure Saturday and returned home to Dallas Monday. Ford said in an email Tuesday that Bush was “doing great” and was able to “get up, walk around, and go up and down stairs just a couple (of) hours after the procedure.” …

If you've just crash-landed from the planet known as Kepler-186f and have no experience with the human life form or its recent history, let me just clarify something for you: George W. Bush was a divisive and unsuccessful president. Economically, internationally, culturally — you name the category of leadership, and the results pretty much range from disappointment to disaster. A CBS News/New York Times poll clocked Bush's final approval rating at 22 percent, which is about as low as you can go in politics without needing a parole officer. You may get confused about this, because lately Bush is enjoying...

President George W. Bush said his younger brother Jeb Bush would make a “great president,” as speculation builds that the Republican former governor of Florida might mount a run for the White House in 2016. Jeb Bush, a favorite of the Republican establishment, has maintained a high public profile in recent weeks, appearing at GOP fundraising events and weighing in on debates over immigration and education policy. He has publicly backed at least two GOP candidates in 2014 races, including his recent endorsement of California gubernatorial candidate Neel Kashkari. “I hope Jeb runs,” the former president said during an interview...

The greatest work of art George W. Bush ever took part in was in 2008, when an Iraqi journalist threw two shoes at his head. “This is a farewell kiss from the Iraqi people, you dog,” screamed the journalist, Muntadhar al-Zaidi, who had been arrested twice by U.S. forces during the occupation.Bush dodged the shoes with the same ease with which he’d had dodged consequences all his life; those for drunk driving, for ruined companies, stolen elections, war crimes, the destruction of Zaidi’s country.After he dodged the shoes, Bush joked about free countries. Meanwhile, guards beat Zaidi bloody. Police tortured him...

Citing his inspirational leadership in promoting democratic values worldwide when faced with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 during one of the most dramatic and consequential periods in American history; his commitment to securing Israeli-Palestinian peace; and his establishment of the United States’ first Special Envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism; the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) presented President George W. Bush with its highest honor, the America’s Democratic Legacy Award. The honor was conferred during the opening gala dinner of the League’s National Executive Committee Meeting, held February 6-8 in Palm Beach, Florida. …

Tony Blair could face legal action amid claims he “connived” with Colonel Gaddafi to block a multi-million pound compensation claim by IRA victims. An email is said to show the former prime minister intervened in a long-running legal action from victims of Libyan-sponsored terrorism. The email suggests Mr. Blair helped to broker an agreement between Gaddafi and US President George W Bush, which saw Libya pay a one-off £1 billion in compensation to US victims of terrorism to settle all actions. […] The Libyan regime supplied Semtex for IRA attacks, said to include the 1987 Enniskillen bomb, which killed 11...

Since Ben Bernanke has been in control of the Federal Reserve, inflation has increased 43 percent more under President Barack Obama than George W. Bush, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Inflation can be defined as the overall general upward price improvement of goods and services in an economy,” the Bureau said. By evaluating the Consumer Price Index (CPI) data, increases in inflation can be evaluated. …

Students, faculty and alumni at the University of Denver plan to protest when the university’s international studies school presents an award to former president George W. Bush. … The Josef Korbel School’s decision has outraged many at the school who fault the 43rd president for starting the war in Iraq and allowing the use of torture on prisoners. …

After years of enormous power and political influence, no member of the Bush family currently holds political office. But as the focus on military action in Syria drags former President George W. Bush’s Iraq war policy back into the spotlight, the Bush family is quietly but forcefully gearing up for another, still-developing debate: The fight on Capitol Hill over a broad overhaul of the nation’s immigration laws—a discussion critical to protecting the Bushes’ legacy on what has, for decades, been a defining issue for them. … For the Bushes, immigration is deeply personal. The family chose to root its political...

The office of George W. Bush revealed the former president had heart surgery Tuesday morning. According to a press release, doctors discovered a blockage in an artery in Bush's heart during the former president's annual physical examination at the Cooper Clinic in Dallas. Bush agreed to have a stent placed to open the blockage and successfully completed the surgery Tuesday morning without complication at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) praised former President George W. Bush for the “beautiful words” on immigration voiced by the former president at a naturalization ceremony in Dallas, Texas on Wednesday. “In the beautiful words of President Bush, that he spoke about yesterday in his speech and has over time, we have to respect what immigration is to our country. I believe that it is the source of constant reinvigoration of America,” Pelosi said Thursday during her weekly press conference on Capitol Hill, which can be viewed on CSPAN. “I’ve said over and over again that President Bush had...

The debate over George W. Bush’s legacy has erupted into a brawl at the University of Denver over whether to present the former president with an award for his humanitarian work. The Josef Korbel School of International Studies’ plan to honor Mr. Bush at a Sept. 9 fundraising dinner touched off a petition drive last month by a recent graduate, who is urging the university to “choose an alternative recipient.” The school originally planned to honor Mr. Bush with its Improving the Human Condition Award, according to an invitation posted on the university’s website. After a spate of publicity surrounding...

In a Gallup tracking poll released Tuesday, former-President George W. Bush currently stands with a favorability rating of 49%, compared to 46% who see the 43rd president unfavorably. Meanwhile, another Gallup poll shows President Obama with only a 47% approval rating, with 44% disapproving. …

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said Wednesday he has introduced a bill to repeal mandatory minimum sentencing for drug use and told the story of two young men—Barack Obama and George W. Bush—who were said to use drugs but did not go to jail. “In this story, both young men were extraordinarily lucky. Both young men were not caught using illegal drugs, and they weren’t imprisoned. Instead, they went on to become presidents of the United States. Barack Obama and George Bush were lucky,” Paul said in a speech at Howard University, a historically black college in Washington, DC. “The law...

Conservative legend Phyllis Schlafly told the Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday that the Republican establishment had given America a series of losers as presidential candidates over the last two decades—and the last time they picked a winner, George W. Bush, he was a bigger spender than the Democrats. “Why is it that the establishment has given us this bunch of losers?” Schlafly said. “The establishment has given us a whole series of losers: Bob Dole and John McCain and Mitt Romney.” … Schlafly said the establishment wants candidates that “will only talk about economic issues” and not social or...

Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush told Chris Wallace on FOX News Sunday that there is no Bush fatigue in America. Chris Wallace: Do you think there would be any Bush baggage? Do you think that would be a problem? Jeb Bush: No. I don’t think there is any Bush baggage at all. I love my brother. I’m proud of his accomplishments. I love my dad. I am proud to be a Bush. And, if I run for president, it’s not because there is something in my DNA that compels me to do it...

Last Thursday, in a sign that the GOP is recalibrating its image after 2012, 100 prominent Republicans (many of whom are no longer serving in office) signed a friend-of-the-court brief seeking to overturn California’s Proposition 8, which effectively banned same-sex marriage in the state shortly after it became legal. The brief states the opinion that marriage is a constitutional right for gay couples—a position that goes beyond even President Obama’s stance on marriage equality. One of the signers, former communications chief for George W. Bush and senior advisor for the McCain–Palin campaign Nicolle Wallace, joined Morning Joe Monday morning to...

A year behind bars: That's what David Kernell received for guessing his way into the private email account of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in 2008. So that would certainly be the starting point for penalties due the perpetrator of this latest invasion of privacy against the politically powerful. From a lengthy account by The Smoking Gun (that includes private Bush family photos and information, if you'd rather not be party to seeing that stuff): The apparent hack of several e-mail accounts has exposed personal photos and sensitive correspondence from members of the Bush family, including both former U.S. presidents,...

George W. Bush left office in January 2009 with one of the lowest job-approval ratings for a president (34 percent) since Gallup started compiling them — as compared to Harry Truman’s low of 32 percent, Richard Nixon’s of 24 percent, and Jimmy Carter’s of 34 percent — and to the general derision of the media. At times the venom accorded Bush in popular culture reached absurd — and even sick — levels. Alfred A. Knopf, for example, infamously published Nicholson Baker’s Checkpoint, a pathetic riff on shooting Bush. Gabriel Range’s unhinged 2006 “docudrama,” The Death of a President, focused on...

Former President George W. Bush will not attend the Republican convention next month in Tampa, POLITICO has learned. “President Bush was grateful for the invitation to the Republican National Convention,” Bush spokesman Freddy Ford wrote in an e-mail. “He supports Governor Romney and wants him to succeed. President Bush is confident that Mitt Romney will be a great President. But he’s still enjoying his time off the political stage and respectfully declined the invitation to go to Tampa.” Asked if the former president had been invited to only attend or whether he was also asked to speak, Ford said the...