December 31, 2011: The Last American Combat Troops Leave Iraq

December 31, 2011: The last American combat troops leave Iraq. It had been 8 years, 9 months and 11 days since the first ones got there.

And what did America get out of it? Well, we got rid of Saddam Hussein, and replaced him with... a government that we're still not sure is trustworthy. And we emboldened neighboring Iran, who were glad to see Saddam out. And we emboldened terrorists in the Middle East, ditto.

Over 1 million Iraqis, the vast majority of them civilians, died as a result of this war. American combat deaths were, officially, 4,507; with another 32,292 wounded, another 47,541 listed under "Injured/diseases/other medical." How many have psychiatric issues as a result of being sent there, we may never know.

In his 1988 book 1968 In America, Charles Kaiser reasoned that the only good thing about the Vietnam War was that America had apparently learned its lesson, and had never had another "Vietnam." That was before George W. Bush, who actively sought to avoid serving in Vietnam even as he supported the war effort (as Donald Trump did, but Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Joe Biden did not) wanted Iraq's oil.

Why is it that Democratic Presidents always have to clean up the messes left by their Republican predecessors? Barack Obama got the Democratic nomination for President in 2008 because, unlike Hillary Clinton, he did not vote in the U.S. Senate (which she was then in, but he was not) to authorize the Iraq War in any way. Maybe he would have won the general election even without the economic crash later that year. But it was the war, and the atrocities committed by certain Americans in it, some of them civilians, that ruined Bush's legacy before the crash did.

Obama said he would end the war. His Republican opponent, John McCain said he would end it by winning it. America preferred an ending sooner rather than later, and voted for Obama. And he ended it.

And we will be paying for it, in many ways, for a long time to come. Which we can truthfully say about a lot of Republican policies.

*

December 31, 2011 was a Saturday. Baseball was out of season. All the NFL games that weekend were played the next day, New Year's Day. There were 5 college football bowl games played:

* The Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas was played at what's now NRG Stadium in Houston. This used to be known as the Texas Bowl, and is the successor to the old Bluebonnet Bowl that was played at the Astrodome. Texas A&M beat Northwester, 33-22.

* The Hyundai Sun Bowl was played at the Sun Bowl Stadium in El Paso, Texas. Utah beat Georgia Tech, 30-27 in overtime.

* The AutoZone Liberty was played at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium in Memphis. (A memorial to a game that's still being played?) The University of Cincinnati beat Vanderbilt, 31-24.

* The Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl was played at what's now Oracle Park in San Francisco. Illinois beat UCLA, 20-14.

* And the Chick-fil-A Bowl, the once-and-future Peach Bowl, was played at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. Auburn beat Virginia, 43-24.

There were 7 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the Sacramento Kings, 114-92 at the Sleep Train Arena in Sacramento.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Indiana Pacers, 96-88 at The Palace in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Michigan.

* The Oklahoma City Thunder beat the Phoenix Suns, 107-97 at what's now the Paycom Center in Oklahoma City.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Atlanta Hawks, 95-84 at the Toyota Center in Houston.

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Utah Jazz, 104-89 at what's now the Frost Bank Center in San Antonio.

* The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Denver Nuggets, 92-89 at what's now the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. Andrew Bynum led all scorers on the night with 29 points.

* And the Philadelphia 76ers beat the Golden State Warriors, 107-79 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena (then named the Oracle Arena).

There were 12 NHL games played that day:

* The New Jersey Devils beat the Pittsburgh Penguins, 3-1 at the Prudential Center. Ilya Kovalchuk, David Clarkson and Zach Parise scored.

* The New York Islanders beat the Edmonton Oilers, 4-1 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Carolina Hurricanes, 5-2 at the St. Pete Times Form (now the Benchmark International Arena) in Tampa.

* The Florida Panthers beat the Montreal Canadiens, 3-2 at the BankAtlantic Center (now the Amerant Bank Arena) in the Miami suburb of Sunrise, Florida.

* The Dallas Stars beat the Boston Bruins, 4-2 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.

* The Ottawa Senators beat the Buffalo Sabres, 3-2 in a shootout at the First Niagara Center (now the KeyBank Center) in Buffalo.

* The Washington Capitals beat the Columbus Blue Jackets, 4-2 at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus.

* The Detroit Red Wings beat the St. Louis Blues, 3-0 at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.

* The Phoenix Coyotes beat the Minnesota Wild, 4-2 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.

* The Winnipeg Jets beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-2 at the MTS Centre (now the Canada Life Centre) in Winnipeg.

* The Colorado Avalanche beat the Anaheim Ducks, 4-2 at the Honda Center in Anaheim.

* The Los Angeles Kings beat the Vancouver Canucks, 4-1 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles.

* The New York Rangers, the Calgary Flames, the Chicago Blackhawks, the Nashville Predators, the Philadelphia Flyers and the San Jose Sharks were not scheduled.

November 4, 2008: Barack Obama Is Elected President

November 4, 2008: History is made when America elects a black man as its President. Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, the Democratic nominee, wins 69.5 million votes. At the times, it was the highest popular vote total in the history of American Presidential elections. Senator John McCain of Arizona, the Republican nominee, wins 59.9 million votes.

Popular vote percentages: Obama 52.9, McCain 45.7. States: Obama 28, McCain 22. Electoral Votes: Obama 365, McCain 173. 

There were 9 States that George W. Bush had won in 2004 that Obama moved to the Democratic column in 2008: Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Ohio, Indiana, Iowa, Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada.

McCain had been hoping that foreign policy, his area of expertise, and particularly the Iraq War, would help him win. It didn't. Unlike the outgoing President, George W. Bush, who seemed at times as if he didn't want to win the war; he only wanted to have the war, to use as a club over people's perceived lack of patriotism, McCain thought the war should come to an end. But he thought America should end the war by winning it. He didn't say how he would do it, only that he would.

As they had already shown in 2006, taking control of both houses of Congress away from the Republicans and giving it to the Democrats, the voters wanted to end the war sooner rather than later, and didn't trust McCain to do that. They trusted Obama, who, unlike Hillary, had never supported it. McCain's suggestion that he would attack Iran next further turned voters off. On December 18, 2011, President Obama withdrew the last U.S. combat troops.

McCain counted on Iraq, and foreign policy in general, to be his edge against Obama. But Obama was very knowledgeable on the subject, thought not as experienced in office. And each man had his stance on the issue magnified by his Vice Presidential nominee.

Obama, then 47 years old and only in the U.S. Senate for 4 years, chose Senator Joe Biden of Delaware, 66 and a Senator for 36 years. Biden had been Chairman on Senate Foreign Relations. McCain, 72, chose Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska, 44, who had been in office for only a year and a half, and before that had been a small-town Mayor.

Beyond also being a military hawk, Palin's idea of "foreign policy experience" was that you could see Russia from Alaska. (On a clear day, from a particular land point, this is true. She never actually said, "I can see Russia from my house!" Yet another thing a politician supposedly said, but actually didn't.)

Palin's foreign policy views did not hurt McCain. But they did magnify how much his foreign policy views were already hurting him. She was a symptom, not the disease.

What really decided the election, as it does more often than not, is the economy. Already in recession for over a year, it got worse, and crashed in September. As Obama kept saying, "John McCain's not a bad guy. He just doesn't get it." He really didn't: As a Navy Admiral's son, a Naval Academy Midshipman, a Naval officer, a Congressman and a Senator, for most of his life, he had had his needs taken care of by the federal government. His longest period of not having that be true was the 5 1/2 years that he was a prisoner of war in North Vietnam.

He had gambled that his amazing life story would be his key to victory. And in a different election -- say, his 1st campaign for President, in 2000, when he lost the Republican nomination to Bush, but could have compared himself very well to Al Gore -- it might have been. 

Instead, it was the lives of people struggling to pay their expenses, something he never understood, that was the key to his defeat. Obama had lived such a life, so he did understand it.

While Palin's flakiness and extremism turned off a lot of moderates, it (and her looks -- she was a former beauty pageant winner) turned on a lot of conservatives (including McCain). We'll never know how many people, who didn't quite trust McCain, she brought back into the fold, but it may have canceled out the people she lost by being, well, Sarah Palin. McCain could have chosen any of several potential Vice Presidents, every bit as conservative as Palin, but with more experience and more gravitas, and it wouldn't have made much difference.

Obama ran a great campaign. The opposition called him a "narcissist" -- which now seems completely ludicrous, in light of who succeeded him. But he never once said, "I, alone, can fix it." Or, "Nobody does (or knows) (whatever the subject in question is) better than me." Instead, his motto was, "Yes, we can!" We, not I.

McCain was the nominee of the incumbent party. There was no way to defend the traditional Republican approach to the economy: Cutting taxes on the rich and keeping wages low had helped to bring the crash on, and the people weren't buying it. They knew that the Republicans, the party of conservative businessmen, couldn't be trusted to fix an economy that was wrecked by conservative businessmen. Like Bush: He, not Palin, and not even McCain himself, was the Republican who caused McCain to lose. Indeed, Bush became the 1st incumbent President in 40 years, since Lyndon Johnson, who did not attend his own Party's Convention, for fear it would hurt their chances.

With the closing of the polls in the Pacific Coast States, at 8:00 PM their time, 11:00 Eastern, Obama crossed the threshold of 270 Electoral Votes. That moment, proving that the American people had chosen him, may have been America's greatest moment. It wasn't just what we were turning our backs on, it was what we were accepting: As the man himself put it, "the audacity of hope." For the record, McCain began his concession speech to his supporters, a rather gracious one, at 11:17.

The Democrats already held both houses of Congress. They gained 21 seats in the House of Representatives, and 8 seats in the Senate. Among the new Democrats elected: Al Franken of Minnesota, formerly a comedian and writer for Saturday Night Live; Mark Begich of Alaska, whose father Nick had been in Congress, and died in a plane crash late in the 1972 campaign; Mark Udall of Colorado, son of Representative Mo Udall of Arizona; Mark's cousin, Tom Udall of New Mexico, son of Representative and Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall, also of Arizona; Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, a former Governor who defeated John E. Sununu, son of a Governor and brother of another; Kay Hagan of North Carolina, who defeated Elizabeth Dole, former Secretary of Transportation and wife of longtime Senator from Kansas and 3-time Presidential candidate Bob Dole; and former Governor Mark Warner of Virginia.

Times had changed a great deal: I had heard someone say on TV after this election that Obama got about the same percentage of the white vote that Michael Dukakis had gotten in 1988, 20 years earlier, but Dukakis had only won 111 Electoral Votes, while Obama won 365. This was due to the growth of the Hispanic vote, which the Democrats had solidly taken, especially after California and other Western States passed anti-immigrant initiatives in the 1990s; while the white vote shrank, and the black vote remained largely the same.

As they usually do with the winner of the Presidential election, Time magazine named Obama its Person of the Year for 2008.

Since Obama was elected President, the changes have been huge. He stabilized the economy. He saved the auto industry. He ended the Iraq War. And, having made finding and killing Osama bin Laden a priority, under his leadership, the CIA found bin Laden, and U.S. Navy's Seal Team Six killed him.

Obama got the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. "Obamacare," passed into law, bringing America closer to full health insurance coverage than ever before. He put Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan on the U.S. Supreme Court. And, thanks in part to those 2 Justices, not only was Obamacare upheld as constitutional, but same-sex marriage became legal throughout America.

Right-wingers insisted that he was an illegitimate President, because he wasn't born in America. Right before the mission to kill bin Laden, he got the State of Hawaii to release the official version of his birth certificate. He gloated about this at the 2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner. In the audience was the leader of the movement to expose Obama as foreign-born, real estate mogul Donald Trump. His movement exposed as bigoted and stupid, Trump was humiliated before the entire country.

Maybe that was Obama's biggest mistake, because Trump was so determined to avenge this humiliation that he ran for President himself. Not in 2012, because he was too much of a coward to run against Obama himself. But in 2016, when his opponent was a woman, Hillary Clinton. Who was still stronger, more experienced, and more successful than he was, and beat him by nearly 3 million votes. But, thanks to Russian operatives, the Electoral College went Trump's way. That happened once: It didn't happen again, because the voters turned to Biden in 2020, hoping to bring back the Obama performance.

In spite of the recency of his Administration, there are already schools named for Obama in the States of California, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey (including a charter high school in Plainfield), New York's Long Island, Ohio, a high school in Pennsylvania's Pittsburgh, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin. His Presidential Library and Museum is planned for Hyde Park on Chicago's South Side, not far from his official residence. Interstate 55 from the southern suburbs of Chicago through Pontiac, Illinois is named the Barack Obama Presidential Expressway.

Hampton University, Hampton, Virginia

Obama is the only President with any connection to Hawaii, although he represented Illinois in politics.

On Saturday Night Live, he was played by Fred Armisen (despite being white) during his 1st term. Jay Pharoah (black) played him in the 2nd term. Keegan-Michael Key played him on MADtv in the 2008-09 season, and then occasionally appeared alongside the real Obama in the comedic role of "Obama's Anger Translator." In 2012, Key joined with Jordan Peele for the TV variety series Key and Peele, but it was Peele who played Obama there. Lovell Adams-Gray played a young Obama on DC's Legends of Tomorrow in 2018.

In a 2011 episode of the YouTube series Epic Rap Battles of History, YouTuber Lisa Nova played Palin, against "Nice" Peter Shukoff as Lady Gaga, with "Epic" Lloyd Ahlquist making a brief cameo as McCain. This was the 1st time a guest star appeared in the series, the 1st time a female character was used, and the 1st time an actor played a character of the opposite gender. In 2012, Ahlquist played Mitt Romney, against Iman Crosson, a.k.a. Alphacat, playing Obama.

McCain surpassed Senator Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican nominee, as the politician from Arizona who came the closest to becoming President, although, having been born in the U.S. Panama Canal Zone, he did not replace Goldwater as the Arizona native who has come the closest. Palin has thus come the closest of any politician born in Idaho, or representing Alaska.

President Pro Tempore of the Senate remains the highest office achieved by a native of Arizona, Carl Hayden, from 1957 to 1969; or Alaska, Ted Stevens, 2003 to 2007. The highest-ranking Arizona native is Stewart Udall, Secretary of the Interior from 1961 to 1969; and from Alaska, Walter Hickel, who succeeded Udall, and served until 1970.

UPDATE: The Barack Obama Presidential Center opened on June 19, 2026. Outside, there is a statue of Barack and Michelle Obama, hand in hand.

*

November 4, 2008, as all modern U.S. Election Days have been, was a Tuesday. The baseball season had just ended. Football was in midweek. There were 3 NBA games played that night:

* The New Jersey Nets lost to the Phoenix Suns, 114-86 at the Izod Center at the Meadowlands.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Houston Rockets, 103-99 at the Toyota Center in Houston.

* And the Dallas Mavericks beat the San Antonio Spurs at the AT&T Center in San Antonio. (It's now named the Frost Bank Center.)

And there were 7 NHL games played:

* The New York Islanders beat the New York Rangers, 2-1 at Madison Square Garden. The game was scoreless until the 3rd period, when Nate Thompson and Richard Park scored for the Isles. Markus Naslund tallied for the Blueshirts with 1:41 left in regulation, but they couldn't get an equalizer. The New Jersey Devils were not scheduled for that night.

* The Ottawa Senators beat the Washington Capitals, 2-1 at the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa. Mike Fisher scored the winner with 40 seconds left in overtime. The reaction of his then-wife, country singer Carrie Underwood, is not recorded. (Yes, her married name was Carrie Fisher.)

* The Carolina Hurricanes beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 5-4 at the Air Canada Centre. (It's now named the Scotiabank Arena.) Niclas Wallin scored in overtime to win it for the 'Canes.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Calgary Flames, 4-2 at the Saddledome in Calgary.

* The Anaheim Ducks beat their arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Kings, 1-0 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. (It's now named the Crypto.com Arena.) Chris Pronger scored the winner, 40 seconds into overtime.

* The San Jose Sharks beat the Minnesota Wild, 3-1 at the HP Pavilion in San Jose. (It's now named the SAP Center.)

* And the Vancouver Canucks beat the Nashville Predators, 4-0 at GM Place in Vancouver. (It's now named the Rogers Arena. 

November 2, 2004: George W. Bush Is Re-Elected President

November 2, 2004: George W. Bush achieves -- due to the appearance of shenanigans in Ohio, I won't say "wins" -- a 2nd term as President, defeating the Democratic nominee, Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts. Although Kerry was a rich liberal Catholic from Massachusetts with the initials JFK, and as a young man had met President John F. Kennedy, he was no Jack Kennedy.

Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney won 62 million popular votes, for 50.7 percent. Kerry and his running mate, Senator John Edwards of North Carolina, won 59 million, for 48.3 percent. This remains the only time between 1988 (when Bush's father did it) and 2020 that the Republican nominee for President got a majority of the popular vote.

Bush won 31 States for 286 Electoral Votes. Kerry won 19 States, plus the District of Columbia, for 251 EVs. One "faithless elector" from Minnesota voted for Edwards instead of Kerry.

(On July 6, the New York Post had a big front-page headline: "KERRY'S CHOICE." They said it was Representative Dick Gephardt of Missouri, the House Minority Leader. A few hours after that headline was published, Kerry announced that his choice was Edwards. Not the Post's first sloppy piece of journalism, nor its last. In hindsight, Kerry would have been better off if he had chosen Gephardt.)

Kerry got 49.2 percent of the vote in Iowa, and 49.0 percent in New Mexico. Had he won both of those States, that would not have been enough to swing the Electoral Vote in his favor: It would still have been 274-263 Bush.

The key State turned out to be Ohio: Kerry got 48.7 percent there, and it was still not called by 12:00 Noon, Eastern Time, on November 3. Switching its 20 Electoral Votes, and no others, would have given Kerry a 271-266 win. But, despite the various media outlets' refusal to call it for Bush, Bush's lead was such that, at 1:50 PM, Kerry began a press conference, and said, "I have come to the conclusion that we cannot win in Ohio," and announced that he had called Bush, and offered his concession. Bush's final margin in Ohio was 118,601.

Kerry's concession, at Faneuil Hall, Boston

As with Florida in 2000, there were rumors of Republican shenanigans in what turned out to be the decisive State. Kenneth Blackwell, Secretary of State for Ohio, and a former Mayor of Cincinnati, was accused of manipulating the vote. Blackwell has never won another election: He was the Republican nominee for Governor in 2006, but got clobbered by Democratic Congressman Ted Strickland. As of November 2, 2022, he works for the anti-choice, anti-gay Family Research Council.

The closeness of the Presidential election was also reflected in the Congressional elections: The Republicans gained only 3 seats in the House of Representatives, and actually gained more seats in the Senate, 4, in each case boosting what had been small majorities. Among the newly-elected Senators was a Democratic State Senator from Illinois, whose speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention had gained a great deal of notice: Barack Obama. (UPDATE: Also elected was Republican John Thune of South Dakota. In 2025, Thune became the Senate Majority Leader.)

During the campaign, Bush ran as the man who was fighting to avenge the 9/11 attacks, while his fellow Republicans mocked Kerry for saying that Democratic leadership could "reduce terrorism to the level of a nuisance."

After 4 more years, the economy was in tatters, and the Iraq War was no closer to being "won" than it was on this day.

There were 3 debates. The 1st was held at the University of Miami on September 30, just a few miles from the "Brooks Brothers Riot" that turned out to be instrumental in Bush's 2000 emergence as President. Bush was asked why he invaded Iraq. He said, “The enemy attacked us.” Kerry reminded him, and reminded America, “Saddam Hussein did not attack us on September 11, 2001. Osama bin Laden did.” At that moment, anybody who still planned to vote for Bush based on “national security” became, irrevocably, a fool.

As they did in 2000, the editors of Time magazine named Bush as their Person of the Year for 2004.

By 2016, after 8 years of Obama as President, with Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State in his 1st term, and then Kerry himself as Secretary of State in the 2nd term, Kerry had been proven correct: They had reduced terrorism, at least against American targets, at home and abroad, to the level of a nuisance.

In 2022, Kerry is President Joe Biden's Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, while Bush is getting a somewhat favorable reassessment: At least he wasn't as bad as Donald Trump.

UPDATE: Kerry left that job on March 6, 2024. He was 80 years old.

*

November 2, 2004, as are all modern U.S. Election Days, was a Tuesday. The baseball season was over. Football was in midweek. And the NHL team owners had locked the players out, so there would be no season in 2004-05. But there were 3 NBA games played:

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Houston Rockets, 87-79 at The Palace in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Michigan.

* The Dallas Mavericks beat the Sacramento Kings, 107-98 at the American Airlines Arena in Dallas. Dirk Nowitzki scored 33 points.

* And the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Denver Nuggets, 89-78 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Kobe Bryant scored 25 points.

May 1, 2003: "Mission Accomplished" In Iraq

May 1, 2003: Just 41 days after sending American troops into Iraq to remove the government of dictator Saddam Hussein, President George W. Bush announces, "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

At the time, it was a justifiable statement. What was not justified was the hoopla around it.

Bush had flown with the Texas Air National Guard in the closing months of the Vietnam War. On this day, Bush became the 1st sitting President to arrive in an "arrested landing" in a "fixed-wing aircraft" on an aircraft carrier, when he was flown (not as the pilot) onto the USS Abraham Lincoln in a Lockheed S-3 Viking, dubbed Navy One, as the carrier lay just off the coast of San Diego, having returned from combat operations in the Persian Gulf.

(Ordinarily, any plane bearing the President of the United States carries the designation Air Force One, not just the jumbo jet that usually flies him where he needs to go. And any helicopter that carries the President is Marine One. This time, because it was a Navy jet, it got the designation Navy One.)

Bush posed for photographs with pilots and members of the ship's crew, while still wearing a flight suit that was necessary for travel aboard the fighter jet. A few hours later, he gave a speech announcing the end of major combat operations in the Iraq War. Behind and above him hung a banner that said "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED."

Bush was criticized for the historic jet landing on the carrier, as an overly theatrical and expensive stunt. For instance, it was pointed out that the carrier was well within range of Bush's helicopter, and that a jet landing was not needed. Originally, the White House had stated that the carrier was too far off the California coast for a helicopter landing, and a jet would be needed to reach it. On the day of the speech, the Lincoln was only 30 miles from shore, but the Administration still decided to go ahead with the jet landing.

The "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" banner was a focal point of controversy and criticism. Navy Commander and Pentagon spokesman Conrad Chun said the banner referred specifically to the aircraft carrier's 10-month deployment, which was the longest deployment of a carrier since the Vietnam War, 30 years earlier; and not the war itself. Chun said, "It truly did signify a mission accomplished for the crew."

The White House claimed that the banner was requested by the crew of the ship, who did not have the facilities for producing such a banner. Afterward, the Administration and Navy sources stated that the banner was the Navy's idea, White House staff members made the banner, and it was hung by the U.S. Navy personnel.

Whether meant for the crew or not, the general impression created by the image of Bush under the banner was criticized as premature, especially later as the guerrilla war began. Subsequently, the White House released a statement saying that the sign and Bush's visit referred to the initial invasion of Iraq.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld ordered any mention of "Mission Accomplished" removed from Bush's speech. Later, Rumsfeld told journalist Bob Woodward, "I was in Baghdad, and I was given a draft of that thing to look at. And I just died, and I said, 'My God, it's too conclusive.' And I fixed it, and sent it back... They fixed the speech, but not the sign."

As it had in 1950, during the Korean War, Time magazine named American soldiers "People of the Year" for 2003.

Bush ran for re-election in 2004, in part, on the Iraq War. He won. The Republican Party went into the 2006 elections, in part, on the Iraq War. They lost both houses of Congress, and Rumsfeld resigned. 

Senator John McCain ran as the Republicans' nominee for President in 2008, with winning the Iraq War as a major part of his platform. He lost, because the American people didn't want to do what it would take to win the war. They just wanted it to be over.

Senator Barack Obama promised voters that, if they elected him, he would end the war, and they elected him. On December 31, 2011, President Barack Obama pulled the last remaining combat troops out of Iraq. A year later, he ran for re-election partly on that basis, and he won.

The "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" banner is now in the collection of the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum, at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. It is not, however, on display in the museum. Other Presidential Libraries have displays of their subjects' policy failures, but Bush's does not.

*

May 1, 2003 was a Thursday. These games were played in Major League Baseball that day:

* The New York Yankees beat the Seattle Mariners, 2-1 at Yankee Stadium. Mike Mussina won with solo home runs from Jorge Posada and Alfonso Soriano.

* The New York Mets lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-5 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis. Jim Edmonds hit a walkoff home run in the bottom of the 10th inning.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Kansas City Royals, 6-5 at Fenway Park.

* The Atlanta Braves beat the Houston Astros, 8-7 at Minute Maid Park (now Daikin Park) in Houston.

* The Toronto Blue Jays beat the Texas Rangers, 7-6 at the SkyDome in Toronto. (It's now named the Rogers Centre.)

* The Baltimore Orioles swept a doubleheader from the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park, winning the opener, 5-2; and the nightcap, 6-4.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Oakland Athletics, 7-5 at U.S. Cellular Field in Chicago. (It's now named Rate Field.)

* The Montreal Expos beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 5-0 at Miller Park in Milwaukee. (It's now named American Family Field.) Zach Day pitched a 3-hit shutout.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 6-5 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis. Cristian Guzman won it with a double in the bottom of the 13th inning.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Colorado Rockies, 7-2 at Coors Field in Denver.

* The Florida Marlins beat the Arizona Diamondbacks, 4-3 at Bank One Ballpark in Phoenix. (It's now named Chase Field.)

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the San Diego Padres, 5-2 at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 4-1 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

* And the Chicago Cubs beat the San Francisco Giants, 5-1 at Pacific Bell Park in San Francisco. (It's now named Oracle Park.) Alex Gonzalez hit 2 home runs for the Cubs, 1 of them in the top of the 10th inning, which was followed by a home run by Sammy Sosa. Barry Bonds went 0-for-1 with 3 walks, 2 of them intentional.

The NBA Playoffs were in the 1st Round. Each of these was a Game 6, and turned out to be a series-clincher for the winners:

* The New Jersey Nets beat the Milwaukee Bucks, 113-101 at the Bradley Center in Milwaukee.

* The Boston Celtics beat the Indiana Pacers, 110-90 at the FleetCenter in Boston. (It's now named the TD Garden.)

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Phoenix Suns, 87-85 at the America West Arena in Phoenix. (It's now named the Mortgage Matchup Center.)

* And the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, 101-85 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. (It's now named the Crypto.com Arena.)

The Stanley Cup Playoffs were in the Conference Semifinals, but only 1 game was played that day: The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Ottawa Senators, 1-0 at the Wachovia Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia. But the Senators would win the series.

April 28, 2004: The Abu Ghraib Scandal Breaks

April 28, 2004: The Abu Ghraib scandal breaks. It was one of the most shameful things ever done by any unit of the American government.

During the early stages of the Iraq War, members of the United States Army and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) committed a series of human rights violations and war crimes against detainees in Abu Ghraib prison, in the Baghdad Governorate (equivalent to an American State) in Iraq.

The abuses came to public attention with the publication of photographs by CBS News. Among them were the photo shown above, The Hooded Man, later identified as Abdou Hussain Saad Faleh. There was also a photo of a bunch of naked men piled on top of one another, known as The Naked Pyramid; Man On a Leash, which showed a female soldier holding a leash on the collar of an otherwise naked prisoner; and another, showing that same woman, smirking, smoking a cigarette, and making "gun fingers" at a hooded by otherwise naked prisoner.

The George W. Bush Administration stated that the abuses at Abu Ghraib were isolated incidents, and not indicative of U.S. policy. This was exposed as a lie by humanitarian organizations including the Red Cross, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch, who claimed the abuses were part of a pattern of torture and brutal treatment at American overseas detention centers, including those in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. The International Committee of the Red Cross reported that most detainees at Abu Ghraib were civilians, with no links to armed groups.

In response to the events at Abu Ghraib, the U.S. Department of Defense removed 17 soldiers and officers from duty. Eleven soldiers were charged with dereliction of duty, maltreatment, aggravated assault and battery. By April 2006, these soldiers were court-martialed, convicted, sentenced to military prison and dishonorably discharged.

The aforementioned female soldier, Private 1st Class Lynndie England, and Specialist Charles Graner were found to have perpetrated many of the worst offenses at the prison, and were subject to more severe charges and received harsher sentences, sentenced to 3 and 10 years, respectively. As it happened, England and Graner were a couple, and when England was arrested, she was pregnant with Graner's child. She ended up serving only a year and a half; Graner, 6 years.

England and Graner. The smiles did not last.

Brigadier General Janis Karpinski, the commanding officer of all detention facilities in Iraq, was reprimanded and demoted to the rank of Colonel. Bush and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld apologized for the Abu Ghraib abuses.

Unfortunately, John Kerry wasn't willing to use the scandal to win an election. You think if it had happened under a Democratic President, the Republicans would have eased up?

After the war, Lynndie England returned to her native West Virginia with her son, and found work as a secretary. As recently as 2012, she said that she did not regret her actions. Graner married someone else, and has refused interviews since his release.

*

April 28, 2004 was a Wednesday. These games were played in Major League Baseball:

* The New York Yankees beat the Oakland Athletics, 5-1 at Yankee Stadium. José Contreras outpitched Mark Mulder. Jorge Posada and Jason Giambi hit home runs. Derek Jeter went 0-for-4 with a walk. Alex Rodriguez went 1-for-4.

* The New York Mets lost to the Los Angeles Dodgers, 3-2 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Odalis Pérez outpitched Steve Trachsel. Dave Roberts -- not yet a Red Sox hero or the Dodgers' manager -- and Adrian Beltré hit home runs. Kazuo Matsui hit one for the Mets.

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 6-0 at Fenway Park in Boston. Curt Schilling pitched 7 1/3rd innings of 5-hit shutout ball, and Alan Embree and Lenny DiNardo completed the 5-hit shutout. Jason Varitek went 2-for-4 with a home run and 3 RBIs. David Ortiz went 1-for-4 with a walk.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Seattle Mariners, 3-1 at Camden Yards in Baltimore. Ichiro Suzuki went 0-for-5.

* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Houston Astros, 4-2 at PNC Park in Pittsburgh.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Cleveland Indians, 9-8 at U.S. Cellular Field (now Rate Field) in Cleveland.

* The Detroit Tigers beat the Anaheim Angels, 10-2 at Comerica Park in Detroit.

* The Milwaukee Brewers beat the Cincinnati Reds, 10-9 at Miller Park (now American Family Field) in Milwaukee. Bill Hall singled Trent Durrington home with the winning run in the bottom of the 10th inning. Ben Grieve hit a home run. Scott Podsednik went 4-for-5. Bill Hall went 3-for-6 with 4 RBIs. Lyle Overbay went 3-for-5 with 3 RBIs. For the Reds, Barry Larkin went 2-for-6, and Ken Griffey Jr. went 1-for-6 with an RBI.

* The Minnesota Twins beat the Toronto Blue Jays, 9-5 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.

* The Philadelphia Phillies beat the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-3 at Busch Memorial Stadium in St. Louis.

* The Kansas City Royals beat the Texas Rangers, 5-3 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City.

* The Florida Marlins beat the Colorado Rockies, 9-4 at Coors Field in Denver.

* The Chicago Cubs beat the Arizona Diamondbacks, 4-3 at Bank One Ballpark (now Chase Field) in Phoenix.

* The San Diego Padres beat the Montreal Expos, 5-4 at Petco Park in San Diego.

* And the San Francisco Giants beat the Atlanta Braves, 10-7 at SBC Park (now Oracle Park) in San Francisco. Barry Bonds went 1-for-3 with 2 walks.

Football was out of season. There was 1 game in the NBA Playoffs: The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Houston Rockets, 97-78 at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles. Kobe Bryant scored 31 points.

There were 2 games in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The Toronto Maple Leafs beat the Philadelphia Flyers, 4-1 at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto. And the Colorado Avalanche beat the San Jose Sharks, 1-0 at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver. Joe Sakic scored the winning goal, 5:15 into overtime.

March 20, 2003: The Iraq War Begins

March 20, 2003: President George W. Bush launches the Iraq War, to topple President Saddam Hussein of Iraq from power.

April 9, 2003: Saddam fled, his regime of nearly 34 years coming to an end.

May 1, 2003: Aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, beneath a huge banner reading "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED," Bush did not use those words himself, but he did say, "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

To be fair, he added, "We have difficult work to do in Iraq. We are bringing order to parts of that country that remain dangerous. Our mission continues."

December 13, 2003: Allied forces captured Saddam, at a farm outside his hometown of Tirkit, about 100 miles north of Baghdad. But this was not the end of the war, either.

September 30, 2004: With the war still going, with no end in sight, Bush was running for re-election, and debating the Democratic nominee for President, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida. Bush was asked why he started the war.

He said, "The enemy attacked us." This was part of his continuing telling of the story that Saddam was involved in the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, including the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York.

Kerry responded: "Saddam Hussein did not attack us on September 11, 2001. Osama bin Laden did."

Kerry was right. Bush was lying. That should have ended Bush's bid for a 2nd term right there.

November 2, 2004: By a margin of one State in the Electoral College -- and we may never know just how much the Republicans cheated in Ohio, possibly in other States -- Bush was re-elected.

May 16, 2006: The 3rd season finale of the military-themed drama NCIS airs. Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, played by Mark Harmon, was in an explosion, and when he emerges from his coma, he has no memory of anything that happened after a similar thing happened to him while he was serving in the original Iraq War of 1991.

Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard (David McCallum) meets with NCIS Director Jenny Shepard (Lauren Holly), who says that Gibbs now knows that 15 years have passed, but, seeing the images of the current war on ZNN, that world's fictionalized version of CNN, he says he wants to know why we're still at war in Iraq. Ducky says, "He's not the only one."

November 5, 2006: The Iraqi Interim Government convicted Saddam of treason.

December 30, 2006: Saddam was hanged. He was 69 years old.

January 20, 2009: Bush left office as one of the most unpopular Presidents ever, and Barack Obama became President. He had been elected partly on a pledge to end the Iraq War, which was still ongoing.

June 1, 2009: Dick Cheney, who from 2001 to 2009 had been Bush's Vice President, finally admitted the truth: "I do not believe and have never seen any evidence to confirm that (Saddam) was involved in 9/11. We had that reporting for a while, [but] eventually it turned out not to be true," Cheney conceded.

December 18, 2011: President Obama withdrew the last U.S. combat forces from Iraq, leaving behind only a token force in a defensive role. There were 4,507 American soldiers killed, among 32,000 wounded. Other countries' forces in support, including the new Iraqi army: 18,000. Pro-Saddam and later ISIS forces killed: Approximately 37,000. Iraqi civilians killed: Officially, over 110,000, but probably far more.

Benefits to Iraq: They traded one corrupt regime for another, with far fewer extrajudicial killings. In other words, things became better, but still not good.

Benefits to America: The Bush-Cheney Administration's friends, especially energy companies and defense contractors, made a lot of money, and... uh... well... America remembered that war is a bad thing, and that just because you spout slogans and wave flags doesn't make you more patriotic than the people who say that war is a bad thing.

*

March 20, 2003 was a Thursday. Major League Baseball was in Spring Training, so any games played in that sport on that day didn't count. The NFL was in its off-season. There were 3 NBA games played that night:

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 113-85 at The Palace in the Detroit suburb of Auburn Hills, Michigan. Chauncey Billups of the Pistons led all scorers with 29 points.

* The San Antonio Spurs beat the Dallas Mavericks, 112-110 in overtime at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. Nick Van Exel scored 35 for the Mavs, but Tim Duncan scored 25 for the Spurs, and Malik Rose and Tony Parker each added 22. The Spurs went on to win the NBA Championship.

* And the Sacramento Kings beat the Los Angeles Lakers 107-99 at the Arco Arena in Sacramento. Kobe Bryant scored 34 for the Lakers, and Shaquille O'Neal scored 28. But the Kings got 26 from Chris Webber, 23 from Peja Stojakovic, and 19 from Mike Bibby, riding a 41-point 4th quarter to victory.

There were 9 games played in the NHL, and 4 of them went to overtime: 

* The only team in the New York Tri-State Area playing that night was the New York Islanders, and they beat the Montreal Canadiens, 6-3 at the Bell Centre in Montreal.

* The Philadelphia Flyers beat the Pittsburgh Penguins, 4-2 at the First Union Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.

* The Columbus Blue Jackets beat the Toronto Maple Leafs, 4-3 in overtime at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus.

* The St. Louis Blues beat the team then known as the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, 3-2 in overtime at the Kiel Center (now the Enterprise Center) in St. Louis.

* The Colorado Avalanche beat the San Jose Sharks, 2-0 at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver.

* The team then known as the Phoenix Coyotes beat the Edmonton Oilers, 3-2 in overtime at the America West Arena (now the PHX Arena) in downtown Phoenix.

* The Tampa Bay Lightning and the Los Angeles Kings played to a 2-2 tie, in overtime at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles.

* The Washington Capitals beat the Calgary Flames, 4-1 at the Saddledome in Calgary.

* And the Vancouver Canucks beat the Nashville Predators, 7-3 at General Motors Place (now the Rogers Arena) in Vancouver. 

January 29, 2002: George W. Bush Speaks of "An Axis of Evil"

Bush, flanked by Vice President Dick Cheney (left)

and the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert of Illinois

January 29, 2002: George W. Bush, the 43rd President of the United States, delivers the State of the Union Address before a Joint Session of Congress.

His speech was largely written by David Frum, a Toronto native who had volunteered for candidates of Canada's socialist New Democratic Party, but converted to conservatism after reading The Gulag Archipelago, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's 1973 account of the Soviet Union's prison system. He got degrees from Yale, then a law degree from Harvard, and worked for conservative publications: The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and The Weekly Standard. The last of these got the attention of the incoming Bush Administration, which hired Frum as a speechwriter.

The night of the speech, it had been a little more than 4 months after the 9/11 attacks, and a few months since the Administration announced that the man who ordered them, Osama bin Laden, was "surrounded" in the mountains of Afghanistan. And then... nothing. No mention of killing him. No mention of an arrest of him. No mention of progress on catching him. Nothing.

Oh yeah: The economy was in recession. The financial hit the country took as a result of the attack didn't help, but the cause was Bush's tax cuts for the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans.

Bush began the speech by saying:

Thank you very much. Mr. Speaker, Vice President Cheney, members of Congress, distinguished guests, fellow citizens: As we gather tonight, our nation is at war, our economy is in recession, and the civilized world faces unprecedented dangers. Yet the state of our Union has never been stronger. 

Not the dumbest thing Bush had ever said, but not smart. Not a flat-out lie, because deciding how strong the nation is at a given time is a matter of opinion, but an opinion that the facts simply did not support.

Bush welcomed special guests, including the restored President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai; and Shannon Spann, widow of CIA officer Michael Spann, who had been killed in the line of duty in Afghanistan.

The speech lasted 48 minutes. Not once in it did Bush mention Osama bin Laden by name, or mention bin Laden's terrorist group, al-Qaeda. He did mention Iraq, Iran, and North Korea:

Our second goal is to prevent regimes that sponsor terror from threatening America or our friends and allies with weapons of mass destruction. Some of these regimes have been pretty quiet since September the 11th.  But we know their true nature. North Korea is a regime arming with missiles and weapons of mass destruction, while starving its citizens.

Iran aggressively pursues these weapons and exports terror, while an unelected few repress the Iranian people's hope for freedom.

In both of these cases, Bush was telling the truth. However, neither nation then represented what the early 20th Century Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes would have called "a clear and present danger" to America.

But Bush brought a 3rd nation into the mix:

Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror. The Iraqi regime has plotted to develop anthrax, and nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade. This is a regime that has already used poison gas to murder thousands of its own citizens -- leaving the bodies of mothers huddled over their dead children. This is a regime that agreed to international inspections -- then kicked out the inspectors. This is a regime that has something to hide from the civilized world.

States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic.

That last line was correct: America did need to keep its eyes on North Korea, Iran and Iraq. However, as we later found out, Bush was lying: Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction, nor were they about to develop them anytime soon. Their dictator, President Saddam Hussein, had used poison gas on his own people, but it was all used up.

Having let bin Laden slip away, Bush wanted to change the subject before people realized that. So he tried to refocus America's attention to those 3 countries, and in particular to Iraq, to set up the war he was going to launch.

We eventually found out the truth: On January 27, 2001, Vice President Dick Cheney convened a meeting in the Old Executive Office Building, next-door to the White House, to discuss how a war with Iraq could be waged. Why? Not to stop their possession, or development, of WMDs, but to take its oil. Cheney had been an executive with energy company Halliburton, and he was still trying to make money for it, and saw a golden opportunity.

But first, he had to get into the White House. And he knew that his own candidacy wouldn't have a chance, despite having been Secretary of Defense under Bush's father, and House Minority Whip before that, and White House Chief of Staff even earlier, under President Gerald Ford. So he put together a group of business lords and evangelical leaders who bankrolled Bush, one thing led to another, and there they were. Now, as "the power behind the throne" -- or to use the Wizard of Oz analogy, "the man behind the curtain" -- he had the power, but not the responsibility.

In hindsight, the real axis of evil was on that podium: Bush, flanked by Cheney and the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert of Illinois, who would later be imprisoned for child molestation.

Frum left the White House shortly thereafter that speech, joining the conservative think tank the American Enterprise Institute, supporting the Iraq War. He was fired in 2010, because he criticized the intensity of the AEI's opposition to Obamacare. He began to turn away from the right wing, writing for The Atlantic, and supporting Hillary Clinton for President in 2016. (UPDATE: In 2024, disgusted with the return to the Presidency of Donald Trump, he officially left the Republican Party.)

In 2002, George W. Bush said Iran, Iraq and North Korea were "an axis of evil." It was a lie.

Weeks later, he said of President Vladimir Putin of Russia, "I looked in his eyes, and got a sense of his soul. He's a good man."

Many years later, Donald Trump praised Putin and North Korea's leader. (UPDATE: In 2026, Trump launched a war against Iran. Gulf War II was a disaster, now, here was Gulf War III.)

*

January 29, 2002 was a Tuesday, as the State of the Union Address usually is. (Sometimes, it's a Wednesday.) Baseball was out of season. The NFL was between its Conference Championship Games and the Super Bowl. There were 11 games in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 78-71 at Madison Square Garden.

 * The Detroit Pistons beat the Washington Wizards, 89-86 at the MCI Center (now the Capital One Arena) in Washington. Michael Jordan scored 32.

* The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Atlanta Hawks, 127-93 at the Philips Arena (now the State Farm Arena) in Atlanta. Kobe Bryant scored 32 points.

* The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, 114-81 at the Gund Arena (now the Rocket Arena) in Cleveland.

* The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Boston Celtics, 109-90 at the Bradley Center in Milwaukee.

* The Los Angeles Clippers  beat the Dallas Mavericks, 117-100 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Golden State Warriors, 100-96 in overtime at at The Summit in Houston. It's now the Central Campus of televangelist Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church. Steve Francis had 33 points.

* The Charlotte Hornets beat the San Antonio Spurs, 78-73 at the Alamodome in San Antonio.

* The Miami Heat beat the Denver Nuggets, 100-94 in overtime at the Pepsi Center (now the Ball Arena) in Denver. Eddie Jones scored 37 for the Heat.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Chicago Bulls, 91-90 at the America West Arena in Phoenix.

* The Portland Trail Blazers beat their arch-rivals, the Seattle SuperSonics, 92-86 at the KeyArena in Seattle.

And there were 4 games in the NHL:

* The New Jersey Devils beat the New York Islanders, 3-1 at the Nassau Coliseum.

* The Philadelphia Flyers beat their arch-rivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins, 3-2 at the First Union Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Center) in Philadelphia. Marty Murray scored the winning goal with 3:13 left in overtime.

* The Buffalo Sabres and the Carolina Hurricanes played to a tie, 2-2 at the Raleigh Sports and Entertainment Center (now the Lenovo Center) in Raleigh, North Carolina.

* And the Toronto Maple Leafs beat the San Jose Sharks, 4-3 at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto.