President Of Good And Evil (Paperback)

At long last, one of the world's leading figures in ethics, Peter Singer, presumes to take Bush at his word. Starting with Bush's claims to value a free and equal society, Singer examines tax cuts, environmental records, global politics, stem-cell research, the Afghanistan and Iraq wars and more besides. It is not comprehensive, but it is the closest thing we have. Singer is exhaustive in his efforts to find a way in which Bush could be considered ethical, often giving far more then is deserved, and ultimately concludes that there is good argument for believing Bush's actions do not live up to the promises he made and continues to make. In light of Singer's work, it is hard to argue that Bush could be considered a morally just president; even a man of his word.

In his speeches and interviews, Bush has pushed his ethics to the forefront of his administration. Many voted for him based on his apparent Christian ethic, after Clinton was perceived to lower the tone. Singer demonstrates that in contrast to Clinton, Bush's actions have been far more costly and far more difficult to justify. One cannot help but concur with Singer that Bush is a man who has made clear the criteria for judging his actions; that being the moral cause he invokes whenever he talks about 'evil' etc. By that criteria, Bush is at best dubious and at worst deceitful.

I am happy to recommend this book to anyone seeking an intelligent, detailed look at the actions of a President who claims to be 'good' but fails to act accordingly.

The reviewer who said this is not a "skimmer" was right. Every page builds on the previous and if you dont read it in its entirety youll walk away like the reviewer from Sydney thinking Singer believes its OK to kill babies.

It doesnt take much for Singer to expose the very BASIC contradictions that riddle Bush's rhetoric vs. his policies, e.g. tax cuts, stem cell, the death penalty, (Bush signed 152 such death certificates as governor of Tx. More than any other governor in the 20th century yet claims to foster a 'Culture of Life').

Furthermore, he shows how the contradictions even cross over from issue to issue illustrating an overall defective philosophy in motion.

Sure, this is not earth-shaking news, but Singer's dispassionate approach breaks it down fact by fact and then rationally dissects it, even giving Bush the benifit of the doubt on several occasions when Bush's own language fails him.

Let's start over. In 'The President of Good and Evil: Taking George W. Bush seriously', Peter Singer makes a thorough examination of George W. Bush's ethics. As Singer observes: "No other president in living memory has spoken so often about good and evil, right and wrong" (p.1). Singer examines Bush's moral philosophy, and the gaps between what Bush preaches and what he does.

The results of Peter Singer's study are not very encouraging. Bush is inconsistent about virtually everything. Does he believe that life is sacred? He says he does, but then he's willing to sacrifice thousands of innocent Afghans and Iraqis in his quest to rid the world of evil (p.50). Fine, then is George W Bush, despite what he says, a Utilitarian, that is, holding the view that the right action is that which is expected to the best consequence for all those affected by one's action now and in the future? Well, that does not square with his position against stem cell research. Stem well research can save lives, but Bush apparently values the life of unborn, sure-to-be-discarded embryos over the life of the many people who can benefit from the cure. Apparently, sometimes life is sacred and sometimes it isn't.

It goes on - does Bush believe in free trade? He says that the case for trade is "not just monetary, but moral. Economic freedom creates habits of liberty" (quoted on p. 126). But how can the imposition of a 30% tariff on steel imports be "work[ing] to end tariffs and break down barriers everywhere"(pp. 128-129)?

Similar inconsistencies abound as to State's rights (they have the right to put up the confederate flag, but not the right to use Marijuana for medical purposes, nor the right to decide for themselves about physician assisted suicide), Freedom (the US is the "freest nation in the world", but if Bush thinks you might be a terrorist you can be held for as long as he fancies without a trial, without the right to see a lawyer, and possibly be tortured), and lying (which is wrong, but not when you're knowingly misleading your countrymen about Saddam Hussein's attempts to acquire weapons of mass destruction in Africa pp. 212-216).

Perhaps the grossest inconsistency is in Bush's justification for engaging in Pre-emptive war. Who gets to determine whether a threat is serious enough to warrant a pre-emptive strike? Given the US possession of Nuclear weapons, its current policy of pre-emption, and Bush's verbal threats to North Korea, would North Korea be justified in launching a pre-emptive strike on the US? Singer notes:

"one might say, as Bush himself has often said, that the United States is a 'peace- loving nation', and it is peace-loving nations that can be justified in waging a preemptive war" (p. 183)

The weakest parts of Singer's critique come in two parallel issues - the domestic rights and obligations of the state and the international rights and obligations of the United Nations. Singer is correct that the UN, and not the US, has the greater moral authority to decide questions of international war and peace, and that the state, and not the individual members in the society, has the obligation to promote equality and fight poverty. But in both cases, Singer ignores or underplays the main conservative argument - that states are inefficient in dealing with poverty through reallocation and resources, and that international bodies are inefficient in diffusing international crises. You don't have to agree with these positions (I have serious misgiving about them myself), but if they are true, they make a good case for small governments at home and unilateral action abroad.

Most of Singer's critique, although it hits the mark, is hardly new. There are countless books which make all or most of these points, and some others. Sources as wide apart as The Economist and The New York Review of Books have criticized Bush's politics, economics, and (although usually implicitly) morals.

I think Singer is somewhat unfair in criticizing Bush's ethics and scrutinizing his speeches in quest for a "coherent moral philosophy" (p.2). Along with Professor Singer's cynical friends and colleagues, I think Bush is a politician whose business is to get reelected, not to teach or demonstrate ethics. Singer writes that "tens of millions of Americans... share the views [Bush] puts forward on a wide range of moral issues.... Those who think I am naïve Bush's view may therefore see [the book] as an examination or critique of a set of beliefs widely shared by the American public." (pp.5-6). Surely there is a better champion of these views then the American President? Attacking some of the leading right wing conservatives may be less commercially successful, but fairer to these views.