While my opinion hasn’t changed much about our former president, I have come to somewhat of an understanding on many of the decisions he made during his presidency. I felt like if he was as candid as he was in his book during his presidency many Americans may have thought twice before criticizing him.

One part I loved was when the Saudi delegates were getting ready to leave the talks at Bush’s Crawford, Texas ranch. Just as the delegation was heading for the door, Bush remembered something about the lead delegate, he liked farming. So as the team was ready to leave Bush asked to give them a tour of his ranch before they left. He agreed to stay to take the tour. Just as they were driving around the ranch a turkey appeared in the road forcing president Bush to stop because the bird wouldn’t budge at all. The Saudi delegate asked the president what it was and Bush replied, it’s a turkey, Benjamin Franklin loved the bird so much that he wanted to make it the national bird. The Saudi grabbed Bush’s shoulder and said my brother it’s a sign from Allah! The team then decided not to leave and finished the talks. Bush claims to have never seen a turkey on that ranch before this and never after.

My favorite quote from the book:

“I took Barney for an early morning walk around our neighborhood. I hadn’t done anything like that in more than a decade. Barney never had — he’d spent his entire life at the White House, Camp David, and Crawford. Barney spotted our neighbor’s lawn, where he promptly took care of his business. There I was, the former president of the United States, with a plastic bag on my hand, picking up that which I had been dodging for the past eight years.”

Overall this is a great book, and I encourage anyone with the slightest interest in current events and/or the Bush legacy to pick this one up, and this is coming from a bleeding heart liberal.