White House Updates Bush’s Biography: Less Prosperity, More BBQ
ChangeTracker, our handy tool that watches for changes on White House Web sites, noticed wide changes to the whitehouse.gov biography of George W. Bush.
References to Bush creating “prosperity” through “an ownership society” are stripped in the new version, and praise of the No Child Left Behind Act has been softened.
We contacted the White House for comment, and a spokesman told us that the version of the biography currently on Whitehouse.gov is actually not new, but an old one written at the end of the Bush administration.
Our research says otherwise. The biography preserved in the National Archives is a near-perfect match for the old version, suggesting that the version now on Whitehouse.gov is, indeed, new. (Peter Bray, founder of Versionista, the system that drives ChangeTracker, just wrote a piece in Slate about the changes.)
Other changes were less political.
Feline fanciers might be upset by the unceremonious deletion of the family cat, India “Willie” Bush, who passed in January. But, the addition that the president and first lady “met at a friend’s backyard barbeque” is certain to satisfy Texans.
So, what do you think? Are the victors rewriting history, or is this just a tempest in a Twitter?
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7 comments
missblue
March 7, 2009, 5:05 p.m.
In exchange for the deletion about how he created an ownership society, the bio becomes more and more loose with the facts.
lyda027
March 7, 2009, 6:57 p.m.
to the victor belong the spoils and any rewrite they deem to downplay the previous occupant. put the cat back in.
EdKilby
March 9, 2009, 12:42 p.m.
The comparative differences are merely cosmetic. I believe they were, in fact, written by a Bush-league writer. This fantasy bio needs to be re-written to reflect reality instead of portraying this man as actually having accomplished something.
David Stevens
March 9, 2009, 12:45 p.m.
If the Cheney/Bush White House wrote the first version (slanted pro), and the Obama White House edited the first version (slanted con)...perhaps the next White House will get it right? History takes a while.
HyperLinked
April 8, 2009, 11:52 a.m.
I think I’d rewrite it too if I were him.
celebrityness
May 4, 2009, 10:23 a.m.
It is very interested to see how govt change its vision. Bush was certainly not what he claimed to be.
Celebrity
Tanya888
May 5, 2009, 1:12 p.m.
Bush looks great after he done so much USA, on the other hand USA would look better after new Gorbi came to the power.
Tanya
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