In honor of World AIDS Day, let me do something I don't do very often - praise President George W. Bush. In his emphasis (maybe even over-emphasis) on the "war on terror," one of the things that gets lost is the fact that the Bush Administration has funded AIDS treatment around the world at a much higher level than this country did before he took office. The President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (Pepfar) pays for 2 million people suffering from AIDS to have life-saving medicine, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa. In an interview with ABC's Charlie Gibson, Bush named Pepfar as one of the accomplishments with which he's most proud.
Another proud accomplishment - though one that's not exactly fully "accomplished" - is the liberation of Afghanistan. First Lady Laura Bush went on "Meet the Press" Sunday to talk about life in Afghanistan, particularly for women and girls. I thought she did a great job, and she's obviously committed to this issue. I'm not sure why she hasn't been more vocal about it during her husband's term...But I'd dearly love to be a fly on the wall at Crawford or Camp David when she and George talk about how much better things in Afghanistan would be if he hadn't flitted off to Iraq, leaving the job unfinished.
Okay, sorry to get snarky. Today, just this once, I'm going to choose to leave aside the unmet potential of the Bush tenure, and focus on the people - millions of them - whose lives are actually better off thanks to President Bush.
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