President George W. Bush wanted to make history — he will. The bad news for the president is that he will certainly not be remembered the way he would have wanted. That is to say, fondly, or as a great American. Opinion polls have consistently placed Bush at the end of the line as far as popularity goes, behind the most unpopular presidents to date, Franklin Pierce, Warren G. Harding and James Buchanan.
In 2006, Siena College in Loudonville, New York, polled 744 professors with the following questions: After five years as president, if today was the last day of George W. Bush’s presidency, how would you rank him? Great — two percent; Near great — five percent; Average — 11 percent; Below average — 24 percent; and Failure — 58 percent.
A more recent survey, conducted in 2008, found that 98 percent believe that the George W. Bush presidency “was a failure,” and 61 percent believed it to be the worst in history. While the way history will remember Bush may not be in accordance with his aspirations or his ambitions, the 43rd president of the United States will go down in history where only two other men and one woman have ventured before, to be remembered because of a shoe. The first time shoes entered contemporary history was when an irate Soviet leader used a shoe to command attention; the second time shoes crossed paths with history was when it was revealed that a dictator’s wife had acquired an incredible collection of shoes; the third mention of shoes in the news was when a would-be terrorist attempted to use a shoe as a tactical weapon, and finally, last month, when an Iraqi reporter hurled his old shoes at the president of the United States.
Now I may be proven wrong by some Internet blogger with far greater knowledge of the role shoes played throughout history, or by a nerdy Webmaster with a shoe fetish, but it really wasn’t until Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev used his right shoe at the United Nations in 1960 to bang on the table that shoes made the headlines.
At the time Khrushchev was protesting a speech being delivered by Lorenzo Sumulong, the head of the Filipino delegation to the 902nd plenary meeting of the General Assembly. Until that time shoes were meant to be worn, not used as utensils in public affairs debates. Khrushchev forever changed that concept. Photographs of the Soviet leader hitting his shoe on the desk of the UN General Assembly, of course, made the front pages of almost every publication in the world.
The shoe incident at the UN became synonymous with Khrushchev. Since then, it became quasi-impossible to disassociate one from the other. For better or for worse, the image of Khrushchev and the shoe became forever etched in the memory of all those who were old enough to understand what was going on in 1960. If Khrushchev, as leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, was modest in his dress, one woman who made the news with her shoes had no qualms about spending money on them.
Imelda Marcos, the wife of the former Filipino dictator, Ferdinand Marcos, owned no less than 1,065 pairs of shoes, or 2,130 shoes. In any case, those were the ones she left behind. The next time shoes are mentioned in the news is about three months following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon.
In December 2001, 41 years since shoes were last in the news — except for the mentions of Imelda’s collection — shoes found their way onto the front pages of newspapers around the world. This time the location is an American airliner flying across the Atlantic from Paris to Miami. The man who was to become known as the shoe bomber tried — and luckily failed — to ignite his shoes which were filled with explosives. Reid, a convert to Islam, tried to blow up the airliner over the Atlantic Ocean. The whole episode sounds rather fishy, but the bottom line is that Reid is in prison for life.
And now, President George W. Bush, who was voted in several polls as the least popular president the US has had since independence in 1776, makes a place for himself in history — albeit certainly not for the most well-heeled of reasons. Bush will be remembered as the president who had an old shoe thrown at his face in Baghdad. And if that was not bad enough, Bush will now be remembered as the president who was shoed — excuse the pun — or if you prefer, booted-out of Iraq. Bush must not despair, these standings do change. A 1982 survey polled 49 historians and placed Eisenhower in ninth place, whereas in an earlier 1962 survey, Eisenhower came in at 22.
But for Bush to climb up in the ratings, future presidents would have to fare far worse in both foreign policies and domestic affairs. That might take a few years.
Claude Salhani is editor of the Middle East Times and a political editor in Washington, DC.
