While people the world over are playing and replaying the Iraq shoe-toss video, and many Americans are trying to figure out whether 1 800 Flowers will deliver a "Thanks for throwing your shoes at our president" bouquet to an Iraqi prison, one thing being overlooked is Bush's shockingly calm response to the incident. Compared to the rash and short-sighted reactions we've seen over the past eight years, Bush's handling of the shoe-toss incident is far and away his most measured, calm, and reasonable response to a crisis on record.

The President Bush of 2001 through 2005 would likely have used the shoe-toss as an impetus to launch a military assault on the Iraqi media, or the media of whichever country he was hoping to attack as soon as someone "gave him a reason." Instead, Bush seemed to take the shoe incident in stride (pun intended). He simply ducked, made a couple jokes, and then continued on his long march to infamy.

He is clearly at that point in his presidency where the only thing on his mind is his legacy. The demands of the financial crisis have denied him a chance to pursue the typical public opinion raising, legacy-shaping policies that many presidents push through in their final days. With January 20th looming, President Bush has likely accepted the fact that his legacy has already been etched in stone by his failures in Iraq, New Orleans, and in the handling of the financial crisis.

But then, like a gift from heaven, a size 10 loafer came flying through the air at his head.

Bush knows this shoe-toss is his last chance to show historians that his presidency wasn't all about the rush to battle. Closing out his tenure in office with a rational, good-humored response to hostile aggression, he's hoping that scholars will look back on his presidency with a more generous eye. "He may have launched an un-ending, chaotic war and left behind an economy in tatters," they'll write one day. "But he learned from his mistakes. So that when someone decided to assault him with footwear, the more mature and even-handed president chose against having the assailant abducted and tossed into a secret prison in the middle of Eastern Europe somewhere."

Only time will tell if it will pay off.

Posted by: Bob Powers      I’m a fan of Bob Powers