Bush's Legacy -- A Flawed Election

By Craig Crawford | January 13, 2009 6:00 AM

The tragic course of George W. Bush's presidency began with what might have well been one of the great accidents in American history -- his flawed election. It is difficult to find a more dramatic example of why voting matters.

The Bush team learned how to cut corners in the 2000 election, avoiding a final recount of Florida's challenged ballots by going to the United States Supreme Court to stop it. In many ways that experience produced an attitude that any obstacle, even the Constitution itself, can be circumvented with the right set of machinations.