Introduction

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Chapter 33: Misdemeanors and High Crimes

Introduction
Reagan's vice president George Bush became president in 1988, and immediately faced the fall of communism in Eastern Europe. Bush sought to strengthen the American position in the "new world order" that was to emerge, and to show American might he invaded Panama and was the driving force behind the UN effort to push Saddam Hussein and Iraq out of Kuwait. Bush gained a reputation for being inattentive to domestic matters, which included a sluggish economy, though, and this contributed to his defeat by Bill Clinton in 1992. Reaction against many of Clinton’s ealry proposals led to a Republican takeover of Congress in 1994, leading Clinton to subsequently move toward the right. The Clinton presidency has been fraught with scandal, but the President's approval ratings remained quite high. Soon after George W. Bush won the 2000 election (though he lost the popular vote to for Vice President Al Gore), terrorists attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The U.S. "war against terrorism" in Afghanistan followed shortly after. These attacks will undoubtedly have a lasting effect on the course of American history in the "imponderable" 21st century.

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