George W. Bush will go down in history as one of the worst American presidents ever, the “decider” who was responsible for the disastrous invasion of Iraq. It may therefore come as a surprise that Bush is widely popular across wide swaths of eastern and southern Africa, where he is justifiably credited with launching the successful campaign to provide AIDS medications that has already helped to save millions of lives.
Antiretroviral drugs started to come into wide use in Western countries in 1996-97, and people with AIDS who had been about to die made miraculous recoveries and went back to work. But the Clinton administration did nothing to spread the life-saving drugs to the millions suffering in Africa. The United States even defended the big pharmaceutical companies, who were changing $10,000 per person a year for the medications.
Enter George Bush. In 2003, he unexpectedly tripled American funding for AIDS in Africa, and then five years later more than tripled it again. Only 50,000 African got the medications back in 2003; the figure today is 7 million, two-thirds paid for by the United States. I have just been to Swaziland, the worst hit country on the continent, where I learned first-hand just how successful the campaign has been, and how much Bush is respected for starting it (as I report in The Nation, “The Campaign Against AIDS in Africa Is Saving Lives—So Why Isn’t the US Investing More In It?”).
In Bush’s memoirs, he dismisses the theory that he proposed the big anti-AIDS effort as compensation for the violent invasion he was about to launch against Iraq. Let us take him at his word. Whatever his motivation, his history-changing act may just be another example of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s conviction that even people who have dark sides are also capable of great humanity.
James, without following your links. On the run, as Phil says. Basically true even our most cherished “enemies” may be human after all. But for whatever reason, I seem to remember, and no doubt I may keep the wrong synaptic connections in mind in this context. How could one ever have the knowledge ultimately needed? Wasn’t there a connection with big pharma at least in the Bush family. Am I a victim of rumors?
This basic semi-prejudice out in the open, did he also support research into the huge riddle, I seem to remember from looking into the topic posed to research confronted with some “carriers”, of the VIP victims of the virus developing astonishing resistance against it? What exactly would that teach us?
Closely following “big pharma”, comes another riddle. I think links I followed in a Krauss comment context. On the average the “third world” is steadily increasing average income, with the exception of Africa, apparently. Now I will spare you my non-expert associations in that context. Among others: Darwin’s nightmare. But no doubt it raises questions.
Misplaced credit! We should be celebrating South Africa’s Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) much more than PEPFAR for progress in antiretroviral (ARV) accessibility. Whereas Bush vigorously defended and enforced drug companies’ patent rights (while at the same time funding very modest levels of drug availability), TAC has been at the forefront of the generic ARV movement that has had far more impact on ARV accessibility. PEPFAR’s disproportionate emphasis on abstinence and fidelity in its anti-AIDS programs was an ideologically-motivated impediment to progress (http://www.pepfarwatch.org/the_issues/abstinence_and_fidelity/). (It was TAC, too, that was primarily responsible for defeating denialism in South Africa.)
James North does a few necessary cast-away lines to cover up the inevitable fact: a slobbering sop to George Bush, a man responsible for millions either dead or displaced.
FYI: Describing Dubya as doing an “act of great humanity” is nauseating. In large part because he didn’t do anything courageous. The early 2000s was the period when there was a lot of international pressure on this issue from people like Gates, Bono, Geldof and so on. Even Blair. Whoever had been president would have done what had to be done.
But I guess North doesn’t really get that, instead he is slobbering to Dubya.
Which kind of sums up James North.
Every once in awhile I run across a reference like this, something outside of the prevailing ideology on the Bush presidency. It was stunning the first couple of times this happened to me. Not that I’ve changed my mind on anything important, just a realization that we did demonize Bush — the same way the right demonizes Obama. The Martin Luther King quote is very apt.
Bush should be praised for his great humanity, and held to account for his dark side.