In a speech last week President George W. Bush touted the plan for his new Presidential Library at Southern Methodist University calling it “a place where we get the thinkers from around the world to come and write about and articulate the transformative power of freedom, abroad and at home.”
Bush expects to raise $500 million for the library making it the costliest Presidential Library to date. The half-a-billion dollars is twice the total amount Bush spent on his entire 2004 Presidential campaign! Just think if public libraries had that kind of kind of support while he was in office.
Among the contributors to the Presidential Library are:
A sheik from the United Arab Emirates, who contributed at least $1 million.
The state of Kuwait.
The Bandar bin Sultan family.
The Sultanate of Oman.
King Hassan II of Morocco.
The amir of Qatar.
The former Korean prime minister.
China also gave tens of thousands of dollars to the library. In addition, funds were received from the late Kenneth Lay, the former head of Enron, and Dick Cheney, the current Vice President.
I received a press release the other day from Rev. Andrew J. Weaver, an outspoken critic of Bush’s plan to house the library at SMU. Weaver points out that in a recent vote among members of the United Methodist Church members voted 844-20 on a petition calling for the rejection of the Bush project! How’s that for an approval rating.
Apparently, this opposition is not enough. Bishop Scott J. Jones of Kansas, a staunch supporter of the library, called the petition merely procedural and that the decision rests in hands of the church’s South Central Jurisdiction (SCJ).
Weaver goes on to say:
I urge Bishop Jones to reconsider and support the democratic and transparent processes of our church. I fear our communion will suffer a lingering and unnecessary wound of distrust, hurt, and anger if there is not fairness on this issue. Thousands of United Methodists…believe that honoring and “celebrating” a glaringly unrepentant UMC member, President George W. Bush, with a partisan think tank, will damage our credibility as followers of Jesus Christ and bring lasting shame upon the our church and a fine university
Article at Media Transparency Dubya’s Tower of Babel
Weaver’s June 2007 piece, Southern Halliburton University
Previous Book Patrol post : And the Envelope Please: Designs for the George W. Bush Presidential Library