George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who was the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009 and the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000. As President, he succeeded Bill Clinton, and was succeeded by Barack Obama.
The son of former President George Herbert Walker Bush, he was an owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team before defeating Ann Richards in the 1994 Texas gubernatorial election, prior to reaching the White House. He is famous for his frequent malapropisms (known as Bushisms), such as "I know how hard it is to put food on your family", and ushering in a veritable golden age of political satire in America. He also "starred" in not one, but two sitcoms (That's My Bush! and Lil' Bush, both on Comedy Central), which pushed satirical boundaries in doing so.
Bush got elected by a very narrow margin over incumbent vice-president Al Gore, losing the popular vote and winning by a margin of 271-266 in the electoral college, leaving him as only the fourth person to be elected president despite not securing the highest number of votes, and the first to do so since Benjamin Harrison in 1888 (112 years prior). The election came down to the state of Florida, with Bush winning the state, and thereby the presidency, by just 537 votes, leading to a massive legal quagmire over demands for recounts — not least because the Governor of Florida at the time just so happened to be Bush's brother, Jeb — that left the presidential transition in doubt until very late in the day, when the Supreme Court ruled in Bush's favor.note He won his second election, this time against John Kerry, more traditionally with far less controversy in what is to date the only time a Republican has won the popular vote since his father in 1988. There were still several disputes over voter fraud and disenfranchisement, particularly in the decisive state of Ohio — though given that Bush won the state by about 118,000 votes, most people, including Kerry himself, were quick to agree that any irregularities almost certainly wouldn't have changed the result.
A brief policy overview: Bush was president during the September 11 terrorist attacks, ordered the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan and achieved his highest recorded approval ratings in the aftermath; decided to invade and occupy Iraq; invested in AIDS awareness programs in Africa and the fledgling science of nanotechnology; signed the US out of the Kyoto accords; promoted the No Child Left Behind Act; signed the PATRIOT Act into law; oversaw tax cuts (mostly) for the rich at the beginning of his term and bailoutsnote for the big banks toward the end of it.
Much like Lyndon Johnson, his foreign policy decisions tend to cast a long shadow over the rest of his presidency, especially in matters of domestic achievements. If his administration's remembered for anything on that front, it's usually its notoriously diffident handling of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (best embodied by an incident in 2005 where Kanye West blurted out "George Bush doesn't care about black people" during a telethon to the visible shock of everyone else on-set, which Bush called the worst moment of his entire political career). Overall opinions on his presidency were extremely negative at the time of his leaving office and are still mixed today.
The years since he left office have seen his reputation recover just a little, however, with some now crediting him for his handling of the immediate aftermath of 9/11, and recognizing that many of the era's more controversial policies (including the aforementioned PATRIOT Act) were passed by the Republican-controlled congress, often by bipartisan, veto-proof majorities, not to mention that Bush's initiatives regarding national security, defense, and the fight against terrorism have been widely praised and have somehow served as a long-term benefit.note The 2008 financial crash also happened late enough in his presidency that he managed to avoid having it define him in the same way that The Great Depression did to Herbert Hoover, though it certainly hasn't helped his reputation any.
All things said and done, most consider Bush the most controversial US president since Richard Nixonnote ; however, the exact nature of his legacy remains a matter of debate. To some, he was a buffoonish oaf who had no clue what he was doing. To others, he was a violent warmonger who was eager to act aggressively against the Middle East and Muslim Americans.note To a third crowd, he was simply a meek puppet leader, with Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and the rest of the neocons being the ones actually pulling the strings. The lattermost characterization is seeing increased popularity among historians as time goes on,note though the general public is more split on what exactly to make of the former president. Public perception of Bush has improved notably in recent years; however, despite this, he remains a highly polarizing figure in American politics, even among Republicans. It has reached the point where within the GOP itself, opinions about him are divided: Republicans from the neoconservative wing continue to praise him, while those from the populist/Trumpist wing vehemently repudiate him, considering him an elitist out of touch with the reality of the average American.
On another trivial and somewhat more dubious note, the term "[President] Derangement Syndrome" was coined during his tenure by supporters seeking to mock his critics, as Bush's controversial nature led to a large amount of parody and criticism among more leftist media outlets and creators. As time went on, however, the increasing unpopularity of Bush's administration would leave his supporters — rather than his detractors — walking away with egg on their faces, leading "Bush Derangement Syndrome" to fall out of the public consciousness until the Donald Trump administration, where a similar media climate resulted in "Trump Derangement Syndrome" becoming the new buzz-term among the American right ("Obama Derangement Syndrome" also briefly popped up among the left during Barack Obama's tenure, primarily as a way of getting back at those who were so eager to cry "Bush Derangement Syndrome" in the 2000s, but this faded out fairly quickly in favor of other forms of parody).
Bush is one of two sons of presidents to become president (the other being John Quincy Adams), and he is a fifth cousin four times removed of former president Franklin Pierce. He is also the first descendant of a former president to serve two terms (John Quincy Adams and Benjamin Harrison both served one). Bush endured one assassination attempt: a guy lobbed a grenade at him while making a speech with Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili in Tblisi, but the grenade was a dud, and Dubya was completely unharmed. This makes him the first president since James Monroe to totally avert the Curse of Tippecanoe (be elected in a year divisible by ten and die while in office, either due to sickness or to being successfully assassinated) without even suffering from serious injury.
In 2015, his brother John Ellis "Jeb" Bush ran for the Republican presidential nomination and was highly expected to become their 2016 nominee. However, he got overshadowed by Donald Trump, suspending his campaign in February 2016 after a disappointing finish in the South Carolina primaries.
Between the death of his father in 2018 and the end of Donald Trump's presidency in 2021, Bush was notable for being the last living former Republican president.
He also helped popularize the phrase "I'm <Your Name here>, and I approve this message", which is now standard operating procedure for political ads on TV (usually as an alternative to the "Paid for by..." voiceover), and released his memoirs in November 2010.
Tropes associated with George W. Bush in media and portrayals in fiction:
- Accidentally-Correct Writing: In The Simpsons episode "Two Bad Neighbors", which aired in 1996, Homer and Bart attempt to prank George H. W. Bush by posing as his sons Jeb and "George Bush Jr." Simpsons creator Matt Groening later said that when they wrote that scene, they intended it as a joke and were completely unaware that there really was a George Bush Jr.
- Aluminum Christmas Trees: Bush is credited with codifying the now-standard practice of a political candidate ending their campaign ads with a voiceover declaring "I'm [name of candidate] and I approve this message" during the 2004 election. However, this is actually required by law starting with the "Stand By Your Ad" provision
passed in 2002 and some of his Democratic rivals used it in their ads during that year's Democratic primaries.
- Beam Me Up, Scotty!:
- He never used the word "Strategery" (although he did say "misunderestimated", "recruitiments", "internets" and "nuculear"). That was Will Ferrell on Saturday Night Live.
- Several Dan Quayle quotes, such as "It isn't pollution that's harming the environment. It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it" and "The future will be better tomorrow" were wrongly attributed as "Bushisms" during his presidency.
- Fan Nickname: "W" and the famous "Dubya" can and have been used in media both affectionately and disparagingly.
- Enhanced Interrogation Techniques: Trope Namer, either from Bush himself or Cheney.
- Everything is Big in Texas: Portrayals of him, if referencing his upbringing, have him being very proud of being a Texan. Although, if it matters, he was born in Connecticut.
- Genius Ditz: He did graduate Yale and is the only President to have an MBA from Harvard Business school. It was once observed that his GPA at Yale was roughly equal to Al Gore's at Harvard (and he actually got better grades than John Kerry (though not by much; 76/100 vs 77/100), who was more commonly depicted as The Smart Guy in the 2004 election, but certain famous misspeakings of his got him frequently lampooned as an idiot.
- It should be noted that Bush's college GPA was only 2.35, which is well below average for his major today (history) and for all college students in the era he graduated (2.9, or a B average). Bush himself admitted to being a mediocre student.
- Certain disclosures about the Bush White House (primarily his refusal to read even summaries of reports prepared for him) led to a persistent rumor that he may have been functionally illiterate. While this obviously can't be proven, Bush himself never did much to disprove it, at least publically.
- It should be noted that
- GIS Syndrome: Some art critics have pointed out that Bush's series of amateur portraits of world leaders, on display at his presidential library, bear a striking resemblance to pictures that appear on the first page of Google Images results for their names.
- Happily Married: His marriage to his wife Laura is always depicted as being a happy one. Also referenced in the movie W. and its promotion.◊
- Malaproper: Multiple statements by him, contributing to his image as The Ditz. Bush became famous for his sometimes odd verbal gaffes, dubbed "Bushisms". Some of them, however, are particularly notable - not just mispeaking similar words, but combining elements from separate words.
- Memetic Mutation:
- "Now watch this drive!"
- Mission Accomplished
- "I'm George W. Bush and I approve this message!"
- The Napoleon: Portrayals of him often get into this, even though he's a little taller than the average American. The portrayal stems from some of his tics, as well as facing the even-taller John Kerry in the 2004 election.
- The Nicknamer: Bush was known for the many nicknames he gave people. 30 Rock parodied this in "Cooter", with the Beleaguered Bureaucrat "Cooter Burger" (real name James Riley, played by Matthew Broderick) explains how he got his name:
Cooter: Cooter Burger? What am I, a cartoon dog? The president gave me that name! "Cooter" because I look like a turtle and "Burger" because he saw me eating a burger one time! It wasn't even a burger... it was a sandwich.
- Old Shame: He acknowledges his infamous "Mission Accomplished" speech in 2003 aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln after the occupation of Iraq as this, seeing the cruel irony of what followed almost immediately after the fact.
- Only in Florida: The chaos surrounding his runoff with Al Gore was the largest example and tends to be referenced in media. How I Met Your Mother had a Running Gag of Ted dressing for Halloween as a "hanging chad," and the recount was dramatized in the film Recount.
- Sad Clown: In Peter Baker's book Days of Fire, it is noted that the deaths of soldiers in the War on Terror deeply affected Bush. When he gave the order to commence Operation Iraqi Freedom, he was reportedly on the verge of tears. Those around Bush speculated that he often used jokes and humor as a coping mechanism to deal with the stresses of the job:
"I cry a lot. I do a lot of crying in this job. I’ll bet I’ve shed more tears than you can count, as president. I’ll shed some tomorrow."
- The Teetotaler: During his presidency, a common joke among his supporters was that he seemed like the kind of guy that they would enjoy "having a beer" with. The irony, of course, was that Bush was an admitted recovering alcoholic, and had long since given up alcohol by the time he went into politics.
- The Unfavorite: The Oliver Stone movie W. interprets that he was this while his brother Jeb was the one his parents had high expectations for.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: According to the movie W. by Oliver Stone, it is often perceived his brother Jeb was the one his father expected to get higher office. In one of Jr.'s nightmares, Dream!Poppy says, "A hundred years it took to build up the Bush name and you single-handedly destroyed it!"
- Bush and his family have denied this, stating HW was always a doting father whose children knew he loved them. This is backed up by public statements from HW, including his reaction to his son winning his first campaign for Governor of Texas: Proud father, is the way I would sum it all up."note
- Bush and his family have denied this, stating HW was always a doting father whose children knew he loved them. This is backed up by public statements from HW, including his reaction to his son winning his first campaign for Governor of Texas: Proud father, is the way I would sum it all up."
- You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: During the debates with Al Gore, Gore (who is taller and more -cough- stoutly built than Bush) was obviously trying to stand close to Bush and loom over him in an attempt to appear more commanding. The contemptuous look that Bush gave Gore clearly took the wind out of him, and also caused Gore's strategy to backfire since it quickly became apparent what Gore was trying to do.
George W. Bush has been portrayed in:
- While not a straight-up caricature, Vice President (simply the President from the start in the anime) George Sairas in Death Note is given a voice that is an impersonation of him in the English dub, as well as having his original Japanese voice actor, Aruno Tahara be the dub actor for him in the Japanese release of “Fahrenheit 9/11”.
- In The Legend of Koizumi, he's an incompetent fool for the first part of the story, looked down on by his father. In a sentence you probably didn't expect to see in your lifetime, George W Bush Took A Level In Bad Ass after Bush Sr. is killed by Nazis from the moon.
- An H-Doujinshi ("Viva Freedom") showed Bush & Saddam Hussein having a three-way with "World Peace-chan".
- Bush appeared in the flesh during the first run of Ultimate X Men. He orders a Sentinel strike on the Savage Land, the secret hideout of Magneto's terrorist group, the Brotherhood of Mutant Supremacy. Magneto takes control of the Sentinels and used them to attack Washington DC, laying waste to the White House and stripping Bush naked and helpless before him on live TV, then tries to crush Bush with a limo, being stopped by the timely intervention of Professor X. One of the Bush daughters was also held hostage by Magneto in an earlier arc, who snidely referred to her as "that human calf."
- He also appears in The Ultimates, asking Captain America if the 21st century was "Cool or Uncool?", when his resurrection is announced. He is seen during an emergency alert system, when a whole armada of alien FlyingSaucers appears in the sky and their existence turns into The Unmasked World. In the second arc, Air Force One is highjacked by supervillains, and the last thing he's seen saying is the name of his wife.
- In the same vein, he's seen making the presentation in the Marvel's Squadron Supreme.
- Because the rest of Mark Millar's last arc on The Authority was published in a post-9/11 world and thus due being seen as tasteless, a planned appearance of Bush as one of the people involved in the then-G8 taking out the Authority was replaced with a fictional President (whereas the aforementioned Ultimate X-Men example was published pre-9/11).
- W. (Dubya), a critical (yet surprisingly sympathetic) biopic by Oliver Stone starring Josh Brolin as Dubya and James Cromwell as George H. W. Bush (AKA "Poppy").
- Understandably, he's prominently featured in Michael Moore's documentary Fahrenheit 9/11, the specific objective of which was to criticize the Bush administration and the War on Terror. Fun fact: one of Michael Moore's mentors is George Bush's cousin (through his mother Barbara).
- In Postal, he holds hands with Osama bin Laden, skipping towards a nuclear holocaust together.
- X2: X-Men United begins with a president strongly resembling Bush narrowly surviving an assassination attempt by rouge mutant Nightcrawler.
- Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, despite being highly critical of Homeland Security, portrayed Bush in a rather neutral (even slightly positive) light. Basically, as much of a layabout The Stoner as the two main characters who lives in his father's shadow and is controlled by Cheney.
- Transformers (2007): Although his face wasn't seen, he was portrayed lying down in his bed on Air Force One asking a stewardess for Ding Dongs. A character at one point notes that the whole incident could decide his presidency. Which means in movieland, George W. Bush ate snack cakes while the Decepticons attacked.
- Seen and heard all over the place in Recount, a dramatization of the infamous Florida Recount of 2000, along with Al Gore. The two are portrayed (with great restraint) by voice-actors and body doubles until the very end, when their victory/concession speeches are played.
- One of the last disguises utilized by the title character of The Master of Disguise is Bush. The actual scene lasts maybe two minutes, but it was heavily played up in the advertising.
Folks around here call me 'Dubya'. But you can call me King George.
- In the 2006 Mockumentary Death of a President, George W. Bush is assassinated and Dick Cheney assumes the vacant office. The film was pretty controversial, with the White House spokesperson notably refusing to comment on the film, claiming that it didn't "dignify a response".
- In Vice, George W. Bush is portrayed by Sam Rockwell. He's played up as a puppet leader to Dick Cheney's machinations behind the scenes.
- The 2005 documentary Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room scrutinizes Bush's ties to the infamous failed energy giant Enron. It also suggests that part of Enron's motivation during the California Energy Crisis was to destroy the popularity of then-Governor of California Gray Davis, who was once seen as a possible formidable Democratic rival to Bush in the 2004 election.
- Appears in Official Secrets by way of Stock Footage from 2003, along with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, in the context of his efforts to justify the upcoming Iraq War.
- Bush is a fairly significant character in The Salvation War. His famous stupidity is mere obfuscating.
- Bush is essentially The Ghost during Axiom's End (set in September-October 2007), but many of his actions indirectly affect the plot. During the events of the book, Bush gives sworn testimony that he didn't know about the ROSA program until September 2007, right after the leak of the "Fremda Memo." A subsequent leak of an audio recording shows that Bush lied under oath and actually knew about ROSA as early as 2004. Facing bipartisan ire from Congress, Bush resigns the next day.
- That's My Bush!, a sitcom parody by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. Incidentally, they had planned on doing a show on the new President prior to the outcome of the 2000 election, with the alternative being Everybody Loves Al.
- Ferrell was also the first W. Bush portrayer on Saturday Night Live, and probably the one who left the greatest impression on the public. Dubya has also been played on the show by Chris Parnell, Darrell Hammond, Will Forte, and Jason Sudeikis, at varying levels of success. Bush was, especially during the Ferrell years, portrayed as a lovably clueless yokel ("We're coming for you, bin Laden. I'm gonna make you my own personal Where's Waldo?. And unlike those frustrating Waldo books, I'm gonna find you.") with Dick Cheney (always played by Darrell Hammond) portrayed as an Evil Chancellor. Just imagine Bush and Cheney as the Sultan and Jafar from Aladdin. In the post-Ferrell years, Bush occasionally became a bit more sleazy if a sketch called for it. Incidentally, "strategery" was said by Ferrell's SNL parody of Bush rather than the real Bush.
- He returned during the Trump administration, mainly to highlight how Bush was being remembered more positively by comparison.
Ferrell (as Bush): I just wanted to address my fellow Americans tonight, and remind you guys that I was really bad. Like, historically not good. [...] Hey, what has two thumbs and created ISIS? This guy.
- He returned during the Trump administration
- Dead Ringers, 2DTV and The Impressionable Jon Culshaw, here grouped together because the portrayals were done by the same people and were very similar, portraying Bush as a malapropism-prone ("My Fellow Armadillos...") warmongering idiot who loved Sesame Street and was surrounded by hapless advisors having to explain things to him with sock puppets. The satire was, however, rather undermined by the fact that they kept reusing the same 'President Idiot' jokes from Spitting Image (then aimed at Ronald Reagan and Dan Quayle) which if anything only evoked nostalgia in a lot of the British audience.
- One sketch in Ringers has the cast of The West Wing called up by President Bartlett with the news that he's not the actual President of the United States. They're horrified when he shows them the show's version of Bush sitting nearby, grinning and cackling.
- The premier episode of NCIS featured clips of Bush regularly, including a scene taking place at a speech where he only appears on the video screens and one where he boards Air Force One. The scene immediately following shows a very convincing imposter, only shown from behind, greeting some of his security personnel on the aircraft.
- Shown (among other famous people) as exemplars of facial readings on Lie to Me.
- The short-lived This Just In had an episode where the conservative main character's one-liners were eerily restated in some of Bush's speeches. In a vast departure from other humor concerning George W., they made fun "with" rather than "of". In the episode in question, the President turned out to not only be an excellent pilot and very intelligent, but spoken in a British-style accent ("I went to Yale, for God's sake!"). Turns out his mispronunciations and other quirks the media/internet constantly berated him for were an act.
- Frequently mentioned in Treme, which makes sense, seeing as how it's set in post-Katrina New Orleans. Mostly from Creighton and Davis, the most political characters. He's also the subject of Davis' song "Shame, Shame, Shame [on you now, Dubya]."
- David Bowie's 2003 song "New Killer Star" was written as an open jab at Bush, the song's title coming from the president's odd pronunciation of the word "nuclear."
- Eminem's song "Mosh" was during the 2004 election, with a direct address to "Mr. President! Mr. Senator!" at the end. Throughout the song, Mr. Mathers suggests he respectfully disagrees with the President's ideas.
- Some also accused the video of featuring a soldier leaving a photo of Bush with a knife in his head. Someone didn't do the research; it's at 2:52, and the knife is holding the photo on the wall, and not actually in Bush's head.
- Some also accused the video
- Loudness directed at least two Protest Songs at him, "Misleading Man" and "Unknown Civilians" from their album Racing, and referred to him obliquely in "The Candidate" on Pandemonium.
- British pop duo Pet Shop Boys did a satirical love song portraying Tony Blair and George W. Bush as lovers, entitled "I'm with stupid."
- Industrial Metal band Ministry had not one or two, but three anti-Bush albums. Not three songs, three albums
- In Cage's song "Grand Ol' Party Crash", we hear several spoken interludes from "The Dubya", voiced by Jello Biafra.
- Conor O'Berst of Bright Eyes wrote an entire song on Bush - an exceptionally scathing one at that - entitled "When the President Talks to God".
- Roger Waters mocks Bush in his 2004 B-Side "Leaving Beirut", written in protest of the Iraq War (much like how he criticized Margaret Thatcher in Pink Floyd's The Final Cut). Waters also had some...less than kind things to say about Bush during the earliest tours of the 2010 version of The Wall.
- P!nk has a Protest Song about Bush and many notable policies from his era, "Dear Mr President" on Stupid Girls, such as Bush's homophobic policies and "no child left behind".
What kind of father would take his daughters' rights away? And what kind of father might hate his daughter if she was gay?
- The National have a Spoken Word in Music interlude on "Walk It Back" from Sleep Well Beast that was recorded from the White House from one of Bush's staffers (credited to Karl Rove, who denies it).
People like you are still living in what we call the reality-based community. You believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality. That's not the way the world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you are studying that reality - judiciously, as you will - we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors, and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." Apparently that was written on a whiteboard with a red sharpie in the Roosevelt bedroom, sometime around Christmas 2007. Yeah, so I can't stay...
- Nine Inch Nails' Year Zero is all about the worst case scenario of his presidency, with America being a borderline fascist theocracy and its civilians being drugged into submission.
- R.E.M.'s "Final Straw" is a Protest Song against Bush and the Iraq War.
- Caryl Churchill of Top Girls and Cloud Nine wrote one called "Drunk Enough To Say I Love You?" that is a thinly veiled satire on Bush's perceived "special relationship" with Tony Blair, with many Depraved Homosexual undertones.
- You're Welcome, America, a satirical Broadway play starring Will Ferrell as Dubya. Featuring a rather suggestive interpretation of Dubya and Condie Rice's relationship and Audience Participation in the form of Dubya giving people nicknames.
- Mentioned in the song "Only For Now" in Avenue Q, a rare instance of the performers expecting/encouraging a song to be interrupted (by laughter and applause); it was well-received enough that, after he left office, a contest was held for a new line, and the change was "George Bush was only for now." At least one production has replaced his name with the line "GLENN BECK! is only for now!"
- According to the lore of Assassin's Creed, Bush was backed by the Templars while Gore was backed by the Assassins during the 2000 elections.
- The Flash game Bush Shoot-Out depicts Bush as a gun-toting badass who single-handedly shoots his way out of the White House after it gets attacked by terrorists.
- DJMAX Portable features the song "Dreadnought", the background video of which is a Take That! to Bush: It features a country called "ⱯMERICA" (totally not the U.S.) ruled by someone named "B.WLAND", whose portrait is basically Bush but with black circles covering his eyes. B.WLAND happily goes around placing military forces around the world and sending off nuclear monkey mechas, until a mysterous silhouette man shows up and starts beating the crap out of him.
- Criminal Case: World Edition. When the Bureau arrives to the United States they try to talk to the president, James Hewett. He looks suspiciously similar to George W. Bush (see here), and even asks to be called "Dubya".
- Bush goes up against an Allosaurus in the 2004 Presidential election in Irregular Webcomic!. (The Allosaurus wins.)
- Ozy and Millie. Llewellyn runs against him in 2000 and 2004; the 2000 strips mock the shouting around that campaign (and provide artist Dana Simpson with some Old Shame). Shortly after 2000, Millie vents her feelings with a 'Mister W' sock puppet, including at one point bashing it with a ruler while disagreeing with No Child Left Behind, in a quickly-apparent short-sighted protest.
- In A Girl and Her Fed, W. serves as the Clippy-esque avatar for a neural implant chip. Word of God claims that this isn't a reflection on his presidency per se, but that the author just liked the nickname "Bitty Bush".
- Strong Female Protagonist: George W. Bush makes an appearance as the President announcing the existence of biodynamics when Alison is 14 and has discovered her powers for the first time.
- Appears as a Young Future Famous Person in Fear, Loathing and Gumbo on the Campaign Trail '72, an Alternate History scenario. When The Vietnam War heats up again in 1973, Bush is unable to get out of the draft as he did earlier on, and ends up in a North Vietnamese POW camp (even meeting John McCain at one point). When he's eventually released, he becomes an actor in science fiction.
- In the Newgrounds flash game Bush Shoot-Out, Bush is an Action Politician who defends the White House from a terrorist assault.
- Bush is one of the main characters in Biden and the Gang. Bush is the stupid and naive one.
- Lil' Bush (featuring Flea as Lil' Dick Cheney!)
- South Park, though often political in nature, is well known for almost never attacking politicians directly (or at the very least portraying them as just as bufoonish as all the other adults on the show). Bush and his cabinet were revealed in one episode to be eminently crafty, as they were the ones who created the 9/11 Truth movement — they wanted people to think that the government was all-seeing and all-powerful rather than inept. In other words, 9/11 wasn't a U.S. government conspiracy, but the 9/11 conspiracy theory was.
- Indeed, Trey Parker and Matt Stone said they were "tired" of everybody else portraying him as a buffoon — partly because it made them realize they themselves were guilty of taking cheap shots at Bill Clinton during the show's early years, and partly because, while they didn't have an especially positive view of Bush's presidency (and it would only grow worse in his second term) they also firmly believed that Al Gore would have been a worse president had he been elected — so they opted to make him a Reasonable Authority Figure instead. The first few times he appeared, he was voiced by and looked like the actor who played him in That's My Bush!, which was also produced by Trey and Matt (his neighbor even made a brief cameo). He was eventually given a new, closer-to-real-life appearance later on. (And the episode focusing on the 2008 election, "About Last Night", had him completely absent; they originally planned to have him take the fall for the theft of the Hope Diamond a la The Dark Knight, but they dropped that as they felt that Bush jokes were overdone.)
- Oddly averted by The Simpsons. The same show that portrayed Homer getting into a fistfight with Bush Sr. never featured any "appearances" by Dubya throughout his entire presidency. Note that every other president who was alive from the time the show began has been portrayed on The Simpsons at least once (except Barack Obama, but his wife made an appearance).
- He was referenced, albeit accidentally, in "Two Bad Neighbors". In an attempt to lure Bush out of his house for a prank, Homer uses cardboard cut-outs of two men in suits on the porch that he calls "your sons, George Bush Jr. and Jeb Bush!" According to Word of God, they didn't actually know about George W. at the time, and said that "George Bush Jr." was an example of Homer being Homer.
- Homer is shown in a family photo album having a fistfight with George the Younger in the Oval Office, right after a photo of his brawl with George the Elder.
- He was frequently referenced, however. At one point Homer referred to him as "Commander Cuckoo Bananas".
- Family Guy portrays him in an extremely negative light, with cutaways showing him as an idiot or a coward (trying to enlist for The Vietnam War years after it ended, hiding in a treehouse to avoid dealing with Hurricane Katrina). The harshest example would be the Season 10 episode "Back to the Pilot", where Brian prevents 9/11 by warning his 1999-era self, which results in a Post Apocalyptic Alternate Universe where Bush lost the 2004 election, lead the South in forming a new Confederacy, and started a nuclear war with the US.
- Ironically, the closest thing to a neutral portrayal was his first, where Peter works for a tobacco company and wines and dines Bush and Gore to loosen restrictions on cigarette sales. In the DVD commentary, the writers remark that they only included him out of fairness and thought he had "no fucking way" of actually winning.
- American Dad!:
- Appears in the episode "Bush Comes to Dinner", where Stan wins a contest to have dinner with him. Hayley tries to destroy Bush's reputation by getting him Off the Wagon, but when he comes to her defense after Stan calls her a lost cause she changes her mind, remarking "At least he's better than Cheney." The portrayal is surprisingly sympathetic, having him be depressed over the fact that so many people hate him and wondering if he should just quit, before Stan's contest-winning speech gives him the heart to stay the course.
- He also appears (after a fashion) in "Stan of Arabia" pulling a Big Damn Heroes and saving the Smiths from being stoned to death by an angry mob, but it turned out to be All Just a Dream, as well as the pilot where God calls him and tells him to quit mentioning his name in his speeches (followed by answering a call from Cheney with "Yes, sir?").
- Robot Chicken likes to play up his love of tacos, and had a famous skit where he becomes a Jedi and fights a lightsaber duel with Abraham Lincoln. Bush wins.
- On the final episode of Time Squad, Buck, Larry and Otto go back to 2002 to stop him from making a big ball of twine instead of focusing more on financial issues.
- Celebrity Deathmatch, Fought Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale due to him mistook their concert for a campaign rally. Rossdale won after he plugs his guitar into Dubya's ear and plays his guitar, causing his head to explode. He showed up again in blink-182 vs 98 Degrees, wanting the robot fight to continue on the grounds of finding it funny. Was later forced by his mom get Deathmatch to stop 98 Degrees' rampaging robot in 5 minutes or else he'd nuke it. due to his fast watch, he sent the nuke anyway despite Jessica Simpson stopping the threat.
- King of the Hill: In the episode "The Perils of Polling", Hank and his family attend a rally for Bush during the 2000 elections. Hank is initially thrilled when Bush approaches him, but after Bush's handshake turns out to be limp, it leaves Hank aghast and having second thoughts about voting for Bush.
