George W. Bush has recently given what is expected to be his last State of the Union address. This is not a political obituary, but with all the coverage given to the presidential race currently, it seems as if the Bush clock has already expired.

The tone of the address was much different to last year. The message before was “We need more troops” while this year it has changed to “The surge is working.” The number of mentions of Iraq is particularly interesting. 0 in 2001, 2 in 2002, 22 in 2003, 24 in 2004, 27 in 2005, 16 in 2006, 34 in 2007, 38 in 2008.

By way of achievements, it is fair to say that on average Americans pay less tax, this is a promise he has delivered, broadly speaking. He also promised reforms of the pension scheme as well as the immigration problem, but both have failed miserably. In a wider sense, the entire campaign for the social conservatism agenda, a sentiment fuelled by his core supporters, including restrictions on the access to abortions as well as gay rights, have really amounted to very little.

His real “success” has been in the Supreme Court. Ronald Reagan appointed three judges in his time, two of which turned out to be rather unreliable conservatives. George W. Bush has appointed two solidly conservative Supreme Court justices, Samuel Alito and John Roberts. The Supreme Court is responsible for making hugely important decisions, including a constitutional re-examination of ‘the right to bear arms’ later this year and as a result of Bush’s appointments, the Court moves from the centre ground and now leans to the right. In a year, Bush will be gone, but his judges will be around for years and possibly even decades.

Nevertheless, Bush seems to be fading away, like a radioactive substance going through the half-life process. Due to his political toxicity, the Republican presidential candidates are constantly trying to identify and compare themselves with Ronald Reagan instead of backing up Bush.

Ultimately, this is not necessarily Bush’s final State of the Union address; in the past, some presidents have decided to add in another burst of rhetoric just before the inauguration of their successor, but it is nobody really expects the USA’s 43^rd president to bother.