Bush a ‘good man’ but mistaken

WASHINGTON, (AFP)

President-elect Barack Obama said Friday President George W. Bush was a “good guy” who loved his country, but warned he would leave the United States struggling with the result of “bad choices.”

When he is sworn in on Tuesday, Obama will inherit two foreign wars and the worst economy since the 1930s Great Depression with the budget deficit forecast to hit more than a trillion dollars this year.

“If you look at my statements throughout the campaign, I always thought he was a good guy,” Democrat Obama said, when asked in a CNN interview whether he still stood by his campaign trail criticisms of the Republican president.

“I think personally he is a good man who loves his family and loves his country and I think he made the best decisions that he could at times under some very difficult circumstances.

“It does not detract from my assessment that over the last several years we have made a series of bad choices and we are now going to be inheriting the consequences of a lot of those bad choices.”

Obama however praised his predecessor and his White House staff for presiding over what many observers say is the smoothest transition of power in recent history.

On the campaign trail before his historic November election victory, Obama flayed Bush over the Iraq war, accused him of taking his eye off the ball in Afghanistan and accused him of favoring the rich and ruining the US economy.