1.+The+Election+of+2004-+Bush’s+Second+Term

 In the election of 2004, George W. Bush decided to run for a second term with his running mate, Dick Cheney for the Republican Party. For the Democratic Party, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts ran with North Carolina Senator John Edwards as his running mate. During Bush’s first term, Americans approved of his response to the September 11 attacks. While campaigning, Bush stressed his leadership skills, improvements to domestic policies, health care, education, and foreign policy from his first term. As election time approached, there was a deadlock between Democratic and Republican voters. And up to the last few days of the campaign, polls predicted Kerry to win the presidency. But on November 4, 2004, Bush was reelected for a second term with 51% of the popular vote and 286 electoral votes to Kerry’s 48% popular vote and 252 electoral votes. During Bush’s second term, he became increasingly unpopular. In 2005, Bush faced disaster when Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. The Federal Emergency Management Agency came under fire along when Bush appointee Michael Brown was painfully slow to respond to the devastation. In 2007, a large increase of troops being send to Iraq outraged Americans. This caused Bush’s approval rate to reach their lowest of 23%. When bush left office in 2008, his approval rate reached 33% which is the lowest approval rate of a leaving president in the past 70 years. But on the other hand, Bush had the highest approval rating of any president in the past 70 years after his response to the September 11 attacks.  media type="youtube" key="AQhQaQyn-ek?fs=1" height="385" width="480" align="center"