George W. Bush was the 43rd President of the United States and was in office from 2001 to 2009, meaning that he served two consecutive terms. During his time in office, he helped unite the American people despite the events of 9/11 and created the US Department of Homeland Security to combat potential future terrorist attacks.
He also signed a major tax cut program and education reform bill called the No Child Left Behind Act, which aimed to improve public primary and secondary schools and student performance through increased accountability for schools, school districts, and states, per Britannica.
However, that was not the only contribution the 43rd US President gave to the American people. He also was the catalyst of many-a technological innovations.
Let us explore President Bush's promotions for technological innovation on his 76th birthday.
How President Bush Promoted Technological Innovation During His Presidency
During Bush's tenure as President of the United States, he announced a series of measures to inspire "a new generation of American innovation."
According to the White House Archives, Bush's measures were meant to encourage clean and reliable energy, assure better delivery of health care, and expand access to high-speed internet in every part of America.
To accomplish the first, he had the Department of Energy select partners through a competitive process to fund $350 million in hydrogen research projects to overcome obstacles to a hydrogen economy.
As for the second goal, President Bush encouraged coordinated public and private sector efforts that would accelerate broader adoption of health information technologies to give every American electronic medical records and the secure exchange of medical information.
Finally, President Bush implemented a handful of policy directives to create economic incentives, remove regulatory barriers, and promote new technologies to help make broadband internet, which was the fastest internet service at the time, more affordable.
The Fruits of Promoting Technological Innovation
Thanks to President Bush's promotion of technological innovation in clean energy, healthcare, and broadband internet, Americans at the time acquired access to a lot of technological advancements.
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology was founded to give every American electronic medical records, which eventually became a reality.
According to Modern Healthcare, in the first decade of the Office's existence, it has tripled the adoption of electronic health records and brought health information exchange into the common vocabulary, per Dr. John Halamka, chief information officer of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston.
Meanwhile, the Bush administration was able to double the amount of spectrum available for "innovative wireless broadband applications" such as Wi-Fi and Wi-Max, which can provide a range of new services to consumers in both the public and private sector, per a separate White House Archives page.
Additionally, President Bush signed into alw a two-year extension of the Internet Access Tax moratorium to make it permanent, lowering the cost of broadband services.
However, the Bush administration failed to make hydrogen energy relevant to the American people. Despite the projects the Department of Energy funded, the US government gave up on research into the use of fuel cells as an alternative for gasoline for cars, per the New York Times.
Nevertheless, the study of the use of hydrogen for electricity generation is still ongoing, with the Biden administration announcing it is allocating $25 million to study advanced clean hydrogen technologies for electricity generation, per the DOE's announcement.
