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STEVE EMBER: Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION – American history in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember. This week in our series, we continue the story of the presidency of George W. Bush.

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George W. Bush began his second term -- and fifth year in office -- in January two thousand five.

Early in his first term, terrorists had carried out the worst attacks in United States history. President Bush declared a war on terror and led the country into wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

In his second inaugural address, he promised to continue fighting to defeat terrorism and increase democracy around the world.

GEORGE W. BUSH: "So it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world."

He also talked about his goals at home and what he called America's ideal of freedom.

GEORGE W. BUSH: "In America's ideal of freedom, citizens find the dignity and security of economic independence instead of laboring on the edge of subsistence. This is the broader definition of liberty that motivated the Homestead Act, the Social Security Act, and the GI Bill of Rights...

"We will widen the ownership of homes and businesses, retirement savings, and health insurance, preparing our people for the challenges of life in a free society. By making every citizen an agent of his or her own destiny, we will give our fellow Americans greater freedom from want and fear and make our society more prosperous and just and equal."

The United States Constitution limits presidents to two terms. Presidential historian Russell Riley at the University of Virginia's Miller Center says presidents traditionally use their first term to focus on their major goals for the country.

Second terms, he says, "tend to be unhappy times."

During his second term, Richard Nixon resigned over the attempt to hide political wrongdoing in the Watergate case. Bill Clinton faced a trial in the Senate over his attempt to hide a relationship with a young aide.

But the first major problem of George Bush's second term dropped from the sky.

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SUSAN BENNETT: "You saw people on the rooftops. You saw people using claw hammers trying to break through their attic to get up onto their roof. That's why you had so many people who drowned."

In August of two thousand five, Susan Bennett received a phone call from her daughter, a television reporter in New Orleans, Louisiana.

SUSAN BENNETT: "She called, on a Friday, and said, 'I think you need to come pick up my son, because there's a really big storm coming.'"

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It was Hurricane Katrina -- one of the worst natural disasters in American history. Along the Gulf of Mexico the hardest hit states were Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Over one thousand eight hundred people died. Property damage totaled more than seventy-five billion dollars.

But Katrina will be remembered mostly because of what happened in New Orleans.

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AP
Thousands of people gathered at the New Orleans Superdome sports center before the storm

A day before the storm hit, officials had ordered everyone to leave the city. But thousand本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。