A billionaire financier’s polemical indictment of the Bush administration’s exercise of American power
What the Work Is
Published in 2004, Pour l’Amérique contre Bush is a political polemic by George Soros, the Hungarian-born American financier and philanthropist. The book stands as a direct and forceful critique of the administration of President George W. Bush, written in the heat of the 2004 American presidential election campaign. It belongs to a small cluster of books Soros produced in the early 2000s that combine political commentary with his broader philosophical concerns about open society and the proper use of power. The work is notable not merely for its arguments but for its authorship: Soros was, at the time, one of the wealthiest men in the United States and a major financial supporter of the Democratic Party, making his public intervention in electoral politics a subject of considerable attention in its own right.
What the Book Is About
The book is a sustained attack on the Bush administration’s foreign policy and its conception of American supremacy. Soros argues that the administration’s approach to the exercise of American power—particularly its conduct of the “war on terror” following the September 11 attacks—was fundamentally misguided and dangerous. His central contention is that the United States, under Bush, had abandoned the principles of the open society that had long made America a beacon to the world, replacing them with a unilateralist and militaristic posture that undermined the nation’s moral authority and its long-term security interests. The book is thus both a diagnosis of what Soros saw as a catastrophic policy failure and an intervention aimed at influencing the outcome of the 2004 election, in which he actively supported the Democratic challenger John Kerry.
Key Ideas and Themes
At the heart of the book lies Soros’s conviction that the Bush administration’s response to the September 11 attacks represented a profound betrayal of American values. He contends that the administration exploited the legitimate fear and grief of the American people to pursue a pre-existing agenda of military expansion and unilateral action, particularly in Iraq. The administration’s rhetoric of American supremacy, in Soros’s view, was not a sign of strength but of weakness—a symptom of a nation that had lost confidence in its ability to lead through example and persuasion.
Soros draws a sharp contrast between the open society, which he had spent decades promoting through his philanthropic foundations, and the closed, fearful mentality he saw taking hold in Washington. The open society, as he conceives it, is one that embraces criticism, tolerates dissent, and recognizes its own fallibility. The Bush administration, by contrast, sought to silence opposition, manipulate public opinion, and present itself as infallible in its judgments. This was not merely a matter of policy disagreement but of fundamental political philosophy: the administration’s approach to governance and foreign affairs was, in Soros’s analysis, antithetical to the very idea of an open society.
A related theme is the corruption of public discourse. Soros argues that the administration systematically misled the American public, particularly in its claims about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and its conflation of the September 11 attacks with the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. This manipulation of information was not incidental but central to the administration’s strategy, enabling it to pursue policies that the American people would not have endorsed had they been presented with the truth. For Soros, this represented a dangerous erosion of democratic accountability.
The book also engages with the broader question of America’s role in the world. Soros rejects the notion that American power should be exercised unilaterally, without regard for international institutions, alliances, or the opinions of other nations. He argues that the United States had squandered the enormous reservoir of global sympathy it enjoyed after September 11, turning potential allies into skeptics and enemies. The administration’s contempt for international law and multilateral cooperation, he contends, left America more isolated and less secure than it had been before.
Underlying these political arguments is Soros’s lifelong intellectual engagement with the philosophy of Karl Popper, whose concept of the open society had shaped his worldview since his student days at the London School of Economics. The book can be read as an application of Popperian ideas to contemporary American politics: a warning that societies which abandon openness and critical thinking in favor of ideological certainty and the suppression of dissent are on the road to tyranny, however noble their stated intentions may be.
Structure and Approach
The book is written in the form of a direct and personal polemic, reflecting Soros’s background as a public intellectual and political commentator rather than an academic. His style is argumentative and urgent, befitting a work published in the midst of a presidential campaign. Soros writes as a concerned citizen and a man of considerable wealth and influence, using his platform to make the case against the incumbent administration. The book’s approach is characterized by a combination of political analysis, philosophical reflection, and personal testimony, with Soros drawing on his own experiences as a survivor of Nazi occupation in Hungary and as a witness to the collapse of communist regimes in Eastern Europe to illuminate his arguments about the dangers of unchecked state power.
Significance and Influence
The book’s significance lies partly in its timing and authorship. When it appeared in 2004, Soros was not merely a critic of the Bush administration but an active participant in the campaign to defeat it, having pledged substantial personal resources to the effort. The book thus functioned as both an intellectual argument and a political act, blurring the line between commentary and advocacy. Its publication contributed to the broader public debate about the Iraq War and the conduct of the war on terror, adding a distinctive voice to the chorus of criticism that emerged from within the American elite.
The book also forms part of Soros’s larger body of political writing from this period, which includes works on globalization, the crisis of capitalism, and the dangers of American unilateralism. Together, these books established Soros as a public intellectual who used his financial success as a platform for political and philosophical engagement, a role that made him a target of criticism from the right and a controversial figure in American political life. The book’s arguments about the dangers of American supremacy and the importance of international cooperation anticipated themes that would become increasingly prominent in American foreign policy debates in the years that followed, even as the specific controversies of the Bush era receded into history.
Soros’s critique of the Bush administration in this book is inseparable from his long-standing intellectual commitment to the philosophy of Karl Popper, with whom he maintained a correspondence. The very name of his foundation, the Open Society Foundations, is a direct reference to Popper’s work The Open Society and Its Enemies. This philosophical grounding informed his view that the market is a purely amoral mechanism that regularly comes into conflict with the general interest of the population. He has argued that the idea that the market is always right is a lie that benefits the wealthy, who attempt to spread this ideology. This perspective underpins his political writings, which include other critiques of American power, such as The Bubble of American Supremacy: Correcting the Misuse of American Power, published in 2003, which is also described as a virulent critique of the Bush administration.
The Author’s Stated Motivations and Personal Views
Soros has stated that his primary interest lies in ideas rather than in accumulating wealth for its own sake. He has said that he pursued philosophy for eight years and initially wanted to earn enough money to become a writer. He has also remarked that the main difference between himself and most of the ultra-rich is his focus on ideas, adding that he does not personally need his fortune but believes that without it, no one would listen to his ideas. This self-conception as an intellectual first and a financier second is central to understanding his foray into political polemics.
His personal views on the September 11 attacks and their aftermath are also directly relevant to the book’s argument. Soros has stated that after the attacks, Americans, who were victims, became a people of executioners. He has further contended that the war on terror has killed far more innocent people than terrorism itself ever has. These statements reflect the core of his opposition to the administration’s policies, which he saw as a disproportionate and morally flawed response.
The Author’s Political Engagement and Financial Support
The book was published in the context of Soros’s active political engagement. In 2004, he invested 12 million dollars to oppose the re-election of George W. Bush, supporting the Democratic challenger John Kerry. This financial commitment was part of a broader pattern of political activity. He is known as a major supporter of the Democratic Party and has been a fervent supporter of Hillary Clinton, being one of her most important donors during the 2016 campaign. He has also been a vocal opponent of Donald Trump, with the New York Times reporting that he financially supported more than 50 partners of the Women’s March that took place in Washington on the day of Trump’s inauguration.
The Author’s Background and Its Influence
Soros’s personal history is marked by his experience as a Jew who survived the Nazi regime in Hungary. He was 13 years old when Nazi Germany invaded Hungary in March 1944. He escaped deportation thanks to the protection of an employee of the ministry who passed him off as his godson. This official, named Baumbach, was responsible for inventorying property confiscated from Jews, which later led to unfounded accusations that Soros, as a teenager, had participated in the spoliation of Jewish property under the Nazi occupation. He left Hungary in 1947, first participating in the 32nd World Esperanto Congress in Bern, then the 3rd International Youth Congress in Ipswich, England, where he subsequently settled. This background as a survivor of totalitarianism and a witness to the collapse of communist regimes in Eastern Europe informed his lifelong concern with the dangers of unchecked state power and the importance of open societies.
