UK notes discord over Bush's lavish library

Like many aspects of his presidency, George W Bush's plan for his presidential library has been mired in controversy from the start.

Bush representatives appear to be closing in on a post-presidency deal to build the reported half-a-billion dollar library, museum and policy institute at the Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas.

Libraries can play a leading role in shaping a president's legacy. But sometimes it is a legacy that people do not want to be associated with.

The SMU faculty has been forced to meet on a number of occasions in the past month to address strong protests by a number of academics and Methodist leaders to Mr Bush's plans.

Two professors kick-started the debate last November by arguing that the library would associate the university with a president who took the country to war unnecessarily, violated international law and was guilty of "misleading the American public."...

James Hollifield, a political science professor at the university, said SMU would benefit from the institute because of the discussion, debate and research prompted by the eight years of documents from the Bush administration.

"We have to set politics aside and build this library and institute and give scholars and historians a chance to do their work," Mr Hollifield said.

But Sidney Blumenthal, former Clinton aide and political journalist told the BBC News website that that"depends on whether you are talking about historians now or in 100 years' time."

"Secrecy is a fetish with the Bush administration," says Mr Blumenthal, author of How Bush Rules: Chronicles of a Radical Regime.

"Mr Bush has already shown that he wants to fight disclosure of his records. His administration has classified a tremendous amount of material as top secret - material that other administrations would not have classified in such a way."

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