Robert Rubin was sworn in as the seventieth U.S. Secretary of the Treasury in January 1995 in a brisk ceremony attended only by his wife and a few colleagues. As soon as the ceremony was over, he began an emergency meeting with President Bill Clinton on the financial crisis in Mexico. This was not only a harbinger of things to come during what would prove to be a rocky period in the global economy; it also captured the essence of Rubin himself--short on formality, quick to get into the nitty-gritty.
From his early years in the storied arbitrage department at Goldman Sachs to his current...

"They misunderestimated me."

Or did they?

Judge for yourself. Here are over 100 memorable misstatements by our syntactically challenged president, collected, annotated, and introduced by Slate magazine's Jacob Weisberg.

"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully."

"Families is where our nation finds hope, where wings take dream."

"We'll let our friends be the peacekeepers and the great country called America will be the pacemakers."

"It's clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it."

"I know how hard it is for you to put food on...

"This business about graceful exit just simply has no realism to it at all."

As the end of the Bush era approaches, the legacy is clear: George W. Bush is a wartime president. His enemy, battered but not defeated after repeated surges: the English language. The ultimate edition of George W. Bushisms captures this legacy -- from the Gulf Coast to Iraq and back -- with all-new pearls of wisdom and the twenty-five greatest hits of the entire presidency.

"You know, when I campaigned here in 2000, I said, I want to be a war president. No president wants to be a war...

The Bush era has been a special time -- for the deficit (back, and larger than ever), for the countries formerly known as our allies, and for the English language. Here it all is, straight from the horse's, er, mouth.

With new Bushisms coming fast and furious in this election season, ace Bushism editor Jacob Weisberg offers a must-read compendium and "explanation" of the first term. Read President Bush's eye-popping description of his economic policy:

"See, without the tax relief package, there would have been a deficit, but there wouldn't have been the commiserate -- not...