George Washington's Farewell Address Analysis

George Washington was our first president and set the standards for all presidents after him. He didn’t think very high of himself. He always thought that he wasn’t good enough and unqualified to ever take the position. Even though he didn’t think he was well educated and smart, he knew a lot about what the country should and should not do. He gave us good advice about political parties and foreign affairs.

Washington was always stating that it was for the good of the country if he didn’t take a third term as president. In my opinion, it might have been beneficial for Washington to stay. It would have prolonged numerous problems that we ran into after he left. Prolonging the outbreak of the problems would have been better because America was in a sorry state. The country was in massive debt from the revolution and just starting to adjust to its new government.

Washington knew a lot about the things that as a new country, America should have stayed away from. Political parties were one of those things that he heavily warned about. He feared that the different political parties would misrepresent one another and spread propaganda. He turned out to be very right. A perfect example of this was the various ads for the senate campaign for Coakley and Brown. George thought the the country would be torn apart based on geographical location. Washington was also right about that. Certain states are democrats or republicans. For example Massachusetts votes democrat always and Texas always votes republican.

George Washington also warned about dealing with foreign countries. He knew that it would only make our situation worse. In his opinion, party fighting would allow foreign influence. Foreign influence in some parts of the country could possibly turn into their own government and breaking away from the country as a whole. Washington stated that our only reason for dealing with foreign countries is for trading purposes or money. Other than that it could be potentially hazardous. George Washington was obviously right. If we had left Iraq alone and let them deal with their own governmental problems, maybe we wouldn’t be in this recession. In all cases dealing with foreign affairs, if we had listened to Washington, they wouldn’t have been so severe.

All in all, Washington was right about a lot of things. He may have not had a great education but he was very smart about politics and economy. If our country had kept taking his advice and following it, our country would be a lot stronger right now. At this time, America is weak and should’ve listened to the man that essentially jump started our country. If he wasn’t our first president, who knows what our country would be like today. Would it have been better or worse? I believe he was perfect for the job. I guess others could say otherwise.