President of America

Great Presidents of America...

Most Awesome Tombs: Suhrawardy Udyan

The great thing about this tomb isn’t that there are three sheiks buried here, or that Mujibur Rahman made his declaration of independence from Pakistan here. Although we admit that’s pretty awesome and we bet that’s really important to the Bangladeshis.

No, what’s great about it is that it’s not just a tomb, it’s a race track. So you can go, pay your respects to some of the great cultural titans of Bangladeshi history, and then blow a wad at the track gambling. It just does not get better than that.

Most Awesome Tombs: Grant’s Tomb

Ulysses S. Grant was, of course, one of the greatest generals ever seen by the North and helped save the Union from being run by ignorant rednecks… well, at least for a while, anyway. So when he passed on, giving him the grand send-off was a pretty big deal, and they buried the guy in a scale model of the Capitol building. We’re not kidding; it’s got a rotunda, murals that we’re sure Mr. Grant appreciates what with being dead and all, and everything. About the only thing it doesn’t have is a snack bar, and we’re sure that’ll be put in eventually: this is America, after all. Cinnabon is probably already hiring a contractor.

President Bush vows action on financial crisis

WASHINGTON -- With stock markets tumbling all over the world, President Bush issued a statement from the Rose Garden today promising aggressive action in concert with other nations to shore up banks and stabilize markets.

"We are a prosperous nation with immense resources and a wide range of tools at our disposal," he said in a nine-minute speech. "We can solve this crisis and we will."

With the credit crunch still threatening to choke world economies, Bush's words had little immediate impact on the Dow Jones, which continued to drop even as he spoke. In the past 10 days, since Congress gave final approval to a $700-billion rescue plan for the nation's financial services sector, Bush has issued six public statements while the market has continued to lose money.

Outlining a series of steps the U.S. government is taking to try to stanch the credit freeze and restore confidence that is battered after historic losses in stock value, Bush acknowledged that this is "an anxious time," but said the American people "can be confident. We know what the problems are, we have the tools to fix them and we're working swiftly to do so."

Calling the American people "innovative and resourceful," Bush also suggested that much of the "startling drop" in the stock market has been driven by fear. "The anxiety is understandable," he said, adding, "Anxiety can feed anxiety and that can make it hard to see all that's being done to solve the problem."

Bush's comments come as leaders of the world's leading industrial economies -- Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States -- are meeting in Washington to coordinate a concerted strategy.

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