“A virulent anti-smoker in Germany was so angry when his girlfriend lit up, he emptied a fire extinguisher to put out the cigarette, caking her and their apartment in powder,” Reuters news service reported on Tuesday. The man later told police he didn’t care about the damage to the apartment, and that the relationship with his girlfriend was over. But isn’t that stuff bad for you? Was there nothing in the apartment worth saving from the flame retardant chemicals?

President George W. Bush elicits the same sorts of violent emotions for a lot of Americans, especially Democrats — they’d love to unleash a fire extinguisher on him, they don’t care about the residual damage and their relationship with him is (almost) over.

But is there anything worth saving? I’m worried that the virulent anti-Bush groups, and even moderates who are just tired of him, would say everything connected with Bush should just be tossed out.

It is no coincidence that every primary campaign has gravitated to themes of hope and change. That is what resonates. On both sides of the political spectrum, people want to get past the Bush administration and all of its negative associations. Tear-off calendars that count down the days until it’s over have sold like crazy.

In typical lame duck fashion, Bush has decided that now is a fine time to go on a goodwill tour in Africa — this is what presidents do when they’re worried about their legacy, and on that front, things don’t look too good. Conservative commentator William F. Buckley has said “Bush will have no legacy,” and MSNBC’s left-leaning Keith Olbermann called the administration “a presidency of Cliffnotes.”

The Bush administration has had the opposite of the Midas touch, so the disdain is easy to understand. From Iraq to Katrina, No Child Left Behind to immigration reform, most high profile issues have not gone well.

During his two terms, Bush has angered a lot of people. It was only last year that Google finally disabled a user generated trick where the first search result for “miserable failure” was the White House Web page with Bush’s official biography. Amazingly, he once hit a record 90 percent national approval rating, albeit immediately after 9/11. More recently, though, his approval rating has dropped to 24 percent. This was the lowest rating since Nixon, and Nixon resigned in a scandal.

Yet even with all of the negatives, the Bush Administration started the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), one major policy accomplishment that should not be swept away with the rest of the Bush rubble — it should also not be forgotten by a new administration eager to start its own initiatives. Don’t worry if you’ve never heard of it. I did not know much before I interned at the corporation, located in Washington, this fall.

The MCC was created in 2004 to administrate a better, smarter U.S. foreign aid, and it operates on two premises. First, the best way to help poor countries develop is to help promote their economic growth. Second, foreign aid should be treated like an investment, and should be given to countries that can use it well. Only countries meeting minimum requirements for measures like low government corruption are eligible, so that the money will actually be used for citizens and not on private jets.

The MCC has received very little attention when compared to most Bush policies. In fact, it’s not even mentioned on the Wikipedia page detailing Bush’s initiatives. But it deserves notice for two reasons: the mission is important, and the MCC is succeeding. Just this week, Tanzania became the 16th country to receive a Millennium Challenge Compact. It was the biggest grant to date, worth $698 million over five years. Countries that don’t qualify have been scrambling to make reforms, and according to the International Finance Corporation, over 24 countries specifically mentioned the MCC as a reason for improving their business climate.

When it comes to Bush’s legacy, the MCC will never overshadow the mismanagement of the Iraq war. But that does not mean the successes are unimportant, and they should certainly not be shoved aside in 2009. I’m all for change, progress and lots of other campaign buzzwords, but discarding a working program, just because Bush is associated with it, would be a huge mistake.

Michael has a big fire extinguisher in his room. If you want to use it to break up with someone, email him at mjwilkerson@gmail.com.