President Bush: Natural Born Killers Don't Need to Explain
Here's the question I would have asked the President at the Valentine's Day press conference: Sir, what are you doing? Why are you even bothering to build a case against Iran? You don't need that. You're President Bush - the guy who gave us the Preemptive Strike, right? It's even called the Bush Doctrine after you.
It clearly states that you can attack anyone anytime. It doesn't have to be a defensive response like thousands of years of civilization have determined it should be. You're the Decider and if you want to kill, you can do it. This is your legacy. The Bush Doctrine will go into the history books as your gift to America.
Sure, it was cute having the press conference on Valentine's Day so your little gang of puppy-love supporters could feel all misty about you. And I suppose we should be flattered that you'd try and explain why we'd attack. But you don't have to do that. You're bigger than that, remember? You're above the law.
Besides, when you and your wretched little buddy Dick Cheney cooked up an explanation for Iraq, it all fell apart on you. So why even bother this time? Do you realize how ridiculous you sound accusing another country of meddling in Iraq? We're meddling in Iraq. The situation we started in Iraq has killed something like 600 thousand of their people. That's meddling, isn't it?
You mention that you're just trying to protect the troops, but they're only in danger because you put them in danger. You were the one who got the troops killed by sending them to an unnecessary war after lying about the connection to 9/11.
So what are you doing with this silly lame attempt to justify a preemptive strike on another country? It's time you could better spend riding your bicycle. Here's how that press conference should have gone:
"Good afternoon. I am George Bush, the Decider, and I have decided to attack another country. The Bush Doctrine - me - gives me, I, the right to kill whenever I or me wants. It's called a preemptive strike, also known as the Law of the Jungle. This time the attack will be against Iran, and I'm not going to stand up here and explain why. I don't need a reason why. We had to spend a lot of time pretending there was a reason for Iraq, and that was time I could have better served the American People. So I won't be taking any questions about the upcoming attack on Iran. Thank you, and God Bless America."
Mr. President, you're clearly a sociopath - someone who is not burdened by the incredible harm you unleash. In that sense, you're a Natural Born Killer, and Natural Born Killers don't need to explain.
posted by Bill McDonald @ 8:41 AM
19 comments
19 Comments:
WOW!!!!!
I'll bet you are going to get tired of me saying that....
WOW!!! Right on the money with this one, Bill...as per usual...
So much truth in one little post.
I just wish other bloggers could pick up on this one and let other readers know about you and your site and your writings.
Thanks. Watching this war scenario unfold again, is truly mind-boggling.
"Mr. President, you're clearly a sociopath..." Bill, you are clearly a "psued" (forgive the lengthy cut'n paste, but your comments seciton doesn't work well for posting link, but I thought this almost PERFECTLY describes you and others that post comments here. From Forbes:
New York Magazine's Head Doctors Analyze Bush
By Andrew Ferguson
Feb. 13 (Bloomberg) -- I know, I know: It is a fool's errand to attempt to trace the intellectual genealogy of the people who put out New York magazine, which so rarely offers any intellectual content at all.
But the recent feature from the Feb. 5 issue, ``Bush on the Couch: Analyzing the President,'' in which 13 writers subject George W. Bush to a long-distance psychiatric exam, tempts us to try anyway.
Pretending that your political adversary is crazy -- rather than merely misguided, mistaken or misinformed -- is a relatively recent strategy of political partisans. It coincides with the rise of the pseudo-intellectual among the country's cultural elite.
There are lots of ways to identify a pseud, that over- schooled, undereducated poser who places the highest value on appearing sophisticated rather than on sophistication itself.
One mark is his belief that whoever disagrees with him must be intellectually deficient somehow -- the owner of a mind far punier than the finely tuned organ the pseud is fortunate to enjoy.
But assuming the stupidity of other people gets boring, and pseuds have short attention spans. And sometimes one's political opponent seems too crafty to be merely dumb.
That's when the pseud calls in the heavy artillery of bogus psychologizing. The fellow with whom you disagree is not merely a dope, he's a nut. And the surest evidence of his psychopathology is -- that he disagrees with you.
Impenetrable
Psychologizing disagreements accomplishes several goals at once.
The circularity of the argument makes the pseud's position seem impenetrable. He gets to maintain his customary pose of detached sophistication even as he exercises the crassest kind of ideological opportunism.
And best of all, the trick forecloses the possibility of genuine debate. What could be more pointless than engaging the ideas of crazy people? Pseuds hate ideas.
The first pseud to apply this form of quackery to U.S. politics was the late Ralph Ginzburg, the convicted pornographer and editor of Fact magazine, who in 1964 asked a panel of psychiatrists to analyze the Republican presidential nominee, Barry Goldwater.
Ginzburg was a liberal Democrat who despised Goldwater's politics; so, apparently, were the psychiatrists. They declared Goldwater not just wrong but nuts.
Nixon's Identity
A few years later the ``psychohistorian'' Fawn Brodie cast her cool clinical eye over then-President Richard M. Nixon. Another liberal Democrat, Brodie despised Nixon's politics. She declared him nuts, too.
``Nixon lied,'' she said, with pristine pseudo- sophistication, ``to gain love, to shore up his grandiose fantasies, to bolster his ever-wavering sense of identity.''
Pretty soon, pseuds didn't even need to pretend to psychiatric training before citing political disagreement as a sign of mental derangement. The journalist Garry Wills, a liberal Democrat who specializes in writing pop history books, published an elaborate account of Ronald Reagan's political beliefs based on the alcoholism of Reagan's father. Yes, Reagan was one sick puppy, too.
Mock Puzzlement
But pseuds like Brodie, Ginzburg and Wills can only gawk in admiration at a writer named John Heilemann, who introduces the New York magazine article and updates their technique for the Bush era.
Heilemann begins with an expression of mock puzzlement. Why would Bush order an infusion of new troops into Iraq?
There are lots of possible answers to that question, including the one offered by Bush himself: More troops are needed to establish order and security in Iraq, without which its political system will never stabilize.
A debatable answer, right? But why debate, when you can just ask, as Heilemann does: ``Has (Bush) actually lost his mind?''
Then, true to the pseud's vocation, he shrugs on his lab coat and gets all technical on us, citing unnamed (of course) psychiatrists who say (anonymously, natch) that ``Bush suffers from a classic case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder.'' And as if those big words weren't fancy enough -- capitalized, too! - - Heilemann even cites the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the way real doctors do.
With the highbrow technicalities out of the way, the New York contributors are free to riff. This gives them license to blithely assert things that aren't true.
Newsweek writer Jonathan Alter, for example, falsely says Bush has only recently begun meeting with the families of military casualties. Another writer, Andrew Solomon, praises the compassion and wisdom that he has discovered in the diaries of Abraham Lincoln, who -- darn it -- didn't keep a diary.
Other Tricks
Facts are dispensable for the pseud anyway. Other tricks are far more essential.
There are the hard-to-follow insults (``he doesn't cast a shadow; he's just this paper construction,'' says novelist Robert Stone); theological musing (``anyone who's ever read the New Testament knows that there's very little upon which George W. Bush and Jesus would agree,'' says humorist Scott Dikkers); mystical powers of mind-reading (``Bush has to remind himself to put on a sad face when he talks about his war,'' says self-help guru Deepak Chopra); and, assertions of superior sensitivity (Bush, says former senator Gary Hart, is ``so blithe and casual about death and destruction. It would have kept me awake at night.'')
And best of all, you can do all these things without once constructing an argument, marshalling a rebuttal, or even gathering facts and evidence from the world outside your own head.
Sound familiar? If I didn't know better, I'd say these people suffer from Narcissistic Personality Disorder. But no. They're just pseuds.
I love the pseud thing. Many times on my cable access show we describe how we know just enough to talk about books, without actually reading them. That's not an insult - that's my life.
I don't think President Bush is crazy either - just missing some parts of normal human feelings. He's incomplete, which is different from being crazy.
In fact, his entire life has been an attempt to compensate for the shallowness he has to live with in his own soul.
As for some of the other points, I in no way wanted to give the impression that President Bush is too crafty to be dumb.
I see him as extremely dumb.
How many times have you heard people say, "The trouble with Iraq is that there are no good solutions."
I've heard that dozens of times from all sides. I think getting us into a situation where there are no good solutions is inherently a dumb move.
Keep the comments coming, Butch. One thing i'll never figure out is Bush supporters. I get the religious ones, but not you. I don't care how much pseudo-psychiatry I think I have: I would never attempt to figure out your allegiance to President Bush and Dick Cheney. That is a complete mystery to me.
I'd like to assume my "customary pose of detached sophistication" on that, but I am clueless on how you can see what President Bush has done and still defend him. Clueless.
On the crazy end Bush does believe God wanted him to be President. I believe I have heard Bush say that himself so I don't think I am making that up.
I'm not too hard to "get". I don't walk lock-step with Bush. I think in many areas he has been mediocre at best, and in other downright lousy.
Where I think he has achieved 'greatness' is namely in the war on terror....and no, I don't mean Iraq specifically. I like that he had the political courage to take some very difficult steps in combatting a problem that had been allowed to fester unfettered for decades - knowing his partisan critics would pounce on their opportunities. He is not governing to simply be popular (obviously) like his predicessor. He is governing based upon what he thinks is right.
I like what he has done for our economy. People like to fondly remember that 'Clinton brought us prosperity'....nevermind that it was a facade built on an internet/tech bubble that quickly popped. Our economy now has a solid foundation that isn't built on ether.
Lastly, despite the 'Bush doesn't care about black people' BS, he has done more than any man in history to combat AIDS in Africa. Bono and Bob Geldoff will attest to this. Why didn't "America's first black President" do squat for funding AIDS prevention and treatment on that continent, but this souless peon from Texas committed BILLIONS? Maybe Bono or Bob Geldoff can enlighten us.
In short, Bush is not the Boogeyman you make him out to be. He is governing during the most difficult time in modern American history, and is doing a pretty damn good job of it despite overwhelming negative press coverage that never burdened his predecessor.
I don't think Bush is perfect...far from it. But I think he's doing as good a job as anyone could do - and better than most - given what has happened under his watch. Clinton didn't face a 9-11 or a Katrina. But given what he did face - first WTC bombing, Embassy bombings, USS Cole, etc etc - I shudder to think what would have happened if he did.
Butch,
Thanks for your input.
You force me to be a better American by putting up with your freedom of speech.
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You said, "Where I think he (Bush) has achieved 'greatness' is namely in the war on terror."
After six years we need more troops in Afghanistan? That is not greatness in the place we know terrorists were and are hanging out.
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You said, "I like what he has done for our economy." I can do great things too if you let me spend more money than I have and don't hold me accountable for the debt future generations are going to have to deal with. Butch, I hope you are learning Chinese because they own us.
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You said, "(Bush) has done more than any man in history to combat AIDS in Africa." Oh bravo. Look at the figures, the amount your visionary has spent on this problem. In other words, if you feel Bush is "great" because of this accomplishment then it sounds like the leadership needed to handle tough issues like education, health care, Katrina, and yes even his social security "crisis" somehow pales in insignificance to this one great accomplishment in your view.
---
You said, "In short, Bush is not the Boogeyman you (Bill) make him out to be." That is a true statement. Bush is not a Boogeyman... he is a criminal and our society that operates by the rule of law has a moral and legal responsibility to hold him accountable for all those little things that you say make Bush imperfect.
daoud....meet clue.
Butch,
I loved the comment about President Bush:
"I think he's doing as good a job as anyone could do - and better than most."
I should send that to New Orleans. They could use a good laugh.
What should Bush have done in NO that he didn't do? The Mayor's and Governor's jobs for them? FEMA under this administration responded just as well to 'standard' disasters as it did under Clinton. Clinton never faced anythink even close to a Katrina so we'll never know how he would have responded. You and the rest of the left have enjoyed alot of cheap shots against Bush for Katrina. But no one can point to what he could have done differently that would have changed things.
BTW - ex-FEMA director "Brownie" is making a pretty good living right now as a disaster response consultant. Obviously some people - those that actually have to respond to disasters - feel he is a bit more knowledgible on the subject than lefty ankle-biters gave him credit for.
I predicted your response almost to the word: Start with Bush's staff making a DVD of news reports to try and get him to notice.
Hey, why don't your write the GOP and tell them to use Bush's handling of Katrina to illustrate Republicans governing well. I think you're finally onto something.
One clue: All you'll hear from your heroes on the other end of the phone line is a loud, "Click."
I predicted your response exactly - maybe not word for word - but EXACTLY. And that is to answer the core question: "What should Bush have done in NO that he didn't do?"
Believe me, I will not be holding my breath.
How about manage the emergency better and then manage the rebulding better.
So you're saying this was good government? As good as any president could have done and better than most?
Do you believe the GOP should run on this issue to show how great they are at governing?
I didn't think so.
The only way Katrina helped President Bush is by taking our minds off of how badly he screwed up Iraq. Or do you think that was another stellar job as well?
President Bush: "Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government and to the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility."
Too bad your own hero disagrees with you. Bush knows he screwed this up so maybe you should argue with him about it.
Cop out. Give specifics. Any. What should he have done that he didn't do. Sorry, but him taking the fall in the wake of criticism is an example of LEADERSHIP, not lack of it. Give an example of something he should have done and at what time during the unfolding of the tragedy that a 'competant' President would have done. If he was such a failure during this, it shouldn't be hard.
PS - I trust you'll come up with something more substantive than 'he should have left the ranch earlier' or 'he should have been in NO sooner'. Give me an example of something the President should have and could have done that would have pre-empted the tragedy.
For years Republicans have been warning that we could lose an American city to terrorists. Ironically,
we lost one to a hurricane. If you think President Bush has responded well to the disaster in a timely manner, then run with it.
You're view of leadership and mine are different.
All you have to see is a few staged photo ops and you think all is right with the world.
If New Orleans was a shining example of what President Bush did right, he would have mentioned it in the State of the Union speech. Oh, I know. It got lost among his greater accomplishments. Maybe he's just too modest. Or maybe he never really gave a damn and only became engaged when his poll numbers plunged.
A real leader doesn't damage the image of America with unneccessary wars or the sight of our people begging for help from rooftops, while the President still did not even get what the situation meant till days after the event.
Most Americans were ashamed at his performance but you see it as a good example of his work. You've set the bar so low for this guy that it is now poking out the other side of the world.
You are doing an excellent job of proving my point. You can't mention even ONE specific of where Bush could have done something different that any other administration would have done to make Katrina 'better'. All you have is to challenge the President to 'prove a negative'. Still waiting for those specifics.....
Specificially, President Bush should have given the impression that he knew there was a Category 5 hurricane heading for an American City. He didn't because he didn't care. He was on the ranch, Cheney was in Wyoming on vacation, and nobody was there to tell him how urgent this was.
Specifically, he should have been on TV, rallying the nation, and then he should have followed through with tenacity - not just photo ops and spin - and rebuilt the city.
Instead he's spending a trillion dollars in iraq.
New Orleans has faded from his shallow mind.
Yet you look at him and burst with pride over how great an executive he is. Eisenhower couldn't have handled this any better.
You're in his camp just like Mary Matalin and all the other right wing spinners.
All these people do is spin, but guess what: They ran into a hurricane - something that spins a lot more.
You're the first person I ever heard give President Bush a glowing review on Katrina. Even long-time GOP leaders like Haley Barbor and Trent Lott thought his work was weak.
You dismiss him not going there, and just flying over the city, but no one else does. Bush was uncaring enough to get his boots on the ground right away. And don't diminish that. This is something Presidents do, something the American People need them to do in times of great traumas. Your guy didn't even understand that, and neither do you. That's part of leadership - comforting the people who are hurting - not days later with a phony photo op, but immedaitely, and not after your desperate staff has to arm-twist you into watching the news, because you're too busy clearing brush and riding your bicycle.
It won't end when this administration is finally and mercifully over. People like you will begin an immediate campaign to view President Bush as one of the greatest presidents of all time.
This has taken the form of a religion with you, Butch, and you can't argue with someone about their religion. President Bush is your messiah figure - you take comfort in his greatness.
My motivation here is to help save America from this moron. In "pseud" talk, your energy in defending him comes from a subconscious awareness on your part that you're worshiping a false prophet. Deep down inside you know you're wrong about this guy, but you can't face it yet.
You say things like, "Where I think he has achieved 'greatness' is namely in the war on terror....and no, I don't mean Iraq specifically."
Butch, your own hero says Iraq is the centerpiece of the War on Terror and yet you discount it because it's going so poorly. President Bush himself says he wouldn't be pleased if he was looking at iraq, but you overlook it and shift right back into praising his greatness in the War on Terror.
I'll tell you who's the idiot here: I am. Why? Because Bush is your God, and you can't argue with someone in the middle of a religious experience.
"should have given the impression". . . ."was on the ranch". . . ."should have been on TV". Oh, that's just rich, Bill. Not one of your 'suggestions' would have done a damn thing to mitigate the disaster that happened in NO. Bush wasn't "on TV rallying the nation" because, like EVERYBODY ELSE IN THE NATION, he was told that a disaster was averted.
And I didn't give him a "glowing review" over Katrina. I merely said he did exactly what any President - including your 'hero' Bill Clinton - would have done. But you've got me on this one, Bill. You're absolutely right. Bush is not a magic meteorologist with the ability to see three days into the future which is obviously a required talent for past and future Presidents in your eyes. On a lite note, that should greatly narrow your field for '08.
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