- Reaction score
- 10,155
- Points
- 1,260
Just wondering what some of you Bushophobes think of this article.
I like it. If anything, flying into to have Thanksgiving dinner with the troops Baghdad earned him my respect.
-----
Why the President drives the Bush-haters crazy
Critics can‘t stand a leader who acts on his convictions
Kelly McParland
National Post
Thursday, January 15, 2004
Once when I worked in Washington, I had dinner with a Clinton-hater who had some inside intelligence to share.
It seems Hillary Clinton was not only a lesbian who had trysts inside the White House but knowledge of her affairs was being used to blackmail her husband‘s administration into adopting her extremist views. So why wasn‘t I putting any of this in the newspaper?
It was loony, of course, but there was a lot of it around, and it persists among those who fear the former first lady is plotting a comeback via her seat in the Senate. And it seems to have jumped SARS-like from its original carriers to new hosts, who view George W. Bush in no less paranoid terms.
A Toronto newspaper columnist this week compared Mr. Bush to Hitler and living in Canada as akin to dwelling next door to Nazi Germany. Mr. Bush launched a war that cost several thousand lives and overthrew a tyrant who had killed somewhere between one to two million Iraqis. Offer Iraqis a straight choice: Mr. Bush‘s war or the return of Saddam, and it‘s pretty clear which they‘d choose. Yet this is equated with a man who burned millions of people in ovens? Wow.
But hating Mr. Bush is not about having a firm grip on reality, just as hating Bill or Hillary Clinton wasn‘t. Mr. Clinton was a terminally dishonest philanderer who treated the truth as a convenience and had an attitude toward women that sometimes bordered on contempt. Mr. Bush, to his detractors, is a jumped-up little rich kid with squinty eyes who knows little and cares less and doesn‘t appreciate how privileged he‘s been.
At heart, Bush-haters believe he isn‘t worthy of the White House, probably because he‘s not enough like them. In this, they consider themselves superior to most Americans, just as they‘re smarter than the poor deluded Iraqis, most of whom are dumb enough to be glad to see the back of Saddam.
Mr. Clinton, if he‘d been allowed to run again, probably would have won the 2000 election, just as Mr. Bush looks to be in good shape for re-election in November. A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll yesterday found two-thirds of Americans think he has "the right personal qualities for the presidency," and attributed his high job approval rating -- 59% -- as a sign of respect.
"It looks as if Bush‘s strength is who he is, more than what he stands for," CNN pollster Keating Holland said.
But what does the public know? Far more useful to Bush-haters was the publication this week of The Price of Loyalty, a book for which former treasury secretary Paul O‘Neill was the main source.
Mr. O‘Neill was a bust as Treasury boss, developing a reputation for running off at the mouth, but evidently feels the administration failed to appreciate his full worth. He paints the President as a bit thick and his closest advisors as ideologues.
At their very first meeting, when Mr. O‘Neill expected a detailed discussion about the job he was taking on, Mr. Bush instead spent his time obsessing about some absent cheeseburgers. He‘d ordered the cheeseburgers but they hadn‘t come. The new President called in Andrew Card, his chief of staff.
"You‘re the chief of staff. You think you‘re up to getting us some cheeseburgers?" he demanded, according to the book.
"Card nodded. No one laughed. He all but raced out of the room."
This is amusing enough. But there are also charges that Mr. Bush was set on invading Iraq well before Sept. 11 gave him an excuse. At the first Bush National Security Council meeting on Jan. 30, 2001, the book says, the President ordered Donald Rumsfeld to "examine our military options" with regard to Iraq.
Mr. O‘Neill is already having second thoughts about some of this. A "red meat frenzy" in the media has distorted his views, he claims. He says he didn‘t really mean Mr. Bush was plotting war in the early days of the administration, when White House policy was just a continuation of Clinton-era hopes for "regime change." He‘s amazed that anyone would think he‘d said otherwise, though his words seem to speak for themselves.
But his criticisms go to the very heart of Bush-hating. Bush-haters think the President flat-out lied about Iraq: about when he made up his mind to invade, and about the likelihood Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.
Mr. Clinton, of course, lied all the time.
"I want to say one thing to the American people," he said on one memorable day. "I want you to listen to me. I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky.
He added: "I never told anyone to lie, not a single time, never. These allegations are false and I need to go back to work for the American people."
It was different for Mr. Clinton, though. He didn‘t seem to care whether the words he spoke were true, as long as they had the desired effect. He was a rogue.
Mr. Bush isn‘t a rogue. He gives every impression he believes what he says and tries to act according to his beliefs.
There‘s something about that that drives Bush-haters over the edge. It‘s as though they can‘t accept the notion of a president who follows his convictions and assume he must either be stupid -- a man more interested in cheeseburgers than economic policy -- or dishonest.
And he‘s getting away with it. That‘s what really makes it too much to bear.
kmcparland@nationalpost.com
© National Post 2004
I like it. If anything, flying into to have Thanksgiving dinner with the troops Baghdad earned him my respect.
-----
Why the President drives the Bush-haters crazy
Critics can‘t stand a leader who acts on his convictions
Kelly McParland
National Post
Thursday, January 15, 2004
Once when I worked in Washington, I had dinner with a Clinton-hater who had some inside intelligence to share.
It seems Hillary Clinton was not only a lesbian who had trysts inside the White House but knowledge of her affairs was being used to blackmail her husband‘s administration into adopting her extremist views. So why wasn‘t I putting any of this in the newspaper?
It was loony, of course, but there was a lot of it around, and it persists among those who fear the former first lady is plotting a comeback via her seat in the Senate. And it seems to have jumped SARS-like from its original carriers to new hosts, who view George W. Bush in no less paranoid terms.
A Toronto newspaper columnist this week compared Mr. Bush to Hitler and living in Canada as akin to dwelling next door to Nazi Germany. Mr. Bush launched a war that cost several thousand lives and overthrew a tyrant who had killed somewhere between one to two million Iraqis. Offer Iraqis a straight choice: Mr. Bush‘s war or the return of Saddam, and it‘s pretty clear which they‘d choose. Yet this is equated with a man who burned millions of people in ovens? Wow.
But hating Mr. Bush is not about having a firm grip on reality, just as hating Bill or Hillary Clinton wasn‘t. Mr. Clinton was a terminally dishonest philanderer who treated the truth as a convenience and had an attitude toward women that sometimes bordered on contempt. Mr. Bush, to his detractors, is a jumped-up little rich kid with squinty eyes who knows little and cares less and doesn‘t appreciate how privileged he‘s been.
At heart, Bush-haters believe he isn‘t worthy of the White House, probably because he‘s not enough like them. In this, they consider themselves superior to most Americans, just as they‘re smarter than the poor deluded Iraqis, most of whom are dumb enough to be glad to see the back of Saddam.
Mr. Clinton, if he‘d been allowed to run again, probably would have won the 2000 election, just as Mr. Bush looks to be in good shape for re-election in November. A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll yesterday found two-thirds of Americans think he has "the right personal qualities for the presidency," and attributed his high job approval rating -- 59% -- as a sign of respect.
"It looks as if Bush‘s strength is who he is, more than what he stands for," CNN pollster Keating Holland said.
But what does the public know? Far more useful to Bush-haters was the publication this week of The Price of Loyalty, a book for which former treasury secretary Paul O‘Neill was the main source.
Mr. O‘Neill was a bust as Treasury boss, developing a reputation for running off at the mouth, but evidently feels the administration failed to appreciate his full worth. He paints the President as a bit thick and his closest advisors as ideologues.
At their very first meeting, when Mr. O‘Neill expected a detailed discussion about the job he was taking on, Mr. Bush instead spent his time obsessing about some absent cheeseburgers. He‘d ordered the cheeseburgers but they hadn‘t come. The new President called in Andrew Card, his chief of staff.
"You‘re the chief of staff. You think you‘re up to getting us some cheeseburgers?" he demanded, according to the book.
"Card nodded. No one laughed. He all but raced out of the room."
This is amusing enough. But there are also charges that Mr. Bush was set on invading Iraq well before Sept. 11 gave him an excuse. At the first Bush National Security Council meeting on Jan. 30, 2001, the book says, the President ordered Donald Rumsfeld to "examine our military options" with regard to Iraq.
Mr. O‘Neill is already having second thoughts about some of this. A "red meat frenzy" in the media has distorted his views, he claims. He says he didn‘t really mean Mr. Bush was plotting war in the early days of the administration, when White House policy was just a continuation of Clinton-era hopes for "regime change." He‘s amazed that anyone would think he‘d said otherwise, though his words seem to speak for themselves.
But his criticisms go to the very heart of Bush-hating. Bush-haters think the President flat-out lied about Iraq: about when he made up his mind to invade, and about the likelihood Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.
Mr. Clinton, of course, lied all the time.
"I want to say one thing to the American people," he said on one memorable day. "I want you to listen to me. I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky.
He added: "I never told anyone to lie, not a single time, never. These allegations are false and I need to go back to work for the American people."
It was different for Mr. Clinton, though. He didn‘t seem to care whether the words he spoke were true, as long as they had the desired effect. He was a rogue.
Mr. Bush isn‘t a rogue. He gives every impression he believes what he says and tries to act according to his beliefs.
There‘s something about that that drives Bush-haters over the edge. It‘s as though they can‘t accept the notion of a president who follows his convictions and assume he must either be stupid -- a man more interested in cheeseburgers than economic policy -- or dishonest.
And he‘s getting away with it. That‘s what really makes it too much to bear.
kmcparland@nationalpost.com
© National Post 2004
Heh-heh.
