What Bush didn't know.

In reply to your last sentence, oh mamajuana that I love so well,
and with no malice intended.........

No duh, princess obvious

It is not what Bush knows or does not know that frightens me. It's his limited ability to understand. If stupidity were a virtue he would be first on line at St. Peters gate. If of course there were such a thing. I have never been as frightened for this nations as I am today. Not even in the darkest days of WW2.

Perhaps the question should be retitled: "What Bush did know" because what he didn't (and still doesn't) know would fill volumes.

I think the better list would be "what does Bush know?" It'll be much shorter, and easier to answer. c.i.

So Peter Arnett got fired, CNN is still droning, Fox news is still blathering.

Exit stratgies seem to be slanted more towards the Bush administration than to any war ending. The news today seems more slanted to who said what, whether Powell is a master tactician in WH diplomacy, whether this one or that one's plans will work better. Lost in this - and related to the Arnett firing - is any mention of the surprisingly effective (so far) resistance of the ordinary Iraqi people to the intense WMD of the USA.

At my doctor's this morning, - a funny conversation with him on this subject. He's a mid-westerner, church raised, moral man. He's indignant about all those video games, thinks they've played a bad part in all this. He sees a lot of this war (which he regards as immoral) as being played as a video game. He also thinks that's all Bush knows.

I don't credit Bush with anything more than below-par intelligence, but he has been briefed. This was a point made many times when his staff was trying to convince the public of Bush's awareness.

But in all the known history of Bush, he has never assumed responsibility for anything that went wrong. He's always had people to cover for him. Now, however, I find it difficult to believe that Rumsfeld, Cheney, Powell or more will allow the blame to fall upon them. Or the Pentagon. Or the generals. So this might be the play to watch.

Bear - I love you too, and think you're funny. Duh, indeed.

Yes, it will be interesting to see where the ax falls if this war goes on too long and too inconsequentially. Neither Bush nor Rumsfeld are the types to accept responsibility for mistakes. After all, this war is the centerpiece of our foreign policy. Then again, Bush does face another election in less than two years...

I predict they will all form a circle "firing squad" and point fingers at each other. This will not be pretty.

Yes, he knew or knows Mama, but he will find a way to wiggle out. There is so much secrecy with this bunch, that I am certain that he will find a way.

I would like to quote Norman Mailer from the March 27, 2003, New York Review of Books:

"...If I were George W. Bush's karmic defense attorney, I would argue that his best chance to avoid conviction as a purveyor of false morality would be to pray for a hung jury in the afterworld."

Remember during the Watergate hearings the saying..."Tricky Dicky knew?" Well, George knew and knows.

Oh, I like that, VNN. Sounds almost like musical chairs. And wasn't it you who put me on to a wonderful news source - thescotsman.co.uk. They had a story about a 40 day wait, which I haven't seen anywhere else except in a Spanish paper. What with Peter Arnett being fired and all, looks like more foreign sources will give a more rounded view - unlike Fox News.

Al Jazeera - both versions - still jammed, it looks like. Can't have any opposite views here, no indeed.

From all accounts Bush is a capable administrator, but he has not the intelecual curiosity interest or capablity for asking question, even mundain ones like "is there another point of vew. He would make an excellent assistant secertary in one of the minor cabniet offices. .

That should have been "intellectual"

Acquiunk



The first time I've heard about his being capable of anything. Whatever he has been involved in the business world has been a failure. He did I understand excel in one endeavor and that is in getting drunk.

Acq, Please provide us with your perspective as to why you think GWBush is a "capable administrator?" c.i.

He's got a Harvard Business School degree, there have been no spectacular screw up in the administration of Government as there were in the first year of the Clinton Administration (example Les Aspin) bill get to Congress in a timely fashion, the mundane functions of his office go smoothly. That does not take a rocket scientist. What does not work is the core function of his office, his world view. It is his philosophy of what government, and what it should do that is a disaster. Clinton was the reverse. Everyone I know that had anything to do with his presidency complained about his work habits, and organization but in the broader sense he knew what he was doing, Bush does not.

Possibly because of the secrecy with which the administration conducts its business we don't know, as they say, the half of it. One thing I have heard about his governing style here in TX is that he's good at putting people together to make things happen. He's a good delegator. And he seems (as I've said before) to be nice to his dogs. There -- I've said everything positive about him that I can think of!

A distinction must be made between the administrative function of the presidency and it's philosophical or governing function. Many people disagree with his philosophy, where he is trying to lead the nation, and therefore write him off as a dunce. Anyone who gets into Harvard Business School is no dunce. As a result he has been living off that misperception politically for years. He is a disaster as a president but that does not negate the fact that he knew how to get there, and play dirty when the chips were down. He is continually underestimated and we are now suffering the results of that underestimation. As I said he would be a good assistant secretary, i.e. a high-powered clerk.

Acquiunk
That daddy paid for.

If that means he knows how to call a meeting I guess I will have to go along with it. I understand he even starts off his meetings with a prayer session to his God. At that point I expect his brain, what there is of it, shuts down and he goes into a stupor.

Acq, Many question GWBush's Harvard business degree; whether he earned it or his daddy bought it. I'm not so sure we'll ever find out the truth. c.i.

I had a friend who was at Harvard Business School in a non fauclty academic position for more then ten years. You can not buy that degree, nor can you buy your way in. That does not mean the GWB was one of their stellar graduates, but he got through. If we keep dis'ing him like this we will be suck with him for another four years.

That should have been "stuck" not suck (Freudian slip).