Dakota

Imminent

Has anyone ever said that they are ashamed of our President? The Group that runs him, let him loose on Meet the Press, (they must be really desperate) and his media training failed him badly. Media training is answering any question asked with one of five (probably the list has to be pared down for the President) prepared answers. If you listen for that, you will see how it works. "Mr. President, how are your daughters handling their drinking, now that they're twenty one? Are you concerned that they will have an addiction problem like yours?" "Thank you for asking, Helen. Since we are at war, I must put familiy concerns aside and focus on -----------------fill in the blank.

This is from his Meet the Press encounter. When questioned about the adminstration's reasons for going to war against Iraq because it was an imminent threat, W, without his group for once, responded. "I believe that when we see a threat, we deal with those threats before they become imminent. It's too late if they become imminent. It's too late in this new kind of war." That's embarassing. Think about how Yale must feel. The Group that runs him has to tell him not to improvise.

George W. projects his own internal aggression onto others. What he sees as imminent is distorted, and the group that runs him takes advantage of that. Too bad he has so much power and can get us all killed with his projections. Paul O'Neill of the "blind man in a room full of deaf people" fame says that he never knew a president to be so intellectually incurious and disinterested in the materials presented to him. I guess the man has alot going on in his own head.
I'd love to see his Rorschach.

Addendum: Excerpt from Robert Kuttner's editorial February 11, 2004

"Under firm but respectful questioning, Bush wilted. He couldn't explain his constantly shifting rationale for war with Iraq or why he was permitted to quit National Guard service eight months before his hitch ended or why his deficit goes ever deeper in the red or the dismal job creation record on his watch.

The result was not just that Bush came off looking evasive and defensive; worse, he looked feeble. You can't very well wrap yourself in national security threats -- Bush kept calling himself a "war president" -- and then look like a weakling. If the United States is indeed facing permanent terrorist threats, then Americans want a plausible leader.

The Bush spin machine has tried to depict the interview as a triumph. But in yesterday's New York Times, Bush loyalist David Brooks devoted an entire column to what Bush should have said (if only he were as clever as Brooks). You don't write a column like that when your guy did well."

Feeble. A very good description.

Posted by Dakota at February 8, 2004 07:38 PM