With the neos about to become cons and the shouts of “next year in Tehran” getting fainter and fainter, I’ve been trying to find a nugget that succinctly summarizes George Bush’s behavior throughout his life, I came across the following.
From John Avalon’s book INDEPENDENT NATION, comes this paragraph on page 422 (I’ve added the material within the parentheses):
“With the South Carolina (2000) primary coming down to the wire, the candidates (Bush and John McCain) met for another televised debate. Before it began, Bush walked up to McCain with his hand outstretched, an apologetic look on his face. “John,” he said by way of explanation, “it’s politics.” “George,” McCain replied, shaking his head, “everything isn’t politics.”
Bush was apologizing for the scurrilous campaigning by so-called evangelicals and Bush devotees (people associated with Bob Jones University and others) who had whispered and intimated that McCain was mentally ill due to his time as a POW in North Vietnam but much, much worse–that McCain’s wife was a drug addict and that McCain’s adopted child was actually from a liaison with a black prostitute.
Attacking an opponent’s wife and child–yes, how low can you go?
The answer for George Bush has always been: as low as necessary.
Unfortunately, that has always been the sole measuring stick regarding the taking of action in George W. Bush’s life.
Bush had just lost to McCain in the New Hampshire primary, was desperate and South Carolina was a must-win-or-shut-down-the-campaign proposition.
Was Bush’s apology actually an attempt to throw McCain off kilter by angering him prior to the debate? Who knows? Maybe it was sincere.
But the McCain bashing demonstrates the morality, integrity and character, or lack thereof, that George Bush has demonstrated throughout his life, evident in both his Jack Daniels-juiced and Jesus-in-my-heart periods.
And the uber heavy-handed tactics utilized against McCain bear a striking resemblance to the savaging of Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame.
Remember the motto: as low as necessary.
One of Bush’s Harvard Business School instructors, Yoshi Tsurumi, related in a September, 16, 2004, Mary Jacoby-written Salon.com article, that the 20-something Bush displayed pathological lying habits back then, denying statements he had just made and then starting whispering campaigns slurring other students who had challenged him in class.
Denying responsibility? Separating oneself from certain behavior? Sounds familiar.
Drunk driving. Not completing his National Guard duty. Other irresponsible personal and professional behavior.
Then there is the incident where Bush was peeved at journalist Al Hunt in 1986 and screamed that he (Hunt) was a “fucking son of a bitch.” This took place in a restaurant where Hunt was dining with his wife, journalist Judy Woodruff and their then 4-year-old son.
Okay, you say, this could all be attributed to the madness of George Bush’s alcoholism and that he has enjoyed a long period of sobriety, embraced Christianity.and turned his life completely around.
I counter with, then I would expect that he live as best a Christian life as possible, abiding by the morality emanating from the 10 Commandments, the life and teachings of Jesus and the like.
Is there such evidence?
Just where are the scruples in the post-sobriety, post-Jesus-in-my-heart attacks on McCain and his family?
Where is the evidence of George Bush ‘living Jesus’ in bringing into his inner circle an inveterate low life such as Karl Rove, someone who rejects any moral compass?
Why did George Bush decide he needed to have someone such as this, someone with such prominent moral failings, directing his professional life?
The same Karl Rove who was fired from the 1992 presidential campaign of George H.W. Bush for planting a false story about a fellow Republican campaign member.
The same Karl Rove who was ready, willing and able to paint a respectable judge, devoted to bettering the life of youth in Alabama, as a pedophile.
The same Karl Rove who did his utmost to taint Bush opponent, Texas Governor Ann Richards, as associating with and appointing lesbians to government positions.
Let’s see. Is all this in Corinthians? Maybe Leviticus?
No, but this is the one constant thread throughout George Bush’s ENTIRE drunk or sober life: morality is relevant, useful when necessary, ignore it otherwise.
That’s the affinity, the marriage made in Hell, that he and Karl Rove share–doing whatever is needed to ensure success.
Through his actions, George Bush, as did Pilate, washes his hands of any truths, denies that truth is of the earth, that it is not to be received and righteously obeyed,
He washes his hands of anything inconvenient.
Remember the motto: as low as necessary.
