Dick Cheney’s disdainful accountable-to-no-one air appeals directly to the coarsest of George Bush. The Vice President’s ‘stick it to ’em’ attitude towards the press, other politicians, rules and regulations feeds oxygen to Bush’s lifeblood, for to snub is the ultimate for this pair.
But for Cheney it’s simply a chosen operating style and not necessarily a psychological need. It’s different for Bush.
Famous for lording over others by passing out unglamorous nicknames to those he meets, Bush amply demonstrates the deficit of someone who needs to be first with a dig in order to demonstrate who is the alpha.
Bush’s remarkable condescension towards so many he encounters — worst example, “Yo, Blair. How are you doing?’ probably followed by the uninvited neckrub of German Chancellor Angela Merkel — is attributable to the mismatch of his swiss cheesed self esteem and his unquenchable need to be viewed, and therefore taken, as someone important. It is paramount for Bush to demonstrate that he is in charge and running the show and all others, anytime and anywhere, are simply subservient.
This despite the fact that his actions actually diminish his standing with both the individuals he inflicts his unwanted and unwarranted attentions on and the general public. It’s a compulsion, part of ‘you can’t take the frat boy out of him’ on display yet again and again.
Also, Bush’s inability to respond to Elaine Johnson — whose son, Army Spc. Darius Jennings was killed in Iraq — when she asked him to define the mission, is oh so telling. Bush’s ‘awarding’ of a presidential gold coin to Johnson and the family members of others who have lost relatives in Iraq, followed by the admonition ‘don’t go sell it on eBay’ is both remarkably callous and demonstrative of an unwillingness to confront the reality he has created. He ‘sticks it’ to the gathering for how dare he be pressed to justify his actions to anyone.
It’s well documented that Bush hated the elitism and snobbery, or what he perceived as such, exhibited by members of his fellow student body during his educational stints in the Ivy League. He was known for his out-of-place chewing of tobacco, the wearing of a bomber jacket and for mouthing but then denying calling such inanities as Social Security, labor unions, the Securities and Exchange Commission, Medicare and even the civil rights movement as socialism. Call him a contrarian but an undisciplined, lazy one
Inside, he knew he didn’t belong and hadn’t truly earned his place in a rigorous educational setting and probably didn’t wish to be there in the first place. It was George Bush the rebel in his mien and behavior but it was also George Bush situated as he was because of birthright — connections as a result of being from a family of East Coast Brahmins.
This is the epitome of the inner conflict haunting Bush his entire life.
But rather than confront such demons head on, he resorted to substituting high positions as personal validity.
Despite affirmations of such from his pals, George Bush has never felt comfortable in his own skin, being much more at war with himself for needing and using the connections available only to the elite to achieve his personal affirmatives.
The inner Bush is fascinating — a combustible mix of egalitarianism and oligarchy. A prime example: he brings an up-from-the-bootstraps individual such as Alberto Gonzales into his societal and political circle but — and this is key — always in a master to be served setting, never as equal. It is Bush to be attended to — always. It is those who should feel gracious for inclusion who must be at the ready to fall on their swords in service to the patriarch.
However, Bush’s relationship with Cheney contains an element of danger he has never previously encountered in the political arena. Bush was successful in building his resume as the governor of Texas because he partnered with the late Bob Bullock, a Democratic Lt. Governor who gladly did the heavy lifting but, and this is crucial, had no Cheney-ian alternative master plan.
Added to this is Bush’s desire to be a no-or-very-few-questions-asked, all pertinent information on one sheet of paper, CEO-type president, combined with not being one of the hardest of workers — the multiple Bush reiterations of ‘…it’s hard work’ are so telling. — created a void gladly filled by Cheney and his minions.
Cheney has insightfully played to Bush’s weaknesses, offering implied subservience but all the while conducting his back channel operations.
So, despite the similarities in the Bush-Cheney mindsets and comradeship in enjoying the denigration of and lording over others, Bush badly miscalculated — what else is new? — about the Cheney darkside — that which involves operating a parallel administration.
But now they are hooked together through a nefarious web of subterfuge and lies, in need of and dependent upon each other. Each holds too much evidence on the other. It’s a marriage made in hell and absolutely deserving for the duo but we, as the uninvited wedding guests, remain prisoners of their shotgun matrimony.
