Bush The Fool: Shame on You

Sure, it's funny, even the toadies of the TV news were chuckling over it. But let's not laugh so long and hard that we don't notice what that moment really tells us. That gaffe did NOT reveal that Bush is simply stupid. In fact, it tells us something much more worrisome.

What was it that the president just could not bring himself to say? "Shame on me." The president could not say "Shame on me," not if his life depended on it -- an inability that's perfectly in character. Search all throughout the mammoth archive of his off-the-cuff remarks (and his scripted statements, too), and you won't find a single moment of self-criticism, self-doubt, ambivalence, or even open-mindedness or simple curiosity. You'll find a lot of pseudo-Christian boilerplate, but not a hint of genuine contrition. Hence, Bush's tongue went AWOL at the prospect of admitting error, weakness, or shame -- and so he had to quote The Who instead. [read more]

thanks to reading & writing

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Can't Fool Bush

I've captured from The Daily Show the clip of W struggling to say "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." Notice the look of abject fear as he realizes that he's going to muff it and it's going to end up on the news, and on damn fool weblogs.

And so it has. [read more]

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