An excellent critique of *'s performance yesterday

Sidestepping on Iraq
hroughout his political career, George Bush has been famous for sticking to a few issues, and repeating a few well-burnished talking points over and over. Wide-ranging news conferences do not play to his considerable strengths, and as president, he has generally avoided them. But having decided to make a rare exception yesterday, Mr. Bush should have been able to come up with better responses to two big and obvious questions: why he ordered the invasion of Iraq and why he pushed for tax cuts that have left the nation sinking into a hopeless quagmire of debt.

Mr. Bush's vague and sometimes nearly incoherent answers suggested that he was either bedazzled by his administration's own mythmaking or had decided that doubts about his foreign and domestic policies could best be parried by ignoring them.

Mr. Bush will simply not engage the issue of whether his administration exaggerated the Iraqi threat in the months leading up to the American invasion. When asked whether the United States had lost credibility with the rest of the world since neither weapons of mass destruction nor a strong Al Qaeda connection had been uncovered in Iraq, the president veered off into a tour through American history and the difficulty of coming up with an Iraqi version of Thomas Jefferson. He then skidded to a halt with the announcement that "I'm confident history will prove the decision we made to be the right decision."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/31/opinion/31THU1.html?th

What Bush is all about.

"considerable strengths". Yeah, right. He's got the highest PAC man score...

I wish that when people say shit like that that they would give specific evidence to back it up.

The only thing I see is that Bush has "considerable weaknesses."

Was Bush's voice really trembling that badly or was it just the quality of the tape. He sounded scared to death to me (and with good reason).

I thought he just ooozed hostility. It's like he can barely contain his contempt for the lowly media flacks or his anger at being questioned at all. His whole attitude reeks of who do you think you are. To me anyway.

yesterday and I found him to be very nervous, and defensive but hell that is just me.

The reponse noted above, in which he rambled on with his second grade history lesson, did not, in fact end with "But I'm confident history will prove the decision we made to be the right decision." It actually ended, when the reporter tried to bring him back to the orginal question, with "You're through. John."

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030730-1.html

I was astonished by how disrespectful his teasing of the press was. Highly unprofessional ... I suppose he thought he was being cute and funny, but that sort of attitude gets pretty tiresome since he's no longer 6 years old!

he kept slurring his words, and falling (leaning) all over the podium.

Hi Deuts!!!!

:hi:

:loveya:

Why, I'm appalled you would say such a dastardly thing about our fine Mr. Bush.

:puke:

SHUDDER. Don't know what possessed me there. Hi, Catwoman! :hi: :loveya: too!

was trembling during a sound byte from south africa. yes he did sound scared ,i think he`s realizing he`s over his head....

he had the nervous little laugh he has whenever the going gets tough. He also made what I thought were some pretty inappropriate statements in his effort, I think, to not appear nervous.

And why shouldn't anyone question smirk as being totally and completely incompetent? If only we had a REAL media to expose his lies, deceit and idiocy instead of this complacent, boot licking, ass kissing bunch that pose as the media

Apparently, Timothy Noah of Slate Magazine thinks * screwed up too.

Link:
http://slate.msn.com/id/2086431/

(snip)
"...Some presidents are invigorated by adversity. George W. Bush is said to have matured markedly and taken the tiller firmly in hand after the Sept. 11 attacks. Chatterbox doesn't really believe this alliterative hooey about Bush, but others do. Still, if today's press conference is any guide, President Bush most certainly does not handle political adversity especially well..."

"...Bush has never been good at press conferences. But he was unusually bad today, particularly at handling retrospective questions about the war in Iraq and the justifications his administration gave for waging it. The questions were far from hostile..."
(snip)

Piss-poor leadership, in a nutshell.


:evilfrown:

corrupt powerbrokers that put him into office illegally is his only 'strength'.

on how W avoids answering and the press allows him to
http://bartcop.com:
Ex:
 It's like:
 Reporter: "Mr. President, why did we invade Iraq?"

 Monkey:  "If you're asking if the world's a better place without Saddam, the answer is yes."

on some kind of speed. Seriously.

does. And he goofed up the African names and gave up after screwing them up several times. He did a parody of himself.