Bush Team Angry about "West Wing" — say they "feel like suckers"

Bush Team, West Wing at War Again

White House and GOP insiders say they feel like suckers after falsely believing President Bush 's re-election would be met with acceptance from Hollywood. Their tip: Last month's West Wing episode in which the Alan Alda character blasted pols who use religion for political advantage. "Just when Hollywood was trying to get back in our good graces," said one insider, "they used that offensive script." Bushies think the script was targeting their boss. But Lawrence O'Donnell, a former Democratic Hill staffer, tells us he was just writing a good story, and he adds that the Alda character is a Republican presidential candidate. Then he let Bush have it. "If the White House worries that when that subject comes up it is somehow aimed at the president, well, you know, who told them to use religion in campaigning so much?" asks O'Donnell. "There's no one in our modern political history who has used his religiosity more deliberately and actively and falsely in campaigning than George Bush, second only to . . . Bill Clinton ."

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/politics/whispers/articles/050411/11whisplead.htm

They don't like it when the shoe fits, huh? Bwaaahaaaahaaaa! "They use that offensive script." God, that's rich.

We'll levy some taxes on those liberal bastards!!

Sure Clinton was bad - but you're worse.

for the bushies* to me. In relation to shrub* by what percent would you rate that Clinton grandstanded with religion as a pure campaign tool?

ON a scal of 1- 10, bush* rates infinity, Clinton would rate...? Would he even show up on the scale?


EDIT: In subject change "scapegoating" to "blameshifting" and that's more what I mean.

NOT.

>White House and GOP insiders say they feel like suckers after falsely believing President Bush 's re-election would be met with acceptance from Hollywood.<

Ohhh, this is so funny, I can't stop laughing. :rofl:

Let's see here. Their party's been coopted by the worst of the "gosh, it's okay because we're FORGIVEN," crowd, and they don't like having their BS reflected back at them? Newsflash to the RNC: We don't like you. Hollywood is the least of your problems after the Terri Schiavo fiasco.

This is the funniest thing I've read in a week.

Julie

They just want to APPEAR to care so they can pander to the fundie base.

Remember, fundie votes help get them "elected" so they can do their real work -- make the world safe for corporate plunder.

nt

give a Shit about what they think!

Bush is concerned about how Hollywood thinks about him, yet 90 percent of the world hates him and he doesn't give a shit. Hmmm. I'm going to take a break and mull that one over a bit.

I thought they hated those "Hollywood Liberals".

Anyone who thinks Alan Alda, as fine an actor as he is, could stretch to being a convincing Neo-COn Regressive RW-er is deluding themselves.

TC

>Hmmm. I'm going to take a break and mull that one over a bit.<

Is anyone besides me wondering if someone in the White House press office drank their lunch before issuing THIS statement?

Julie

I'm so happy it's happy hour.

Everything the Bush* Cabal does is quite simple in fact that is the secret of their success. It is all so basic. In fact so basic that most Americans who are looking for ulterior motives and great deep thinking behind their actions can't grasp it. Propaganda Propaganda Propanganda. It doesn't get much simpler than that.

:rofl:

during the campaign?

Clueless...fucking clueless.

And anyone who actually watched that episode would have seen a sympathetic Republican character.

But when you are guilty, everything that even remotely points to you or your behavior Would Seem Like an Attack, I guess.

:eyes:

"Oh, we're just poor victims here; feel sorry for us 'cause we're in control of everything and somebody doesn't LIKE US! WAAAAAAH."

Fuckin' WAH.

:P

These guys are NOT fast on the up-take.

Bozos.

for a number of reasons. Usually, the story line meanders through several subplots until it ties back to the original theme -- some of the best scripting on tv. I enjoy watching the reruns nearly as much as the new episodes and have earmarked Monday night for "Marathon" night.

I particularly like how they'll take relevant current topics to spin a tale. Sometimes, West Wing is more relevant than the news as it does a good job of background fill-in to try and bring a story to life.

There has been many a story that seemed to take aim on the current White House or Congress.

As much as I like Martin Sheen as the President, I also like that they're moving the story along through an election and will have a new President installed.

It's a shame when a television show that includes the warts and defects of the individual players is more relevant and interesting than the real White House. Perhaps, if an alternative West Wing were written with the paranoid machinations that seem to be occurring, it would be what we really need to see.

Give us GWB in caricature with all of the slimy Repukes portrayed in their glory. THEN, the WH might have something to complain about in Hollywood -- or would have to clean up its act.

There's a whole world out there and this is the stuff the White House cares about?

Shut up and switch your TVs off, assholes. You've got a Social Security System to destroy.

"Don't they have a country to run?"

Shouldn't there be an "i" in run?

Yeah. Nobody has ever used religion to further their own agenda. That has never happened in the history of the world. :sarcasm:

... that operates top-down like the GOP. How completely delusional to expect "Hollywood" to somehow all praise GW after the election.

N/T

I guess they thought by winning the election (and I use that phrase lightly), they were also defeating Hollywood. Dimwits, all of 'em, I say!

Wait till they find out that THERE ARE NO F'IN WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION IN IRAQ!! Morans!

in religiosity.

Since when do the networks have to run their scripts by the White House for their approval? Well, at least the non-"news" programs, that is.

Crybaby conservatives!

In the fictional world of the West Wing not only does a thoroughly loveable Hispanic Democrat win the Democratic party nomination but apparently an equally loveable moderate wins the Republican nomination leaving most Americans with a choice between two good alternatives and no one to hate.

The West Wing is a fantasy. In the real world, if a moderate Republican was foolish enough to diss the fundies the way he did he would have been targeted by the Right Wing wackos in your party and wouldn't have made it past the first southern primary without an organized drumbeat of the worst sort of aspersions being cast on his character and those of his wife and children.

Please Karl Rove, you've taken everything else away from us--at least allow us our fantasies.

It's a fictional TV show! They should get a grip. I bet the same crowd brushes off any complaints that scientists might have about that Michael Crichton book -- "settle down, nerds, it's only a novel".

That any deviation from conformity, no matter how small brings on such disbelief and quiet hysteria

What would BushCo have to bitch about without them! Alda did make a POWERFUL statement! Any real life candidate that made that statement and still went to church and was a decent human being regardless of party affiliation would INDEED win the White House in a landslide! Is Alda thinking of running?

BTW, when did Bill Clinton use religion? I can't say I remember him being particularly religious!

I believe that the psyche of Bush is so fragile that they have multi-level manipulation and handling going on. There is a possibility that the non-scholarly President is a big tv watcher (in addition to what we do know about him being a big video game player).

I believe that the protection they take to isolate him from dissentors is essential to his equilibrium. I believe he believes that everyone thinks that he is God's President on earth. If true, and he watches West Wing, it is understandable that they would go as far as they have with this WW episode feedback and accusation.

I am beginning to think that they have to keep him pumped up, i.e., keep his ego pumped up. In addition, they have to protect him from anyone he might think is disloyal so that he doesn't order some kind of revenge.

The thing about him not being a big newspaper reader, may be, in fact, a manuever to keep him away from papers.

What if we have a classic Shakespearean type situation here where all the castle goes along with the facade that he is great - just so, in his case, they can keep him away from mind relaxers which mess up his speeches and especially the Q's and A's and spontaneity, rationality, and articulation.

Just a theory.

a few rugs on the ladder.

:kick:

no problem consuming its products.

the dumber the story, the more those slack-jawed, mouth-breathing neanderthals will plunk down $8 to see it.

I'd have to say that they were putting forth the idea about what Republicans used to be and could be again. Alda's character comes off as a Republican that is his own man, with his own beliefs and values, unlike the 'goose steppers' today. Hell, even the West Wing staff on the show found themselves pausing when this guy made his acceptance speech. Maybe the show is trying to stoke the fires of any good Republicans that are left so they'll begin to rise up. I used to like the old Republicans when it was about governing and not power. You could have a useful dialogue then. Now, their so rabid, all you want to do is take em in the back and put a bullet in their brain(metephor not a real desire).

good grief, we NEVER get that sort of thing in the self-censoring media anymore.