Bush to Middle East leaders: 'Thanks for coming''...and then he left

And Perino calls this 'fully engaged'. :wtf:


Bush to Middle East leaders: 'Thanks for coming''
Posted at 3:34 PM


by Mark Silva

ANNAPOLIS -- "Thanks for coming,'' President Bush told the leaders of Israel and the Palestinian Authority, representatives of Saudi Arabia, Syria, the Sudan and some three-dozen other nations represented at today's Annapolis Conference.

And then Bush was gone.

The president, who has maintained that the United States will foster but not attempt to steer any of the peace-talks to which the Israelis and Palestinians have committed themselves today, did not even stay for lunch at the Naval Academy officer's club.

Bush shook hands and clasped Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as the three delivered promising speeches here -- all sounding a common refrain, that "the time is right'' for peace talks.

But 10 minutes after Olmert finished speaking, just after noon, Bush lifted off from the grounds of the U.S. Naval Academy in Marine One for a return trip to the White House. Abbas and Olmert, who met with Bush in the Oval Office on Monday, will return Wednesday for a followup before departing and opening talks which they have pledged to start next month.

"Thanks for coming'' -- Bush told the audience around the square table of Memorial Hall. He had met here with the two leaders beforehand, strode into the hall with them, and then he was gone. He returned to the White House for a meeting with Iraqi representatives and an interview with the Associated Press, in which he was certain to speak of today's achievements.

It was "a big event,'' White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said later in Washington. Tomorrow morning "is like the after-party.''

more...

http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2007/11/bush_to_middle_east_leaders_th.html#more

And "bringin" people together is not one of Georgie's forte's....

She said that? And this potentially historic summit is totally, like, a really "big event"?

Oh brother.

we're just supposed to trust her.

Maybe he didn't want to appear too Clintonesque.

They know he could fuggup a wet dream. So they thought it would be in everyone's best interest to get his pathetic dumb ass out of there as quickly as possible before he created any more animosity toward the USA than he already has.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=103&topic_id=323093&mesg_id=323093

oh and check out gratuitous's analysis here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=3079788&mesg_id=3080140

addressing the attendees and he sounded like it was the first time in his life he had pronounced the names of Ehud Olmert and Mahmoud Abbas. Embarrassing.

Business leaders were there having meetings and all Bush did is stick his head in doors and ask, "Everything all right?"

And for this he received kudos from the right-wing scream machine.