Africa moved me, says Laura Bush

[sabra]

<<SNIP>>
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=68&art_id=vn20050717142920847C557718

Africa moved me, says Laura Bush

American First Lady Laura Bush heard a Rwandan girl tearfully describe raising her three young brothers, their father killed in the 1994 genocide and their mother dying of Aids.

She saw kilometres of South African shanty towns crowded in the shadow of Cape Town's wealth. She met women risking ostracism by flaunting their HIV-positive status as the only way to make inroads against the disease that is crippling Africa.

Moved by the orphans and many others she met on a weeklong trip, the First Lady said on Friday she would try to make sure the United States kept its promises to the world's poorest continent.


<</SNIP>>

[billybob537]

1. I'm so touched

It's too bad they don't have any oil, we could go in and liberate.

[babsbunny]

8. When you get to her age

it is a little hard to have a "movement":rofl:

[yorkiemommie1]

29. i am her age

and cannot believe how shallow this sounds.


edited to add; " I'll bet she's forgotten about it already. "

[DELUSIONAL]

47. We were thinking along the same lines

she is married to an empathy-less (zero empathy moron) -- it's doubtful she has any more empathy than he does.

So she had to visit Africa in order to go to the bathroom.

[saigon68]

49. Africa moved my bowel, says Laura Bush

A colonic of bitter vetch.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

2. Ask her how much her hubby donated to the Tsunami victims.. and

ask her how much several hundred billion could have done for those orphans... not to mention how much is going to have to be spent on our returning amputees, psychologically scarred and forever changed Iraq massacre II veterans.

[tjdee]

3. Like she's going to say "Those people were so whiny!"....

:eyes:

I'm sure they moved her all right...moved her right back to her mansion in DC.

[marmar]

4. I hate to be mean...

but Laura Bush comes off to me as completely vapid and intellectually vacant. (Which I suppose makes her the perfect match for her hubby).

[barb162]

19. That's why she's into children's books; she never advanced

beyond that.

[Jara sang]

32. Why are all the Republican first Ladies into children's books?

Laura Bush, Barbara Bush, Lynne Cheney. I guess they see it as another untapped resource. It's always about the Benjamins

[livinginphotographs]

53. Off-topic, but what is that picture from?

That is heartbreaking.

[libnnc]

25. "Africa moved me" says Miz B.

I guess she'll have to up her dosage. Can't have the First Ninny actually FEELING anything now, can we?

Yeah, I'm mean too. I have no patience anymore for vapid, intellectually vacant, enabling women.

[struggle4progress]

50. I hear she was better before she hooked up with Snow Snorter. eom

[geckosfeet]

51. Oh goodness,,, you are being charitable to the poor thing,,, n/t

[Libby2]

5. I think she's touched period n/t

n/t

[Eurobabe]

Too bad we can't move YOU

and your moron idiot boy king to a nice patch on the Serengetti.

[Divernan]

6. Her husband is the reason US hasn't "kept its promises"

And it's a disgusting state of affairs when the US (Bush) makes promises for the immediate publicity and campaigning for the black vote, as in the millions promised to Africa for AIDS relief, and then does not keep those promises. Ever heard the expression, "My word is my bond", Laura? She inadvertantly admits by this statement that she knows her husband does not keep his promises.

Puts me in mind of Robert Frost:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep,
Miles to go before I sleep.

[EFerrari]

9. Hmm. The Bushes always put me in mind of another one:

Provide, Provide

The witch that came (the withered hag)
To wash the steps with pail and rag
Was once the beauty Abishag,

The picture pride of Hollywood.
Too many fall from great and good
For you to doubt the likelihood.

Die early and avoid the fate.
Or if predestined to die late,
Make up your mind to die in state.

Make the whole stock exchange your own!
If need be occupy a throne,
Where nobody can call you crone.

Some have relied on what they knew,
Others on simply being true.
What worked for them might work for you.

No memory of having starred
Atones for later disregard
Or keeps the end from being hard.

Better to go down dignified
With boughten friendship at your side
Than none at all. Provide, provide!

[greekspeak]

7. So NOW it is OK to feel bad for non oil producing Africa cuz Pickles says?

I am so glad that her precious little heart was thawed a little by seeing how most of the world lives. Maybe she will talk to her hubby and he will fix everything. Nah. Just another thorazine laced shake and back to Happy Stepford Bubble with Pickles. We are at war with terra! We haven't got time to fix all those AIDS ridden homosexuals down there! Africans shouldn't be gay if they don't want AIDS. AIDS is God's curse on queers, you know.

[smirkymonkey]

10. So, what? Was sending the lovely first lady and her spawn over

to Africa supposed to be in lieu of financial aid. Wow, I bet the African people are forever grateful.

[mom cat]

11. Sentimentality won't change a damned thing..nor will your hubby. They

always use the plight of Africa to try to get a bounce by attempting to look caring.The sweetness of the moment never translates into meaningful change. Never!.
If any change comes it will be an escalation of devastating neo-liberal financial strangleholds on the country and greater access for rapacious corporate pillagers to suck the continent even more dry, all in the name of "development"!

[cap]

12. so how are you and your husband planning on raping Africa???

there's nothing humanitarian about either one of you.

[bushisanidiot]

13. Translation: African Americans should vote repuke cuz Laura "cares"

and got her pic taken with some kids in Africa.

yeah right.

it was a KKKarl Rove orchestrated photo op.

[madrchsod]

14. if you are so moved laura,

why don`t you move out of the whitehouse? it`s your husbands handlers and their descendent's that have created the problem .please laura,go back to the whitehouse and take care of your baby.

[clydefrand]

15. It's about fucking time she got moved over something! Maybe

she and that dumb ass husband she's married to and their millionaire status could possibly be moved enough to help out some poor woman/child/man?

I've always wondered if she has ever looked beyond her own wealth to really see what is in this world. Now I can see that she hasn't. If she had, she would have known the condition of their lives in Africa before now.

[leesa]

16. Suppose she picked out her new fur coats?

[zara]

17. Go have a cigarette; you'll get over it soon.

[cap]

18. something is quietly going on in Africa

and not just with Laura
The military and USAID are joining forces on delivering aid. Now, where is the corporate connection on this one... these people dont do anything remotely appearing nice unless they can scam the system.

http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=30411

[cap]

21. More stuff on military cooperation in Africa

We are starting to put troops down there.

http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/jfq_pubs/0537.pdf

[bahrbearian]

22. Chimpy pledged Billions of our tax dollars, don't you think

he deserves a cut ?

[barb162]

20. she meant she went to the washroom?

[LSK]

23. How did she like the French yellowcake mining operation in Niger? n/t

[Gregorian]

24. Go to Iraq if you really want to be moved.

Lots of dead and dying children. And almost no medical help. Cluster bombs; Napalm; Depleted uranium; Sanctions that kept all help from getting to the people. There's a hell of a lot to be moved about there. No, you say? Can't be bothered? Too profitable?

[VegasWolf]

26. So moved that she had to buy $100,000 in native African trinkets

just to decorate the WH.

[Demeter]

27. Just Not Far Enough!

[AngryOldDem]

28. Reality bites n/t

[ChairmanAgnostic]

30. I am confused

Wasn't Laura shocked by other things in the past, like visiting our soldiers and shot-up vets in the VA hospitals, just a few months ago? Didn't you notice how much better VA funding and medical care for soldiers became?

I am sure that we will seem the same success in Africa.

The only breaking news was that she was allowed to go off message.

[rexcat]

31. More than likely when LB returns to the US...

she will forget about what she saw. Nothing is going to be done in any substantial way as far as US aide to Africa. It is too bad LB missed the point about the woman with AIDS. When her husband was killed in 1994 she more than likely had to turn to prostitution so she and her family could survive.

One disturbing thought comes to mind. We have not given much aid to Africa, even during Democratic control of the WH.

[Lefty48197]

33. Laura Bush - Searching for a legacy?

Laura, your legacy has already been scripted. You are the one that sat by like a Stepford wife and said nothing while your husband stole an election, and thus overturned American democracy. You did nothing while your husband started an unnecessary war, killing thousands of innocent people, including American soldiers, the same troops that your party claims to support.
Please don't pretend that there is a kind bone in your body, Laura. You are every bit as bad as you husband, and you will go down in history being hated every bit as much as he is.

[Gin]

34. Being "MOVED: means...she had been constipated...while in Scotland..

and then....during her trip to Africa...she was cured...ergo...she was moved!
Nothing more..Nothing Less.

[ewagner]

35. I'm going to go against the grain here

Like most of us here, I think Laura is a pretty simple person. I think she's been accustomed to just living the good life with George, trying to raise two daughters and being dragged out of the closet for photo ops from time-to-time.

But, unlike a lot of others, I don't think Laura is as evil as her husband. I do think she turned her brain off some time ago as a price for being part of the Bush dynasty...maybe she picked up on the tricks of the trade of being a politicians wife along the way.

Having said that, I think the trip to Africa may have been a true education for her. I think maybe she was "touched" by what she saw but I doubt that Dubya will listen to her if she actually tries to influence him. In fact, if she steps "out of her place" he'll put her back in her place in no uncertain terms.

Her life may be a living hell for the duration.

[cliss]

36. I'm moved by Laura Bush -

I can feel something moving at the tail end of my intestines.

[WhiteTara]

37. she looks like she has needed to have a movement

for years. I don't believe that her heart was touched, she lives with chimpy and therefore everything she says and does is very suspect IMO

[angryxyouth]

38. Laura were you moved?

Did you apologize to them for this country's inaction. Did you educate any of them about safe protected sex. Were you also moved by the Iraqi children who have been killed, mutilated, left orphaned by your husband's actions. Did the children with birth defects caused by the depleted uranium bombs move you. What moves you more suffering brown children or suffering black children. Do the suffering poor white children in this country move you, because ya know, they are suffering more now because funds which could help them are being spent to make the children in Iraq suffer more. Will you be moved when our vets come home, and their children are born with birth defects due to depleted uranium cell damage. Are you moved enough to actually do something and make a difference? No? Then FUCK YOU!!!

[gulliver]

39. Maybe the mother wouldn't have AIDS had condoms been ...

... promoted more. By trying to put a compassionate face on Bush Administration incompetence and religious fanaticism in dealing with AIDS, Laura is helping to kill the people who "moved" her.

<snip>

Bush's plan calls for an "ABC" approach to HIV prevention -- which stands for abstinence, "be faithful" and condom use -- but the administration is stressing the "A." In its first year, PEPFAR spent more than half of the $92 million earmarked to prevent sexual transmission on promoting abstinence programs. Studies show that such programs actually increase risk by discouraging contraceptive use. What's more, focusing on abstinence and monogamy ignores the reality facing young women and girls in Africa and other impoverished regions, who are often infected by wandering husbands or forced to have sex in exchange for food or shelter. Among fifteen- to twenty-four-year-olds in sub-Saharan Africa, studies show, more than three times as many young women are infected with HIV as young men.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/_/id/7371950?pageid=rs.Politics&pageregion=single1&rnd=1121626804861&has-player=true&version=6.0.12.1059

[Algorem]

40. "Seein' all them n------- really made my gas-pedal foot twitch."

[LynnTheDem]

41. ut only for a short time, eh Laura? Like the women in Afghanistan, WORSE

OFF now than when they "moved" you in 2001. And ya don't give a flying fuck about them now.

[wildcat78]

42. Mexico moved me too...

When I was in Cancun, I has some serious movement from Montezuma's revenge!

Laura: "Oh George, is there anything we can do for those people in Africa?"

GWB: "We already pillaged that continent. There's nothing left for us there. Let them eat cake!"

[sakabatou]

43. So Mrs. Bush how did it move you?

To tears? To forgiveness? BS. You were never moved by suffering ever.

[daleo]

44. They are hauling out Pickles again.

Polling on the Rove fiasco must be very bad.

[LisaL]

45. If Africa moved Laura, why doesn't Laura move to Africa?

And takes George with her?
:shrug:

[Piperay]

46. 'Moved'??? What kind of 'move' most likely

a bowel movement that's the only kind the Bushes are capable of.:hurts:

[Alpharetta]

48. Liar. Ever since she killed her boyfriend she has remained unmovable

Clouded for 40 years in a haze of mindnumbing drug dependency to avoid the guilt she feels for crashing her car into her boyfriend's and killing him, she can't feel a thing.

[Arkana]

52. Moved her where?

Cause I know it didn't cause any swell of pity in her vodka-and-Xanax soaked brain.

[Alien8ed]

54. Enough To Move There, Perhaps?

No?

Oh, golly, I'm terribly surprised and disappointed.

... or at least terribly disappointed.

[livinginphotographs]

55. Yeah, moved her back to her mansion in the US.

Yawn.