Bush: "Well, I'm talking to you. You're a person."

[dajoki]

WP
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2005/12/12/BL2005121200655.html?referrer=email

Bush Talks About the Bubble

By Dan Froomkin
Special to washingtonpost.com
Monday, December 12, 2005; 1:39 PM

In a rare, one-on-one interview with President Bush this morning, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams showed the president the latest Newsweek cover , which depicts Bush trapped inside a big soap bubble, and asked if it's true that he's out of touch.

<<snip>>

Williams: "How do you wake up on a Monday morning -- I brought some visual aids, I have Newsweek and Time -- the cover of Newsweek, look what they've done to you. ' Bush's World; The Isolated President: Can He Change? '"

Bush chuckles.

Williams: "And inside Time, it says: ' Bush's Search for His New Groove .' Time Magazine says you're out there talking to people, and Newsweek says you're in here not talking to people. So what is the truth, Mr. President?"

Bush: "Well, I'm talking to you. You're a person."

Williams: "This says you're in a bubble, you have a very small circle of advisers now."

Bush: "Yeah."

Williams: "Is that true?"

Bush: "Uh."

Williams. "Do you feel in a bubble?"

Bush: "No, I don't feel in a bubble. I mean, you feel in a bubble in the sense that I can't go walking out the front gate and go shopping, like I'd love to do for my wife -- although I'm a man, I'm not going to tell you what I'm gonna buy her."

[Viva_La_Revolution]

1. Is that a quote?

Bush: "No, I don't feel in a bubble. I mean, you feel in a bubble in the sense that I can't go walking out the front gate and go shopping, like I'd love to do for my wife -- although I'm a man, I'm not going to tell you what I'm gonna buy her."

What the hell does being a man have to do with going shopping for your wife?

am I confused or just a little drunk?

[jobycom]

3. I guess you could be a little drunk...

How tall are you? :-)

(It's just really hard to take anything Bloodbath Bush says seriously.)

[dajoki]

8. i don't think it's you...

that's drunk, if you know what i mean. or could he be that stupid?

[Arkana]

29. Think of it as akin to "Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handey."

[Warpy]

4. Nah, you're not the drunk in this particular picture

Stupid obviously doesn't have a clue what the interviewer said to him, hasn't read the article, has no interest in finding out what it said, and doesn't care if nobody will tell him.

All he can think it means is that he's a public figure and can't go out without being recognized.

What a dope.

[No DUplicitous DUpe]

30. Warpy nails it.

"has no interest in finding out what it said, and doesn't care if nobody will tell him.

All he can think it means is that he's a public figure and can't go out without being recognized.

What a dope."

Yup

[bammertheblue]

11. I can't even begin

to make sense of that sentence above.
Maybe we're all drunk.

Maybe HE'S drunk!

[dajoki]

14. what has he done in ...

five years that has made any sense?

[John Q. Citizen]

16. Pilfered the treasury for his cronies. That ain't stupid. corrupt but

not stupid.

[Cha]

24. What's he done in

58 years that has made any sense or however the damn old he is?

[Skittles]

15. the stupid f*** did not understand the question

he is thinking literally - what an ass

[MiniMe]

18. That was my first thought nt

[Canuckistanian]

27. "talking to people"

It was meant in the sense of "talking to a lot of people from all walks of life and really listening to them, and maybe even responding to them"

It really wasn't a dodge.

He just didn't, doesn't and will never get it.

[dajoki]

35. "you talkin' to me"

:rofl:

[jobycom]

2. Did he specify which wife, since both Condi and Laura claim him?

[pinto]

5. Beavis and Butthead have some seriies competition.

:silly:

[dajoki]

50. "Dumb and Dumber"...

AND DUMBEST!!

[DesEtoiles]

6. MORAN!

[tuvor]

7. bush speaks like an eight-year-old.

Specialty: the bleedin' obvious.

[LizW]

19. He's "Rainman"

"Yeah."

"Uh."

[No Exit]

32. "10 minutes to Wapner" "9 minutes to Wapner"

Compare: "10 minutes to Alito"..."8 minutes to Alito"...

[guidod]

47. Very good...

LOL

[dajoki]

9. Williams: "Is that true?"

Bush: "Uh." WOW!!!!

[Supersedeas]

45. Competence Competence Competence Competence - thus, the bubble

[dajoki]

48. incompetence!!

[WindRavenX]

10. did he really say this?

Oh. Lord.

[dajoki]

13. what can you say?

there are no words to describe his lack of the slightest bit of wit and knowledge of any kind.

[rucky]

12. He's 12.

He reminds me of that Star Trek episode with the really big, powerful kid who wants the crew to stay and play with him.

[Carolab]

17. Oh, dear. STOP HIM.

"Once he gets past the midterm elections, Bush plans to introduce a concept that, if anything, is even more ambitious than his failed Social Security plan: a grand overhaul that would include not only that program but Medicare and Medicaid as well."

[dajoki]

36. my...

mother and mother in law already got screwed by that new program.

[Starbucks Anarchist]

20. I remember Brian Lamb from C-SPAN interviewing him.

It was for the Booknotes program, so Brian asked * what he reads.

* said (paraphrasing), "Well, I read the briefings my staff give me." Brian then said, "I meant what BOOKS do you read?"

:rofl:

[Cha]

26. ANd brian

whores for him.

[dajoki]

37. bwahahahahaha!!

[Mad_Dem_X]

21. Ladies & Gentlemen, the pResident of the Untied States...

Excuse me while I go bury my head in shame. :yoiks:

[dajoki]

38. it hurts...

to watch him, he is such an embarrassment.

[freestyle]

22. I shouldn't be able to be embarrased anymore, but damn.

I feel bad enough about all the blood on our collective hands even though I worked hard against this war. Then, to hear that idiot speak makes me cringe at the fact that this is what we present to the world, this mindless fool who is incapable of independent thought or clear speech unless it involves death. And to think, enough people voted for him to make it close enough to steal, twice.

[dajoki]

39. amazing, isn't it? n/t

[Lisa]

49. Yeah. I'm ashamed too, and I'm not even American ...

People from overseas say: "Canadian? Hey, don't you guys live next to ..."

I happen to live within sight of the US, and I swear that I looked over the Strait this morning ... and the landscape itself was blushing.

[atommom]

23. The more I see, the more there is not to like.

He's still a mean little frat boy.

"Bush may be the most isolated president in modern history, at least since the late-stage Richard Nixon. It's not that he is a socially awkward loner or a paranoid. He can charm and joke like the frat president he was. Still, beneath a hail-fellow manner, Bush has a defensive edge, a don't-tread-on-me prickliness. It shows in Bush's humor. When Reagan told a joke, it almost never was about someone in the room. Reagan's jokes may have been scatological or politically incorrect, but they were inclusive, intended to make everyone join in the laughter. Often, Bush's joking is personal -- it is aimed at you. The teasing can be flattering (the president gave me a nickname!), but it is intended, however so subtly, to put the listener on the defensive. It is a towel-snap that invites a retort. How many people dare to snap back at a president?

[Lisa]

51. that's it, exactly!

Bush uses his jokes to humiliate people and keep them in line. He's got a reputation for being self-deprecating (which feeds his "charming but modest" phony image) but most of the time he does NOT get a laugh at his own expense. Instead, he targets someone else, as punishment or just showing that he's the boss. He will only allude to personal flaws which he feels do not make him look bad, to his "base" (i.e. that he doesn't like to read books, and didn't get good grades in school). The serious stuff -- being inattentive, rude, or uninformed about important issues -- never gets mentioned, of course.

I have learned that one of the best ways to check a person's character, especially if you're trying to predict what they'd do in a position of power, is to look at what kinds of things that individual finds funny. The warning bells went off for me when I heard about an incident at Bush's Crawford property, late in 2000. He tricked a visiting reporter into drinking out of the creek, then told the guy that the water was contaminated. Another time, he pretended he was going to toss a football to another reporter, then lobbed it at his face so hard that the recipient was lucky to avoid injury. Nasty little pranks like that really show what kind of person Bush is.

In comparison, Al Gore's idea of a practical joke was to hide a weird object (a zucchini, I think it was) in colleagues' briefcases. A few times he noticed people sleeping on his plane, then had someone photograph him, apparently in the middle of giving an involved lecture, to the sleeping person -- and gave that person a copy. (The implication being that boring ol' Al Gore had put yet another listener to sleep -- so the joke was really on Al.) The type of person who prefers constructive/inclusive jokes is generally much more inclined to be creative and hardworking than the one who does bullying pranks like Bush. (Also, note the frequency of demeaning nicknames handed out by Bush ... he is a master of the backhanded compliment. Who would dare to complain? At his most daring, he will get away with things like talking about "hanging" a portrait of Martin Luther King Jr., right in front of Mrs. King ... that was definitely NOT an accidental mis-step, and I suspect he was snickering about it for weeks after.)

[gratuitous]

25. I like Williams' interview style

Keep asking the question until it's in a form that Stupidhead can answer. Cut out the damning answers (Yeah, I'm in a bubble with a very small circle of advisers) or the incoherent answers ("Uh.") and just go with the one answer he finally managed to spit out, even if it doesn't make any sense.

Jeez, why didn't NBC send a real journalist to ask Stupidhead some real questions?

[Nimrod2005]

28. OMG!!!

:wow:

[Loonman]

31. Bush is drunk or stupid

Or both.

[Uncle Joe]

33. Brian Williams is part of the bubble.

At the end of World War II, Hitler lived in a bubble. Hitler would look at maps and move Army divisions that had long since been destroyed, his Generals did not have the courage to tell him.

[XemaSab]

46. Apt analogy

The story that he's only talking to Bab, Pickles, Condi, and Karen Hughes is very similar.

[opihimoimoi]

34. That last sentence is SO REVEALING...his brain is ...TOTALLY FUCKED

[Lindacooks]

40. "Uh"??????? That's his answer??????

God, this piece of crap is not only the worst pResident ever, he's the worst PERSON ever.

[dajoki]

41. lets not forget...

DUMBEST!!!!

[Javaman]

42. yeah, right and none of those questions were screened or

written by the WH. Oh please, cut the shit with the feel good tour moron*, no one is buying it.

colossal racist prick failure*.

[dajoki]

43. yeah...

and he still can't answer them!!

[slampoet]

44. To quote Doonesbury

"Someone is stoned here. Is it me again?"

-Zonker 1986

[dajoki]

52. if it's you...

then we're all high.