Faith in Bush: It's almost like being in LOVE? (a la Matthew Dowd)

[Sparkly]

Perhaps this explains the irrationality of Bush supporters?

“It’s almost like you fall in love,” he said. “I was frustrated about Washington, the inability for people to get stuff done and bridge divides. And this guy’s personality — he cared about education and taking a different stand on immigration.”

Mr. Dowd established himself as an expert at interpreting polls, giving Karl Rove, the president’s closest political adviser, and the rest of the Bush team guidance as they set out to woo voters, slash opponents and exploit divisions between Democratic-leaning states and Republican-leaning ones.

In television interviews in 2004, Mr. Dowd said that Mr. Kerry’s campaign was proposing “a weak defense,” and that the voters “trust this president more than they trust Senator Kerry on Iraq.”

But he was starting to have his own doubts by then, he said.

He said he thought Mr. Bush handled the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks well but “missed a real opportunity to call the country to a shared sense of sacrifice.”

He was dumbfounded when Mr. Bush did not fire Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld after revelations that American soldiers had tortured prisoners at Abu Ghraib.

Several associates said Mr. Dowd chafed under Mr. Rove’s leadership. Mr. Dowd said he had not spoken to Mr. Rove in months but would not discuss their relationship in detail.

Mr. Dowd said, in retrospect, he was in denial.

“When you fall in love like that,” he said, “and then you notice some things that don’t exactly go the way you thought, what do you do? Like in a relationship, you say ‘No no, no, it’ll be different.’ ”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/washington/01adviser.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

:eyes: ... I believe Rove, as well, talked about "falling in political love" with George.

[bklyncowgirl]

1. Did you ever see "The Last King of Scotland"? This reminds me of that movie.

A young, naive, Scottish doctor becomes a member of Idi Amin's inner circle. Charmed by the dictator, who is a huge Scotofile, and thrilled with the possibility of making a major contribution to health care in this poor African country, he remains blind to Amin's true nature.

The movie, of course is fiction. In real life it's hard to see how anybody could be that dumb. I could see Dowd in this role--swept off his feet by a charismatic leader in 2000. By 2004, however, he had to know the true nature of his president. If he really felt this way he should have not worked so hard to re-elect him and inflict four more years of George W. Bush on the country.

[alfredo]

9. Squeaky Fromm loved Charlie Manson.

[atommom]

2. All I can say is that * must make a different impression in public.

I have heard many stories about his charisma and charm, but I've never seen even a glimmer of that on TV. What is it, mind control rays? :shrug:

[opihimoimoi]

3. Bull Crap...Dowd was infatuated with power/ego/greed...now wants to clean up his act...

[trof]

4. What a day this has been

What a rare mood I'm in
Why, its almost like being in love

Theres a smile on my face
For the whole human race
Why, its almost like being in love

All the music of life seems to be
Like a bell that is ringing for me
And from the way that I feel
When that bell starts to peal
I would swear I was falling
I could swear I was falling
Its almost like being in love

[GCP]

5. I believe Rove's in love with him

...it was in Washington that Rove met the younger Bush. He fell, politically speaking, in love. "Huge amounts of charisma, swagger, cowboy boots, flight jacket, wonderful smile, just charisma - you know, wow," Rove recalled years later. In 1977, Rove was sent to Texas, in theory to run a political action committee, but according to one Texan political consultant who knew him at the time, "It was really to baby-sit Bush back when Bush was drinking".

Has been since day one - it sounds like he got an instant woody.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1165126,00.html

[Nay]

6. This isn't love. It's a power & greed fantasy of the "true believer"

Just read Eric Hoffer's book of the same name. He lays it all out. These people become like robots willingly, and underneath it all, the source is an all-powerful wish for personal power and unlimited greed.

[Bluedogvoter]

7. My opinion.

Some people just don't want to admit they got a bad deal. If they paid $100 for a sandwich that was made of dogcrap, they would claim it tasted good just too not let anyone know they got a bad deal.

Maybe its their way of being prideful.

[gratuitous]

8. In love with what?

Bush's stands on education and immigration? Holy smokes, talk about there's no there there. Bush never cared a whit about education, except to claim that he cared about it. When forced into it like a cow to the slaughterhouse floor, he might finally grudgingly accept some kind of change, and usually appropriate other people's hard work as his own; but an independent position? Hah!

Dowd's been a major enabler of this criminal regime, can see the handwriting on the wall at long last, and is now trying to justify himself after the fact. Mene mene tekel upharsin, motherfucker.

[leftofthedial]

10. all fascists share the experience of having been seduced

[Skittles]

11. anyone who ever saw "substance" in that piece of shit bush

really, REALLY needs therapy