the political climate

"It would have been funny if it hadn't been so terrifying, being in the power of these people who actually believed their own fantasies."

Bush goes to India. Gallant that he is.


There was some more "groovy street theater."

One 14-year-old boy even "died."



(Police estimated the crowd at 100,000. More photos here)

Digby:

I can understand why people may have intially thought that the guy just had to be smarter than he appeared in public because well.. nobody that dumb could possibly be president. It just defied reason. It wasn't long, however, before it became clear that the Republican Party had insulted our collective intelligence beyond our wildest imaginings by using sophisticated marketing techniques and every lever of institutional power at their disposal to install an idiot manchild in the oval office. (I came to believe they did it just to prove they could.)

After it was revealed that he had ignored the terrorism threat until 9/11 and then he continued to screw up everything that came after, any sentient being should have been able to see that what you saw in public was real: an arrogant, spoiled inarticulate man who didn't have a clue about how to run the most powerful country in the world...

Bush's entire life had consisted of trading on his father's name and failing at everything he touched. That is the legacy of this failed presidency as well.That John Dickerson is only now beginning to realize that Bush is exactly what he appears to be is nothing short of mind boggling.

This isn't entirely accurate. George also uses the dumb act as a Nietzschian umbrella. And as a signal of solidarity with cool kids (and members of his higher education generation) everywhere...in which appearing too studied and readily smart, much less proud of one's intelligence in its own right, is a serious faux-pas...also everyone loves an underdog, etc. But listen to Bush speak candidly to an audience of potential donors, and his easy eloquence is quite remarkable, if equally revealing of a committed ideologue (or an ideologue deserving to be committed, if you prefer).

The dialectics of Bush's acting were no doubt hard-wired since birth; that playing boring and dumb, rather than bearing one's ideologitry in one's eyes and smirk was far easier to make resonate with voters is hardly a revelation. It might as well be called the first rule of politics.


Steve wonders what an entire book of mistakes would be like.

Impeach this "President."