Why George W. Bush didn’t support Trump in 2020
Jack Cashill asks why – considering the threat that the left represented in the 2020 election and Trump’s obvious successes in his first term – former president George W. Bush couldn’t bring himself to support Trump, or at least not to actively speak against him. Cashill believes that if Bush had come to Trump’s aid, Trump probably would have been re-elected.
Whether that is true or not we’ll never know. Cashill also doesn’t answer the question of why, although he does write:
As the weeks counted down to the November 2020 election, he was the Achilles sulking in his tent. The Achilles of legend, however, refused finally to see his own men slaughtered and joined the battle. Bush never left the tent. In betraying Team GOP, Bush, in effect, betrayed Team USA. From reading Dovere, one gets the sense he did not much care. Bush had a new team now, Team World.
After the events of January 6, 2021, Bush joined his new teammates for an end zone dance. Dovere reports, “Clinton, Bush, and Obama released coordinated statements decrying what happened.” Coordinated? Had the three released coordinated statements decrying the summer of mayhem the left inflicted on America, one might forgive Bush his complicity here, but they did no such thing.
The last the reader sees of George W. in the Dovere book is at the 2021 Inauguration of Joe Biden, an event at which he seems much too comfortable. Reports Dovere, “Bush leaned in to make a joke to Obama, and they both started laughing.” It gets worse.
I think I know what motivated Bush, though. It has three elements. The first is that Bush isn’t a conservative; he’s always had some leanings towards what, for want of a better word, I’ll call internationalism. So he probably disliked Trump’s trade policies. The second is that Bush also was not much of a verbal puncher during his term or after; he remained quite silent during Obama’s term, for example. I believe he’s old school enough to detest Trump’s general style and his verbal pugnaciousness in particular. That combativeness had turned personal in the 2016 campaign (and even earlier), when Trump not only attacked Jeb Bush quite viciously, but attacked George W. in various ways that must have stung so badly that it made it impossible in Bush’s mind to ever bury the hatchet.
I wrote about the situation back in October of 2015, in a piece I did for the online version of the now-defunct Weekly Standard. Old links to the article don’t work, but I preserved it in my own records. It was titled “An Old Animus,” and here are some quotes from it:
It’s no secret that Donald Trump has contempt for Jeb Bush, some of it well-earned. And Trump’s recent remarks pointing out that “the World Trade Center came down” during George Bush’s “reign” have been rightly seen as a way to needle and flummox brother Jeb…
But this was hardly an isolated incident of attack on George W from Trump. In fact, it’s one of
the milder things that Trump has said about the 43rd president over the course of many years, beginning long before either Trump or Jeb Bush were presidential candidates. Trump may have changed his mind on some things, such as single payer health care. When asked his opinion of people, he sometimes speaks in generalities, often saying “I like him/her a lot.” But one topic on which he’s been the soul of consistency and specificity since at least 2007 (and perhaps earlier) has been his extremely low opinion of George W. Bush…Trump’s criticism of Bush not only goes back many years, but it has often followed the leftist template rather than the pattern on the right. And although it’s Jeb he’s running against this go-round, the evidence is that there’s a rift between Trump and the Bush family that goes back to the 1980s, when George H. W. Bush the elder was president:
“Trump is open about his animosity toward [the Bushes]; he characterizes his relationship with former president Bill Clinton, for instance, as far closer. He lashed out at former president George W. Bush over the war in Iraq during his tenure. He turned on Bush’s father when he raised taxes during his term as president, despite pledging not to do so.”
The WaPo piece says that during their interview with Trump in August of 2015, “He found 33 ways to skewer the [Bush] family – about one put-down per minute.” One of those put-downs of George W. Bush was still another jibe far more typical of leftist taunts than of the right:
“He didn’t seem smart. I’d watch him in interviews and I’d look at people and ask, ‘Do you think he understands the question?’”
But the sharpest of Trump’s attacks on GW had occurred much earlier, in a series of interviews in 2007 and 2008, when neither Trump nor Jeb Bush was a candidate. For example, in a 2008 interview with Wolf Blitzer, Trump advocated Bush’s impeachment while adding how much he likes Nancy Pelosi:
“BLITZER: [What do you think of] Nancy Pelosi, the speaker?
TRUMP: Well, you know, when she first got in and was named speaker, I met her. And I’m very impressed by her. I think she’s a very impressive person. I like her a lot. But I was surprised that she didn’t do more in terms of Bush and going after Bush. It was almost – it just seemed like she was going to really look to impeach Bush and get him out of office, which, personally, I think would have been a wonderful thing.
BLITZER: Impeaching him?
TRUMP: Absolutely, for the war, for the war.”
In the same interview, Trump repeated the familiar “Bush lied about WMDs” mantra, and when Blitzer questioned whether he actually believed that, Trump repeated it:
“TRUMP:”Bush got us into this horrible war with lies, by lying, by saying they had weapons of mass destruction, by saying all sorts of things that turned out not to be true.
BLITZER: Their argument is, they weren’t lying, that that was the intelligence that he was presented, and it was not as if he was just lying about it.
TRUMP: I don’t believe that.
BLITZER: You believe that it was a deliberate lie?
TRUMP: I don’t believe it. The fact is that he lied.”
Later in the interview, Trump said that Bush was “is probably the worst president in the history
of the United States.”
That’s an awful lot to swallow; Ted Cruz managed to get past a lot of insults from Trump (including some to Cruz’s family), but what Trump said about Bush was considerably worse.
For the sake of the republic, it would have been good if Bush could have done stopped being a NeverTrumper in 2020. But I doubt most people could do it under the same circumstances, and at any rate, certainly Bush couldn’t or wouldn’t.
I don’t really think it mattered, though. I don’t think a Trump endorsement from Bush would have changed the results. If fraud occurred, for example, it would not have changed that. And I doubt there are many people following the lead of George W. Bush anymore, and so I doubt his endorsement or lack thereof had a chance of making a difference with a significant number of voters.
Does the person exist that thinks that if only George W Bush endorsed Trump I would have voted for him? Not likely.
W. should consider having a joint art exhibit with Hunter.
Although I doubt Jeb has ever slept with Laura.
George P Bush, son of the dreadful Jeb, seems to be the only member of the family with a clear head and a reasonable approach to politics, and he has hopes of becoming AG in Texas next year. The list of formerly at least somewhat respectable conservatives whose brains have been, without question, completely addled by TDS is long and melancholy to contemplate, including George Will, Mona Charen, Jonah Goldberg and too many others to count. Even Andrew McCarthy would appear to have lost his mind, if one considers, with logic and reason, his latest piece at NRO on January 6th (“infamy”, DJT’s “disgrace” etc.).
The reality of election fraud has been proved far more conclusively (using the standards of science) than global warming.
Remember that GW Bush is an alcoholic. Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic. A dry alcoholic is almost worse than a drunk. Only a child of an alcoholic can understand this, perhaps. Worse than Iraq was Afghanistan but Rumsfeld and Tommy Franks were right about Iraq. Flatten them and get out. When Bush appointed Bremer, it was like Kennedy assassinating Diem in Vietnam. It became a Chinese finger trap. I never understood the Bremer appointment. It was the fatal mistake.
Cashill is wrong. A good word from George W Bush would have been of interest only to a persuadable NeverTrump constituency. The trouble with his thesis is that there is no such constituency street-level and the Capitol Hill / K Street / Security state nexus wasn’t going to be persuaded by W. Republican voters were as satisfied with Trump as they were with Bush in 2004, Reagan in 1984, and Nixon in 1972.
A digression
I’ve noticed that Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale were pleased to be associated with Biden, at least for public consumption. Not letting that pass. I don’t expect them to make antagonistic public remarks about him personally, but I do expect them to speak truthfully about process issues. As far as I’m aware, neither of them did so when the situation demanded. And from May of 2013 to the present, the situation demanded. And they said nothing. Mondale has now shuffled off, having ignored some gross misconduct that never would have passed muster when he was a mid-career elected official.
And that’s my beef with the Bushes. When the situation demanded, they said nothing. Then, in 2016 and 2020, they were motivated by their personal hobby horses. Now, we discover that George W Bush has stirred from his 12 year long slumber and will be promoting…open borders. He would benefit us all by leaving public life completely.
Remember that GW Bush is an alcoholic.
I remember that, but it’s not relevant to matters under discussion.
George P Bush, son of the dreadful Jeb,
There’s nothing dreadful about Jeb; he’s a decent person with a problem child. He just harbors certain inane professional-managerial class attitudes, as John Derbyshire noted. In Jeb’s case, it’s the notion that Americans are lazy slobs and need leavening from immigrant streams. (Kevin Williamson, non-profit sector chiseler, offers a particular rude example of this mentality). Jeb’s too polite to put it that way; (or, Derb speculates, too obtuse to decode the logic of the positions he’s taken over the years).
including George Will, Mona Charen, Jonah Goldberg and too many others to count. Even Andrew McCarthy
I don’t think at this juncture they’re addled. They’re telling you something about themselves we didn’t know before. What they’re telling you injures their reputations, as it should.
“I remember that, but it’s not relevant to matters under discussion.”
Remember also that, while W is an alcoholic gone dry, Trump doesn’t drink at all as a promise to himself after watching his brother’s sinking and demise. I’m sure an alcoholic person’s mind might be wired a little differently than a non-alcoholic’s.
Yes, I believe it is relevant.
The Book of Proverbs says, “Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise.” How many decisions were misleadingly made because of the long-term after effects of alcohol in the mind, we don’t know and we never might.
How many decisions were misleadingly made because of the long-term after effects of alcohol in the mind, we don’t know and we never might.
But you’ve already concluded it did make a difference. (“Yes, I believe it is relevant.”). Are the characters in the State Department who drafted ‘The Future of Iraq’ plan all drunks? How about Richard Cheney?
I think DJT needs to be a verbal counterpuncher.
But there is a point beyond which it becomes unproductive and the impact on the mush heads (MEAN TWEETS!) is not offset by any improvement in standing or acceptance of policies.
In this blog post, Neo has reprinted most of her 2015 article on Trump vs Bush, but if anyone wants to read the original, here’s a link:
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/tag/donald-trump?source=%2Fweekly-standard%2Ftrump-vs-the-bush-family-an-old-animus
(Looks like “The Washington Examiner,” reprinted the article from “The Weekly Standard.”)
I supported George W. I believed at the time that Afghanistan and Iraq were necessary. He was a decent, though not great President. I even supported his silence during the Obama administration.
All that said, I slowly recognized that the Muslim world cannot be brought into the modern world. At least not until they reject Wahhabism. I’ve had my doubts about Trump and dislike his style. However, it seems to me that his take on America First and getting away from “The Pentagon’s New Map” version of international relations is a smart thing. Trump’s policies worked better than anyone since Reagan. Only people who carried a grudge against Trump would not see that. It’s pretty obvious to me that W. has carried a grudge against Trump and that made him willing to speak out against him – unlike his silence during Obama’s administration.
I agree that, if the election was stolen due to fraud, W.’s support would have made little difference. Only in a fair election process would his endorsement have made a difference.
I was astounded to see George P. Bush speaking out as an unflinching Trump supporter. I wonder how his relationship with his dad and uncle is going these days? It takes courage to be your own man in such a situation.
“including George Will, Mona Charen, Jonah Goldberg and too many others to count. Even Andrew McCarthy”
Art+Deco- “They’re telling you something about themselves we didn’t know before. What they’re telling you injures their reputations, as it should.”
What a great comment, and I think that it hits the nail on the head. Unfortunately, the same can be said for many others I used to admire, for example Mitt Romney. What a disappointment so many people I used to admire have become.
I’m sorry people, but do not be deceived by George P Bush making Trump-friendly comments and thereby believe him to be of acceptable character. Pay attention closely and see that he is a particularly corrupt and opportunistic cad in both business and politics. Hopefully the good people of Texas will see through him.
The Bush family promote a WASP establishment old school integrity story line that is just that, a story line. Careful examination shows that weakness of character is the commonality from Prescott Bush to GHW Bush to GW Bush to Jeb and his offspring. Their wealth and especially their connections allowed them to advance despite rarely having to display strength of character.
GHWB was shot down in the Pacific, and lost a daughter at a young age, but otherwise avoided the life tests that required true courage and determination. Ronald Reagan in his union days had to hold off and defeat Communists and otherwise put his popularity at risk for principles, and he could use that muscle memory many times later in his career. The Bushes were all shielded from those stark choices.
Bush 41 waffled on abortion and his tax pledge and was on the Saudi side rather than Israel. Bush 43 needed a Colin Powell to give him cover, but then threw him under the bus. Numerous conservatives and GOP politicians paid a big personal price to rally behind and support GWB when Iraq turned bad and his popularity tanked, and he never reciprocated the loyalty, further indicative of the family’s weakness and lack of character.
History will not be kind to the Bushes and their political machine. Time for the right and the country to move on from these opportunists and grifters.
I heartily voted for G.W. Bush both times, but by the end of his second term I was calling him a traitor for his seemingly open border policies. ( Some of his efforts towards real ID, as I understand it, may have been towards better security in the long run. I will give him that benefit of the doubt.)
I hesitantly voted for Trump the first time but by the second time, I heartily voted for him, his rough manners, not withstanding.
Religiously, I probably have more in common with Bush than Trump. But I would rather have Trump for President.
My take is the same as JJ’s with the one exception of “the Muslim world cannot be brought into the modern world. At least not until they reject Wahhabism.”
Wahhabism is just one sect within Islam. There are many more equally virulent and devout sects within Islam. More fundamentally, the devout sects hold Islam’s theological high ground, as “to be brought into the modern world” Muslims must reject both Muhammad and the Qu’ran. This is necessary because acceptance of Islam requires acceptance of Muhammad’s most basic and frequently repeated claim, that the Qur’an is a faithful transcription of Allah’s direct testimony, perfectly received and dictated by repeated visits to Muhammad by the Archangel Gabriel. As angels are perfect there can be no errors and as, fallible mankind is literally incapable of ‘correcting’ infallible Allah… not one comma can ever be changed in the Qur’an. So rejecting Muhammad’s claim destroys Islam’s theological foundations.
Bush the Lesser had his moments where he responded adequately to pressure. The WMD debacle was, I believe, a setup by the intelligence community, a gift for Democrats to ride BtL into the ground. But I always look to see what former public figures do when others are not watching, and in this, BtL gets high marks – greeting returning wounded troops and so on. But he needs to get completely out of the policy spotlight, and stay out. He wasn’t a visionary; he does seem like a pretty decent individual. But I can easily see why he wouldn’t be able to manage acceptance of Trump’s clear success as President, because Trump went down fighting where BtL conceded defeat.
Bush the Elder was, I thought, one of the last of the solid politicians who made the effort to really understand politics by serving in many, many different roles, a lot of them thankless; starting as a certified war hero. He gets higher marks than BtL in my book, even though he doesn’t get much credit.
Careful examination shows that weakness of character is the commonality from Prescott Bush to GHW Bush to GW Bush to Jeb and his offspring. Their wealth and especially their connections allowed them to advance despite rarely having to display strength of character.
The family isn’t big rich.
No clue how you got the idea that Prescott Bush showed ‘weakness of character’.
GHWB was shot down in the Pacific, and lost a daughter at a young age, but otherwise avoided the life tests that required true courage and determination.
He was a decorated combat veteran who volunteered at age 18. He moved to a region of the country where he was a stranger and started his own business. He remained married for 70-odd years and fathered six children. He went into politics avocationally and then professionally, choosing the then more challenging path of attempting to build a Republican organization in Texas. For all that he seemed flat-footed in political life, he landed in the President’s chair. Quit talking rot.
George W Bush had a number of business pratfalls over a period of 17 years. There was nothing notably untoward about Jeb’s career in business or in politics. He has one bad blemish in life, and that that is daughter is a mess.
One word…
Jeb!
A whole lot of people, generally moral and competent, are just not strong enough to stand up to the mob when the mob turns as ugly and vicious as the Democrats have become. Trump’s psychological strength is the most extraordinary thing I have ever seen. Can anyone name another person who has demonstrated that they could take the abuse that was heaped upon Trump? He not only handled it, but managed to be extremely successful with every powerful institution and special interest group in the country sabotaging and slandering him relentlessly.
Remember, no elected GOP’er including any Bush was ever willing to speak the truth about the corruption and dishonesty of the news media. Until Trump. The contrast of their cowardice is striking.
The popular kids in our national “high school” hate Trump and have done everything imaginable to ostracize and “other” him. Very few people had the guts and strength to stand up to them. Back in high school or today as adults.
Sorry, but a lot of the explanations from both Cahill and you feel a bit weak. And I say this as someone who supported and defended Bush quite fervently in his Presidency and the Obama years and still has some residual loyalty or even affection for him. Like him I am something of a Neocon and Internationalist. But his actions towards the Republican Party (and inaction) were repulsive to me.
But “if Bush had endorsed Trump in 2020 he probably would have won”? Not buying it. For starters this continues to ignore the endless issue of Voter Fraud that is continuously being substantiated. Now you MIGHT be able to argue that a Bush support might have given enough push to test even the Left’s vote rigging infrastructure to the limits and make the screwups so obvious Exposure and even persecution were unavoidable, but I am not holding my breath. Moreover it would have run the risk of alienating the isolationist wing of the party and anti-interventionist lefties like Greenwald. And as you have said I just don’t think there was much reason to believe that many people were persuadable.
But that doesn’t mitigate against TRYING.And Trump’s anti-Bush attacks were one of the things I held against him most, ditto chumminess with the Clintons. And while it might be easier to set aside as an observer rather than as the target, I also point nobody elected me to office to make hard decisions and eat $hit dealing with people I do not like for the greater good.
“ The first is that Bush isn’t a conservative; he’s always had some leanings towards what, for want of a better word, I’ll call internationalism. So he probably disliked Trump’s trade policies. “
While I am something of an internationalist myself and even (gaaasssp) a war hawk, the China Scam policies were one of the greatest US policy failures in the history of ever and badly in terms of needing correction. This is true even if it isn’t appealing for former Presidents taking sweetheart deals from those connected to the CCP but ey.
“The second is that Bush also was not much of a verbal puncher during his term or after; he remained quite silent during Obama’s term, for example. I believe he’s old school enough to detest Trump’s general style and his verbal pugnaciousness in particular. “
Ok, but that was also one of his greatest weaknesses and frankly Dubya could have used someone as outspoken and take no prisoners as Trump in his corner. Instead he conducted the office with “dignity” and let himself by torn apart by those without it. I still routinely have to smack down people peddling the “Iraq didn’t have no WMDs” or “Saddam wasn’t allied with AQ” or “No WaR 4 OIILLLL” nonsense.
“That combativeness had turned personal in the 2016 campaign (and even earlier), when Trump not only attacked Jeb Bush quite viciously, but attacked George W. in various ways that must have stung so badly that it made it impossible in Bush’s mind to ever bury the hatchet.”
Oh boo freaking HOOO.
I admit those remarks- and especially the reputation of the Left’s lies on Iraq- also infuriated me and were enough to make me consider sitting out the election of ‘08.
(Note: I was still NEVER going to support Clinton OR Sanders because I am not an imbecile or completely devoid of moral fiber. I was simply not going to support Trump).
BUT I TOOK A SECOND THOUGHT after the initial rage and realized that this was STILL better than allowing a corrupt usurper legally ineligible to hold the office of Presidency to ascend it. So I supported Trump quite vocally even if skeptically at the time. Because I placed the Republic over my precious fee fees.
And this becomes especially galling when you remember that Obama and the Clintons made attacks JUST as hideous and slanderous against the Bushes as Trump ever did, they were just (sometimes) couched more politely. Who on Earth should accept the abuse Obama inflicted on Bush and not only be neutral but even come back to support him?
The hypocrisy and double standard Dubya had to Obama and to Trump has seriously tarnished him in my eyes and lowered him on my estimation. I do not regret defending him during his term or voting for him, but I almost certainly would not vote for him again knowing what I know.
Sometimes it really comes down to getting over yourself.
Mike+K is right about W’s alcoholism, and it is relevant if one knows anything about Alcoholics Anonymous.
As a colleague in Mike’s profession, I can aver that AA works by the gradual revelation to a resistant alcoholic brain (sober or drunk) of personal character defects, and seeks God’s and man’s help in getting rid of them, or suppressing them. A close friend has been in AA for 39 years, stopped drinking at age 30, still goes to meetings 3x/week because his “malady” can well up daily; usually, he tells me, in the form of self-centeredness leading to conduct and decisions (while sober, mind) that he recognizes soon or later, and tries to correct them, not with 100% success.
Failures of selfishness are usually followed by self-pity (“It was not my fault, but his”)
So I believe this is relevant to George W. He and his family are basically Yankees (big family compound occupying a peninsula in Kennebunk, Maine which I’ve seen from afar) who were fat cats that got fatter in the Midland TX oil patch but were Texans in name only.
W is a globalist (Neo calls him an “internationalist”) of limited managerial skills and experience. Being TX governor is not a powerful position, and that’s all W. brought to the White House. That, plus managing finances of an NFL team.
W had learned how to fly a fighter, but he was no warrior. His selection of people, and his accepting of their advice, was spotty. Bremer was an incompetent fool. Rumsfeld is a notable exception. As to Cheney, his advice was not automatically taken either. But no one is right all the time. No one.
Counterpunching the Taliban was a no-brainer. Going into Iraq, whether or not Saddam had WMDs, would have been OK if the US had then established a permanent large military presence there in the heart of the MidEast to keep the Iraqi Shia quiet, the Kurds safe, and so check Iran.
But he screwed that up. Badly. Contractors instead of warriors? A couple trillion dollars and where are the purple fingers of democratic voting women 20 years later? Seven thousand troops dead plus many maimed in the Afghan twenty year war plus Iraq? Yes, Obama did not fix things either, but today’s topic is George W.
On a personal level, W. is a very nice, likable guy. We’ve met.
But as POTUS he proved the Peter Principle: one ascends to the level of one’s manifest incompetence.
Art+Deco:
Nose out of spreadsheets please.
“The Family isn’t Rich”
A cursory google gives answers in the range 400-500M.
Now I grant that a dollar isn’t what it used to be, but still.
I don’t know about you, but I work around people in Wealth Management who deal with multi-generational Wealth as well as the Johnny Mainland Chinamen-come-lately who are aiming to supplant them and Rule 1 with Old Money is that it is like an ice-berg. There is always a lot more of it than you think you can see.. tied up in Trusts, Foundations, offshore properties, complicated networks of ownership with cut-outs.
They’re good for a round billion or three if you hung them upside-down from meat hooks and persuaded them to cough up.
Then there’s knowing how to use what you have. The Bushes at least up to Emperor George I swam expertly in the waters of finance and goverment. Didn’t necessarily do much actual good for the USA, but that’s not exactly what they were there for, were they now?
Bushes are done now because while they might know how to finesse shafting Israelis and Saudis and profiting therefrom during the same week, they’re just not in the same money or mass manipulation leagues as the new Tech Oligarchs. Plus quality of offspring is declining. Plus George I was the last one to put in real time in the machinery of Washington and Northern Virginia, so they’ve lost most if not all of their purchase on levers. Maybe can still be a force in Texas or Florida for a while… don’t much know or care.
But this ‘Not Rich’. Get a life! All that’s happened is that they’ve run their race and lost their vital spark. Low Energy Jeb.
I had the extreme displeasure of working for George P at the Texas Land Office, so I feel quite comfortable in saying he’s dumber than a box of rocks. He’s only saying nice things about Trump because he thinks it will sway Republican primary voters. I have no doubt the Bush clan are all on board with his bleatings of support for Trump simply because they think it will make him a more viable candidate. Any notion he’s his “own man” is absurd; he’s just doing what needs to be done to further the family business of getting elected.
@Cicero well said indeed. And I particularly think “ Counterpunching the Taliban was a no-brainer. Going into Iraq, whether or not Saddam had WMDs, would have been OK if the US had then established a permanent large military presence there in the heart of the MidEast to keep the Iraqi Shia quiet, the Kurds safe, and so check Iran.
But he screwed that up. Badly. Contractors instead of warriors? A couple trillion dollars and where are the purple fingers of democratic voting women 20 years later? Seven thousand troops dead plus many maimed in the Afghan twenty year war plus Iraq? Yes, Obama did not fix things either, but today’s topic is George W.
On a personal level, W. is a very nice, likable guy. We’ve met.
But as POTUS he proved the Peter Principle: one ascends to the level of one’s manifest incompetence.”
Cuts to the heart of it. Though I would slightly mitigate it by noting most of the casualties happened under Obama, which points to an(admittedly intentional) systematic issue with the US. Elections are meant to allow regular change of power, but regular change of power also makes it much harder to sustain a common policy over long terms as one helmsman after another comes up, steps down, and is replaced. Tyrants are evil things and capable of being just as or even more indecisive or disunited, but at least they will hang in until outright removed. Vietnam highlighted one of the key issues with this. Without a Union Sacree to sustain long term large commitments long term success is unlikely, and the nature of the Left today makes that all but unthinkable.
But with the benefit of hindsight I can see many other issues I know were crucial that Bush neglected or at least was not effective in. Demographic transformation. Immigration. Electoral integrity (given the nearly successful steal in Florida 2000). “Islam is a religion of peace”. And communication (not talking about the Bushisms so much as the decision to not counterpunch). Mark Steyn has a saying that throughout the West that the Left holds power when it wins but when the Right wins it merely holds office. In the long run Bush was sadly all too typical of this, and many of his actions like No Child Left Behind and the PATRIOT Act worsened it.
Mike+K is right about W’s alcoholism, and it is relevant if one knows anything about Alcoholics Anonymous…So I believe this is relevant to George W.
He quit drinking 35 years ago. He doesn’t show much evidence of a deficit in his sense of personal agency.
So I believe this is relevant to George W. He and his family are basically Yankees (big family compound occupying a peninsula in Kennebunk, Maine which I’ve seen from afar) who were fat cats that got fatter in the Midland TX oil patch but were Texans in name only.
His father grew up in Columbus, Ohio and his mother in St. Louis. His mother’s family bought a seasonal property in Kennebunkport, Me ca. 1895. Neither family could be called old money. The Bush family’s ship began to come in during the 1890s as Samuel Bush built a career as a corporation executive (railways, IIRC). The dry goods business that made the Walker family wealthy was founded in 1878.
His mother and father were married in 1921, spent a few years living and working in western Massachusetts, then moved to Connecticut. Prescott Bush was working in the financial sector in Manhattan and commuting. The family actually lived in Greenwich, Ct, which is smack on the New York – Connecticut border. It’s an exurb of New York City, only formally a part of New England.
Of Prescott Bush’s children, one lived abroad for a time working for Pan Am, then returned to the US (in 1951), settled in Greenwich, and found work in the insurance business in Manhattan; one decamped to Texas and entered the oil business; one married an insurance agent from Boston and settled there; one tried his hand as a stage actor, then worked in finance up and down the BosWash corridor, spending his last years in Connecticut; he specialized in private banking services. One decamped to St. Louis in 1962 and spent his life there, working for banks and investment counseling firms.
Note, the financial disclosure forms filed by George and Barbara Bush in 1984 suggest they hadn’t as of that date inherited much money. (Their net worth was, IIRC $2.1 million; the sale price of Zapata Oil in 1963 was about $900,000). It’s a reasonable inference that the other Bush and Pierce siblings hadn’t either.
Prescott Bush and Dorothy Walker had (IIRC) 16 grandchildren. I think four settled in New England as adults, two others grew up there but settled elsewhere, and two others spent a chunk of their adult life living there.
I once wrote a post (don”t have time to find it now) about George W’s childhood home. I recall it as being quite modest.
He quit drinking 35 years ago. He doesn’t show much evidence of a deficit in his sense of personal agency. –Art+Deco
Agreed. In the 2000s I remember fighting angry Democrats who wielded the “dry drunk” charge against Bush 43 with relish. Unless I hear some real science plugged into real data relevant to Bush, I’m not buying it.
AA has its points. Half my family went to AA with varying success. I went to Alanon myself for several months. God bless AA, but much of what they say I would call “lore” rather then science.
Are David French and Jonah Goldberg drunks, wet or dry? Do we need to explain Bush that way?
Occam’s Razor — Bush 43 is human and has made errors of judgment and character or has chosen courses others may disagree with.
That said, I’m with with Turtler. When Bush came out with Obama et al. to condemn Trump for the “Insurrection,” I’m done with Bush.
In this post I attempt to explain Bush’s behavior. But not excuse it.
Since I’m thinking about psychedelics from the Jordan Peterson podcast and now we’re talking about AA, here’s a tidbit for conservatives and AAers to consider.
Gerald Heard, a psychedelic friend of Uncle Aldous Huxley, guided the sainted “Bill W,” founder of AA, on on his first acid trip. Bill W. was impressed — he said the experience was like the night he came up with his vision for AA. Bill W. wanted to move AA towards psychedelics as a mode of healing.
Which created an intramural scandal within AA. Bill W.! LSD! What to do? So, it was properly scotched and no more was heard of LSD in AA.
Nonetheless, for those who care about facts and helping alcoholics, there are studies, including from Jordan’s interviewee, Roland Griffiths, that show psychedelics can help alcoholics in a major transformation away from alcohol.
Would that interest you? If not, why not?
https://www.apa.org/research/action/speaking-of-psychology/psychedelic-therapy
Art+Deco:
You ignore my comments about AA and my sober, for 39 years, friend who still attends AA instead of church. And the relevance and possible similarity of that case to the long-sober George W.
You ignore also that Prescott Bush was a Wall St investment banker, not just “working” there; then a US Senator from CT.
41’s biographer states “his Wall Street father and Grandfather Walker [were] two dominant figures in the financial world”. Not small fries, but dominant.
41 was a Houston GOP Congressman, was considered a VP candidate by Nixon, was RNC chair, and director of CIA.
And your remarkably detailed family history (whence came the info? Are you a Bush?) proves my point: neither George H.W. nor George W. are true Texans. The whole cloud are up in New England, aka Yankees. That they might have property in TX, whether homes or oil wells, is insufficient to declare them Texans. Papa Bush made money in the Permian Basin. A million $ for Zapata in 1966 was real money; my MD daddy earned about $10-15K yearly then. 41 didn’t just fall out of a tree to become CIA director, etc., etc.
Modest house here… Modest compound there…. Modest ranch there…. Modest network of blind trusts here… Modest estate wagon to pick you up from Philips Exeter or whereverthehellitwas at term’s end… Modest pile of documents in a modest lawyer’s lock box in boring old Liechtenstein… A ten gallon hat and a cracker barrel of aw shucks and the common touch… Pretty soon all that modesty adds up.
Patrician types *do* modesty. It’s one of the myriad things separates them from the Trumps of this world.
As for tax returns and statutory declarations of interest… Best tax advice anyone ever gave was “Always pay some tax. Somewhere.”
Until the debacle of 2001-8 coterminous with the physical decrepitude of George I, these folks were in the first circle of powers in the land… Power (which hoovers in more money powerfully enough to make Kamala blush) aside, they were rich beyond dreams of avarice from about 1900 onwards and because some dude drives around in a pickup truck and yucks it up with farmhands he’s what he seems to be?
Beyond some point, money is a bit of a bore mostly… although that seems to be less true of late when guys like Soros, Bezos and Gates show up at the influence game with orders of magnitude more. But to think that you don’t spend a Century playing the game at highest levels and end up with a hat and a dusty ranch and not one hell of a buried nest egg is bit naive.
Don’t want to go all Gore Vidal on you good honest folks… but c’mon.
You ignore my comments about AA and my sober, for 39 years, friend who still attends AA instead of church. And the relevance and possible similarity of that case to the long-sober George W.
Cicero:
That’s what scientists call an “anecdote” and as the saying goes, “the plural of anecdote is anecdotes, not data.”
The world provides endless “possible similarities.”
Probably shouldn’t kick GW all day long… but then he did incompetently hammer some stakes into the heart of the Republic’s still warm corpse… so what the hell, let’s do it.
It wasn’t just the alcoholism and the youthful fecklessness… I could never really get comfortable with the ‘It took a Good Woman to Sort Him Out’ story line. Just speaks weakness and lack of character. It wasn’t the Female Tames Wild Man archetype… it was more Lost Little Boy Finds Mommy. Not what you want (supposedly) running the Executive Branch.
No real problem with the Texas ANG. Strings obviously pulled, but at least he was doing something smacked of danger and personal risk. Putting life on the line in a high-status kind of way should be expected and demanded of Aristocracy.
Hmmm… Given we now live in a virtual Palace Economy, how about Minoan Bull Vaulting? I’d like to see that. Starting with various Cheneys. Ben Shapiro could be the Rodeo Clown. Sans percentage of the gross, mind you.
I once wrote a post (don”t have time to find it now) about George W’s childhood home. I recall it as being quite modest.
When GHW and Barbara moved out there in 1948, they had an apartment with shared amenities for a time. The other household they were sharing with was a mother-daughter team of prostitutes.
The family’s standard of living was in flux for quite a number of years and their house in Midland was an unremarkable ranch house of the period IIRC. This is consistent with the thesis that what they had to live on was his earned income. I’m going to guess they received some help from the older generation when their daughter was ill, but maybe not. When Jonathan Bush got out of the Army in 1955, he informed his family he wanted to try his hand at stage acting. He said he thought better about it after a time living as he was in New York on a cot in a basement apartment with water leaks.
Dorothy Bush died in 1992. Pauline Pierce died in an auto accident in 1949; her husband remarried in 1952 and died in 1969; his 2d wife died in 2006. It’s a reasonable wager that If the Bush and Pierce heirs were left any money, they did not see it until they themselves were old.
Bush the Elder was derided ca. 1986 as a faux Texan. I cannot help notice that when he retired, he made Houston his primary residence. Recall that Gerald Ford settled in Palm Springs in 1977, and did not have a home in Michigan. Richard Nixon returned to Southern California for about 7 years, then relocated to New Jersey to a township about 40 minutes from Tricia (absent traffic) and about two hours from Julie. Obama and Clinton may be found anywhere but the towns in which they grew up and the towns in which they made their career.
Zaphod: Right on, bro! But the “Good Woman” line applies also to Dick Cheney. He was a phone lineman until he started dating a college woman who insisted he get a college degree.
Huxley: there are lessons in anecdotes. One does not need P<.05 to learn from them.
It wasn’t just the alcoholism and the youthful fecklessness
What’s the indicator of fecklessness?
No real problem with the Texas ANG. Strings obviously pulled,
In your imagination only.
Zaphod:
The way I heard it, Billy Graham and God straightened Bush 43. I never touched bottom on that one. I’ve known people who said God straightened them and I’ve been impressed with their lives.
______________________________________________
The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.
–John 3:8 KJV
______________________________________________
I don’t know how that works, but sometimes it does and maybe it did for GWB. Though it hardly makes his every single judgment and action a matter of divine guidance.
I’m with you on GWB’s wealth.
Huxley: there are lessons in anecdotes. One does not need P<.05 to learn from them.
Cicero:
That’s where you start. But not where you finish, as you seem to.
Zaphod: Right on, bro! But the “Good Woman” line applies also to Dick Cheney. He was a phone lineman
Nothing wrong with being a phone lineman; just not the life Lynne Vincent wanted. He had credits accumulated and finished the degree not quite a year after he married her. He was 23 the year they married, almost precisely the median age for a man to marry in 1964.
The nonsense doesn’t apply to Bush, either. At the time he married his wife, he’d finished his military service, finished his schooling, and started a business. It was about eight years later she insisted he quit drinking.
Zaphod; Art Deco:
Here’s the post I wrote on the subject of the Bush homes and finances.
You ignore my comments about AA and my sober, for 39 years, friend who still attends AA instead of church. And the relevance and possible similarity of that case to the long-sober George W.
Recovery’s a way of life for some people. For others it’s a discrete process. By all appearances George W Bush is the latter. (I’m not sure if he was a full blown alcoholic or just a lush).
You ignore also that Prescott Bush was a Wall St investment banker, not just “working” there; then a US Senator from CT.
I did not specify he worked for Brown Brothers Harriman. This bothers you just why? The point of my discussion was that Prescott Bush and his wife did not come from New England old money; they came from midwestern new money (newish in the wife’s case). Marvin Pierce and his wife were in 1925 two people from middle class households in Ohio who were running their own middle class household in Rye, NY; the money came later.
41’s biographer states “his Wall Street father and Grandfather Walker [were] two dominant figures in the financial world”. Not small fries, but dominant.
The Wear-Walker family was in the dry goods business in St. Louis; they moved into finance later. That description indicates the biographer has a wretched sense of diction. They were partners at one particular bank and the father-in-law the owner of another. They did not dominate the financial world and the other partners in their firm would have been big pine cones as well. The financial sector was at that time far more decentralized than it is today. The firm calved it’s investment banking business when Glass-Steagall required it. (The same happened at J.P. Morgan, hence Morgan Stanley).
41 was a Houston GOP Congressman, was considered a VP candidate by Nixon, was RNC chair, and director of CIA.
And?
And your remarkably detailed family history (whence came the info? Are you a Bush?) proves my point: neither George H.W. nor George W. are true Texans.
That wasn’t your point.
That aside, George W. Bush has spent about 3/4 of his life in Texas. Ditto his brother Neil. He lived in New England for about eight years if you pro-rate seasonal residency and hasn’t lived there at all since 1975.
The whole cloud are up in New England, aka Yankees.
Again, this contention has been addressed and refuted.
Here’s the post I wrote on the subject of the Bush homes and finances.
One thing you don’t emphasize is that the Bush family had connections but were only mildly wealthy. Other people with money do not have the connections, so no privilege, just wealth.
Bear with me a sec. Around the time Rahm Emanuel first became the mayor of Chicago there was some discussion about how he scored several million dollars income because of an investment banking deal he had put together.
Investment banking can be a legitimate endeavor, but sometimes it’s not. So I thought, gee I didn’t know Rahm had serious background in finance. As far as I could tell, he didn’t. Someone in a big firm gave him this investment banking job for a year or two and he walked away several million richer. That’s not proof of anything, but it didn’t smell good to me.
Then Jeb Bush campaigns for the presidency and some of the commentary states that he been engaged in various lucrative investment banking deals. (In addition to being a board member on a dozen different corp. boards, yada yada.) I presumed Jeb must have a Wharton business degree or similar. No, he got a degree in Latin American studies. That and his fluency in Spanish got him a job as a bank branch manager in Venezuela (later VP of retail banking). Right. That and a governorship makes you a investment banker.
Jeb’s net worth is either $45M, or maybe $1.3B?
https://www.thewealthrecord.com/bio-wiki/jeb-bush-net-worth-height-weight-age-girlfriend-wife-kids-2021-2022-2023/
This one sounds suspect. Any feelings out there about it?
https://thenewamerican.com/jeb-bush-s-ties-to-insider-financial-interests-are-confirmed/
Until the debacle of 2001-8 coterminous with the physical decrepitude of George I, these folks were in the first circle of powers in the land… Power (which hoovers in more money powerfully enough to make Kamala blush) aside, they were rich beyond dreams of avarice from about 1900 onwards and because some dude drives around in a pickup truck and yucks it up with farmhands he’s what he seems to be?
George the Elder lived to be 94 years old he was always lucid and also perfectly ambulatory when his son was in office. The notion that the family was ‘rich beyond the dreams of avarice’ has no reality outsize the space between your ears.
Steve Sailer laughed at Jeb Bush because his net worth was a measly $2 million from his real estate and banking ventures; after all, anyone should have been able to make a mint in Miami in the 1980s with all that drug money flowing through. You guys might try being consistent in how you deride them.
Around the time Rahm Emanuel first became the mayor of Chicago there was some discussion about how he scored several million dollars income because of an investment banking deal he had put together.
He’d never worked for a commercial enterprise in his life other than minor wage jobs. Wasserstein, Perella hires him and pays him $16 million for ‘investment banking services’. William Dyer (“Beldar”) discussed this massively corrupt transaction on his blog. Again, a Democratic pol has to do something really crude like have a chest freezer full of bribe money in his basement before a US Attorney will take an interest.
Jeb’s net worth is either $45M, or maybe $1.3B?
It’s not.
Wow. Rahm Emanuel got a scholarship to the Joffrey Ballet, but got a liberal arts degree at Sarah Lawrence instead. And a masters in communication from Northwestern. His nickname is Tiny Dancer. Ha.
Art,
It is certainly much easier to track income than wealth. It looks like the $45M number might come from 33 years of income added up. Though they state he made $7.3M in 2014 alone. Still a large um “active” family would eat up a chunk over 33 years.
How Trump has “evolved” since his Pelosi-admiring days!
Trump’s blaming GWB during the debate, for not protecting us against Bin Laden, must have stung mightily. *Now* GWB is punching back.
“Because I placed the Republic over my precious fee fees.”
And that’s all ye need to know.
All they had to do was look at the catastrophic—criminal—alternative square in the eye and swallow their gall (and their pride).
But no, just couldn’t do it. (Either that or they didn’t believe “Biden” would prove such a catastrophe…or they believed/believe that Trump was the worse “catastrophe”….)
Well, so much for their judgment…. though, yes, I realize we’re all human…
Nonetheless, wouldn’t have made a difference in the outcome (as Neo and some commentators have stated) because of the massive, immaculately-planned and brilliantly executed election fraud (together with the absolutely, extraordinary cover-up).
But would have made a moral difference—as I believe some anti-Trump pundits have been finally able to understand. (I could be wrong about that last remark, though…)
Related;
https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/455763/
@Barry Thanks.
And my mistake. I meant “the Election of ’16”, not “the election of ’08”. Though McCain was repulsive to me too.
But in any case I supported Trump against Clinton and was pleasantly surrpised and much more fervent in supporting him over Biden and co.
And so here we are:
The GOPe appears to be firmly supporting tearing down (i.e., fundamentally transforming) America neighborhood by neighborhood, aluminum siding by aluminum siding, brick by brick…
https://twitter.com/ggreenwald/status/1403700035938930693
Nothing new, though: this is what Obama was proposing toward the end of his regime.
(Can’t say they aren’t thorough, though. Or predictable.)
@Barry Meislin:
Looks like I might have to start liking this Greenwald fellow.
For the rest, and there are exceptions and edge cases, there’s really just the UniParty Punch and Judy Show: it has all kinds of entertaining and mutually antagonistic squabbling factions from Extreme Left Degenerate Democrat Genociders to Defending Israel to the Last American and Gay Marriage and Drag Queen Story Hour and Importing Foreigners to Take Americans’ Jobs are What the Founders Intended Funhouse Mirror ‘Republican Right’.
But if you sit down and draw an imaginary circle around those you love and the world you grew up in and the world you wish you had today, just about everyone in that UniParty is outside the circle pointing metaphorical spears inwards at you.
The utterances of this Bush or that Bush post some date well before 2016 are just UniParty background noise.
What should be done? Don’t know. Can it be fixed? Don’t know. There’s mild gossip interest in traducing Bushes — I don’t mind myself — helps make me feel better for having taken so long to remove the scales from my own eyes. But can’t help feeling that the way forward is to do something gloriously impractical — and demolishing the Whited Sepulchure that is the Republican Party is as good a place to start as any. All they ever do is slow things down by a few years at best.
@Huxley:
Re the discussion on Alcoholism and recovery from it, you probably have the right of it. I cannot think of a recovered alcoholic I’ve known who said ‘I did it myself!’ — and some of these guys were not shy at all about talking about losing and making small fortunes again the hard way all by themselves.
Perhaps there has to be a belief in the presence of some exterior beneficent agency — whether it’s just a support group or something more. Maybe Laura B nudged him towards that… The idea of nagging wife all-in-one cure doesn’t gel with my default misogynistic orientation so a Higher Power it should be in the interests of my Famous Consistency.
Art Deco rightly observes that of Bush and leading Dems, “I do expect them to speak truthfully about process issues. As far as I’m aware, neither of them did so when the situation demanded.”
Has any leading Republican done so about the obvious fraud? The illegitimate FICUS?
IT is possible that the coming de-legitimization that’s coming will do de-legitimize Dem controlled organs like the media mafia and government that not only is a tidal wave of voter revolt is coming, but the expected blood letting will not come either.
Which is perhaps unfortunate. We need blood letting to kill the Marxist virus in the systems. It’s everywhere. And the ten years it’s going to take to vanquish it is too long to endure.
The Bushes are outwardly genteel, but we learned from experience that they are consistent enemies of the working class. In varying degrees, the same goes for Romney and the entire Never Trump universe.
Of all Trump’s accomplishments, his greatest (and most lasting) was to expose the treachery of those we previously considered friends.
The idea of nagging wife all-in-one cure doesn’t gel with my default misogynistic orientation so a Higher Power it should be in the interests of my Famous Consistency.
Marriage is a dyad and people can be enhanced or diminished by their interaction with the other half. This banal observation seems to escape some participants here.
The GOPe appears to be firmly supporting tearing down (i.e., fundamentally transforming) America neighborhood by neighborhood, aluminum siding by aluminum siding, brick by brick…
The delinquency rate on residential real estate loans held by banks (accounting for about 1/4 of all residential real estate loans) was 2.38% in the last quarter of 2019. It increased to 2.86% in the last quarter of 2020 and fell to 2.66% in the 1st quarter of 2021.
The share of households living in owner-occupied housing has been fixed for decades at around 64%. No indication as yet that that ratio has declined.
On Exactitude in Science Jorge Luis Borges, Collected Fictions, translated by Andrew Hurley
….In that Empire, the Art of Cartography attained such Perfection that the map of a single Province occupied the entirety of a City, and the map of the Empire, the entirety of a Province. In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guilds struck a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, and which coincided point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of Cartography as their Forebears had been, saw that that vast Map was Useless, and not without some Pitilessness was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of that Map, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; in all the Land there is no other Relic of the Disciplines of Geography.
—Suarez Miranda,Viajes de varones prudentes, Libro IV,Cap. XLV, Lerida, 1658
Professor Irwin Corey – call your office !
I have just had the pleasure of reading all 64 comments, and it seems clear that no one commenter has convinced any other who holds contrary views to revise their held views. Sometimes, comments ignore components of previously stated views while refuting or disagreeing with them in toto, argumentatively.
A sign of our times? We just “talk” at one another? I fear so, even though there are very few Democrats among us.
Those seeking more engaging and humorous dialog may occasionally find it at https://patriots.win – informative and erudite with interludes of Animal House. Variety is the spice of life.
Enjoy
I had the extreme displeasure of working for George P at the Texas Land Office, so I feel quite comfortable in saying he’s dumber than a box of rocks.
He has two handsome degrees and passed the bar exam. Come up with a more credible cut than that.
This extended back-and-forth over George W. Bush, who hasn’t shown an inkling of interest in the Republican Party or the people who voted for him in over a decade, demonstrates an emotional/habitual weakness conservatives need to remedy. You can also see it in those who continue to defend or excuse the despicable behavior of jagoffs like Jonah Goldberg or David French because “I used to like them” or “They used to be good guys.”
Politics ain’t beanbag and while utter ruthlessness is a losing game, the Right needs to stop letting sentiment and civility overly dominate its thinking. George W. Bush has picked a side and unless you’re part of the global economic/political establishment, it isn’t your side. Defending him is a waste of time and energy that can be better used elsewhere.
Mike
“He has two handsome degrees and passed the bar exam.”
There is no way on God’s green earth you honestly believe “handsome degrees” and the bar exam are in any meaningful way true and accurate indicators of real intelligence. America’s political elite is crammed up the yam with folks possessing “handsome degrees” and who passed the bar exam. Are their continued and repeated failures because they’re just too gosh darn smart?
Mike
A cursory google gives answers in the range 400-500M.
Again, George Bush the Elder had to file financial disclosure forms in 1984 as a candidate for federal office. His net worth was then about $2.1 million. Geraldine Ferraro was running as an exemplar of immigrant ethnic vernacular so was embarrassed when it came to light that her husband’s net worth exceeded that of George Bush by 80%. Jeb Bush also had to file such forms in 2015.
And you’re forgetting that Prescott Bush had 17 grandchildren (all but two still living) and there are now dozens of great grandchildren.
And here is the Bunge raising the quality of discourse. Sophistication, erudition, that’s the Bunge. 🙂
For those of you who think that Ronald Reagan was infallible I have two names for you to contemplate 1) George H.W. Bush, and 2) Sandra Day O’Connor. The Bush family is mediocrity personified. Reading Trump’s comments I always felt that the nasty side of him would be his downfall. Given his successful economic and foreign policy victories he should have been re-elected.
om:
I happen to agree with Bunge, so that’s two of us raising the bar.
Art+Deco thinks working for George P is somehow less enlightening than viewing his degrees hung on a wall somewhere. Cannot agree that framed degrees are better criteria for evaluation of ability than personal experience with the degreed person. Jobs and Gates never got degrees, did they? So obviously they are unable, unaccomplished, un-degreed.
There is no way on God’s green earth you honestly believe “handsome degrees” and the bar exam are in any meaningful way true and accurate indicators of real intelligence.
They’re quite satisfactory indicators of general intelligence. They aren’t indicators of specific skills or a host of other personal assets. The commenter in question did not advance the thesis that he was lacking in skills for the position, , or a proper moral sense, or a sense of what makes competing constituencies tick. He said he was ‘dumb as a box of rocks’. And, no he isn’t.
Art+Deco thinks working for George P is somehow less enlightening than viewing his degrees hung on a wall somewhere.
Cicero doesn’t understand the difference between intelligence and expertise.
For those of you who think that Ronald Reagan was infallible I have two names for you to contemplate 1) George H.W. Bush, and 2) Sandra Day O’Connor. The Bush family is mediocrity personified.
The Bush-Walker-Weir family has managed to maintain it’s position in society over four generations, because they consistently generate people who are satisfactory earners in the business world. I have a suspicion that’s pretty unusual among wealthy families. “Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations”. Seen it up close and personal.
Cicero:
You agree with what Bunge is saying, that GWB has proved to be a profound disappointment in the last four years, that the NRO crowd are worse than worthless, and that the GOPextinct are only a little better than the Democrats (?). But do you have to use sub-adult (adolescent) slang to express yourself? To each his own, I thought this was a salon, not a barracks or construction site. My bad.
Cicero:
The Bunge may correct me, after some comment on my obvious mental deficits my parentage or a trip into the gutter, that GWB was actually the spawn of Satan and the country would have been better off with Al Gore or John F Kerry. It is Bunge after all.
Carry on, I’ve got to prep the cedar sidewall shingles for painting.
om:
I’m not sure to which of my words you object as “adolescent” usage. Kindly quote next time.
Art+Deco: I assure you I understand the difference between intelligence and expertise. We intelligent, inexpert people have to start somewhere to become experts. We were not born with the level of expertise with which you were apparently endowed at birth. We had to learn it and earn it.
It is clear, for whatever reason(s), you dislike my comments reflexively. I reciprocate the sentiment.
Cicero:
Sorry, not your words Bunge’s words, go and read his again.
I said
” But do you have to use sub-adult (adolescent) slang to express yourself? ”
You answered – No I do not. Ding! Ding! Ding!
You are the winner. You express yourself without resorting to adolescent slang.
Congratulations.
Cicero:
“Let’s not worry about who killed who. This is supposed to be a happy occasion.”
https://youtu.be/y05eFDQnSfE
It is clear, for whatever reason(s), you dislike my comments reflexively.
I dislike the comments of Zaphod reflexively (for reasons others have elucidated in their own case) and those of that other fellow who favors incomprehensible prolix mush (which I don’t read). There are three others here (apart from the moderatrix) whose opinions I always want to hear. The rest I read, but I have trouble assigning a precise perspective to a given handle (well, Bunge I recognize). My memory’s not getting any better.
“…the pleasure of reading all 64 comments…”
Which reminds me (I keep forgetting to ask): is there any way that comments can be numbered in the current system? (Might help when referring to previously-expressed opinions…not that I would wish to “reduce” some of the wonderful comments here to “mere” numbers, but….)
= = = =
“…moderatrix…”
In black leather?…or no doubt because of the dominating intellect?
George H. W. Bush was soft and indecisive, an appeaser without a clear vision or purpose. Jeb is very much like his father. George W. Bush was also weak and without a clear focus or purpose for what he wanted to do as POTUS. My anecdotal evidence indicates that many people now think GW was not that bright and, lacking a vision or direction, was led around, policy-wise, by Dick Cheney.
If all that you write is true, and I don’t doubt that it is, then the Bushes are petty and vindictive political players, and have a lot more in common with Biden, Pelosi, and Schumer.
Has Jeb’s wife learned to speak a word of English after 50 or so years of living in this country? Just curious…
Methinks yer mixing up the merely mediocre with the sheer evil.
(Could happen to anyone…in this day and age of looking at everyone and everything under the microscope of the ‘net and social media, no one can escape unscathed.)
Not that the Bushes didn’t have (don’t have) some decent qualities and strengths (cf. Barbara) to go along with their obvious faults…though Dubya does seem to be going out of his way to be simply perverse (or was he always this way?—No, actually, I don’t think so.)
And maybe that’s why Trump has been so “refreshing”: you don’t even need a microscope, since with him it’s WYSIWYG all the way down, which is just fine—or even better that that…. For maybe just maybe DJT has that gift of bringing out—for revealing—the truth (for better or worse, scoundrel or “prince”) in, and about, everyone?….
Has Jeb’s wife learned to speak a word of English after 50 or so years of living in this country? Just curious…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pz40dJu9Nvg
Yes she speaks English. She learned it after the age of 15, so she has a persistent accent.
Good thing Low Energy Jeb wasn’t a son of Joe Kennedy or there would have been an outbreak of prefrontal lobotomies.
George H. W. Bush was soft and indecisive, an appeaser without a clear vision or purpose. Jeb is very much like his father. George W. Bush was also weak and without a clear focus or purpose for what he wanted to do as POTUS. My anecdotal evidence indicates that many people now think GW was not that bright and, lacking a vision or direction, was led around, policy-wise, by Dick Cheney.
“Many people” (i.e. partisan Democrats and palaeotrash) have been saying that for 20 years. It’s not credible.
George Bush the Elder was a combat veteran who founded his own business in a part of the world where he was a stranger. He’s not constitutionally weak or indecisive. The son was never as talented as the father, but he’ll do for most purposes. Jeb’s an ordinary bourgeois with some smarts and some quirks. The problem with papa and with George (if not Jeb) is that they were in politics because they were naturally competitive and had only vague and protean opinions about public policy. It made his father easy to shift and it made W easy to shift if he hadn’t declared himself. (The complaint I’ve heard about Jeb as Governor of Florida was that he couldn’t set priorities, not that he was unprincipled).
Easy to shift, with exceptions. Papa had one issue for which he’d go to the mat. Alas, it was preferential tax rates for capital gains. W, as it happens, is an open borders extremist.
The other thing that bothers you about father and son (especially W) is that they were willing to sell out their constituency post hoc. I wouldn’t blame them for disliking Trump; I do blame them for completely disregarding the interests and preferences of the people who voted for them (as well as non-partisan concerns in regard to procedural probity). I have little doubt George P’s stances are opportunistic.
One other thing that does grate. Why would the elder Bushes want anything to do with the Clintons personally? They’re 20+ years apart in age, the distaff side has nothing in common, and the men have nothing in common other than a history in electoral politics and some liking for golf. Yet, Bilge was able to worm his way into their circle of friends. (Recall Barbara Bush and Nancy Reagan were frenemies).
They’re quite satisfactory indicators of general intelligence.
No, they’re not. Especially today. I have a degree. I work somewhere where you pretty much have to have a degree to get a job to work there. There are numerous people who are as dumb as boxes of rocks that have degrees. Of course, this all depends on the degree itself. Engineering or Math are indicators of intelligence; African American Studies degrees are not.
George H. W. Bush was soft and indecisive, an appeaser without a clear vision or purpose. Jeb is very much like his father. George W. Bush was also weak and without a clear focus or purpose for what he wanted to do as POTUS. My anecdotal evidence indicates that many people now think GW was not that bright and, lacking a vision or direction, was led around, policy-wise, by Dick Cheney.
I agree with your first two sentences. As for GWB, no he knew exactly what he was doing: he’s a moderate to the core. Liberal about a lot of things; conservative about others. He prided himself on “working with the other side”, which was something that in Texas was not only easier, but necessary. He tried that at the federal level, and of course they screwed him over every chance they got.
Policy-wise, he was a Christian globalist. All of his decisions were based on that. I don’t think that is what Americans want; I KNOW it’s not what I want. But he had his principles and stuck with them.
No, they’re not. Especially today.
If you want to make a critique of George P. Bush, identify his actual character and personality flaws and his actual skill deficiencies. The notion that you can gain admission to schools which reject 90% of their applicants, pass the Texas Bar exam and be ‘dumb as a box of rocks’ is one regarded affectionately by people who resemble the title character in the film Henry Fool. You fancy their are no indicia of performance more reliable that what you pull out of your rear end. Why do you expect people to take you seriously?
Art+Deco:
George P Bush was a Social Studies Teacher for a year while his curated cursus honorum litany of lawyering legs-up was being lined up. That was probably the one honest job he has ever held that he was qualified for and still would have gotten *that* via patronage. He’s the son of an academic under-achiever and a Mexican Mestiza (national mean IQ ~87.2) of very average abilities. Wouldn’t be expecting miracles from him or any of his siblings.
Do you think Special Ruling Class Whites don’t get Affirmative Action? God knows, everybody else does except for Plain Old Whites.
You’re flogging a dead horse.
I am stronger than both Bush 2 and T Red at this point. THey are waiting for me to decide what happens.
As for America…. well, you all are under Judgment. Exactly as I told you all before. Enjoy the Harvest and the End Times. End Game is here. Prepare for the New Order and Age of humanity.
Talking is over.
Do you think Special Ruling Class Whites don’t get Affirmative Action?
He passed the bar exam.
He’s the son of an academic under-achiever and a Mexican Mestiza (national mean IQ ~87.2) of very average abilities.
His father attended a public Ivy, graduated with honors at age 20, and was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. We should all be such underachievers. He’s had a satisfactory career since in banking and real estate.
(Steve Sailer’s usual line is that W’s psyche is regulated by his brother being the capable one and he being the clown – well, it’s that until he’s deriding Jeb!’s net worth; again, you guys need to get your story straight).
OMG I am stunned at how nonsensical and useless these comments are.
In retrospect, the GWB presidency was a complete and utter disaster. Name one actual accomplishment for conservatism that came from those 8 years…. Right, NONE.
Regardless of how good you believe the INTENTIONS were, the outcomes were universally awful, including animating the progressive left to such an extent to allow for coming Obama administration and all the horrid awfulness that it entailed.
The War in Iraq, regardless of intention, was a complete an utter failure on every imaginable level.
The war in Afghanistan wasn’t much better. A better result could have been achieved from afar after a year or so. There was NEVER a valid justification to stay there for 20 years.
Meanwhile, Chief Justice Roberts (who GWB had to be shamed into nominating instead of Harriet flippin’ Miers) has been an unmitigated disaster in SCOTUS, allowing the affirmation of untold numbers of Obama’s unconstitutional acts, including the obamacare disaster.
If you’re defending GWB in any way, shape, or form, you’re flat out WRONG. Stop it.
The comments illustrate that Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS) is quite as resistant to reality as Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS).
Bless their hearts, those with BDS, they mean well.
Shouting (all caps) in a comment thread doesn’t help your points. Have a good day, anyway. 🙂
BTW, in case you’re not following, while Trump wasn’t necessarily correct at the time, likely due to not having seen the media for the scum that they are, at the time, believed their anti-war narrative.
BUT, in hindsight, he’s absolutely correct. GWB is by far the worst president of my lifetime, and that includes Carter and Obama, and likely Biden as well.
@om, shouting is ALL caps, not highlighting the choice bits by using caps on individual words.
PS – And that’s coming from someone that voted for GWB twice and defended him and everything associated with his presidency for FAR too long.
PPS – Trump actually won
Oh, another lasting carryover from the GWB administration that has been double wicked awesome –
The cynical use of gay marriage as a wedge issue for GOTV efforts.
That really paid off, huh ?
That goes along with animating the progressive left, but if you know anyone remotely adjacent to the LGBT community, you cannot imagine a more damaging effort. While the media narrative is a major part of it, the constant drumbeat of Republicans as homophobic lunatics has stuck pretty strongly for 2 decades now.
deadrody:
BDS.
GWB has really been a disappointment in the last four years, but everything evil can’t be laid at his feet (or cloven hooves).
Worse than J Carter, GHWB, BHO, and J Biden (Joe and Jill)? Wow, those hooves have been hidden by cowboy boots.
Come on man, GWB was the worst president ever (in the past or in the future). BDS on full display. 🙂
The War in Iraq, regardless of intention, was a complete an utter failure on every imaginable level.
If it were a complete and utter failure, Iraq would be run by Baathitsts or be run by ISIL. It is neither.
The cynical use of gay marriage as a wedge issue for GOTV efforts. That really paid off, huh ?
Proposition 8 passed in California in 2008. You need to get out more.
“If it were a complete and utter failure, Iraq would be run by Baathitsts or be run by ISIL. It is neither.”
Judging the success or failure of the Iraq War by who isn’t running it today is grading on a curve so low Satan himself couldn’t get under it.
Mike
“Proposition 8 passed in California in 2008. You need to get out more.”
So…no gay marriages are going on today in California? You might want to think a little more on the subject.
Mike
So…no gay marriages are going on today in California? You might want to think a little more on the subject.
Go back to his complaint and understand its import. This isn’t that difficult.
Judging the success or failure of the Iraq War by who isn’t running it today is grading on a curve so low Satan himself couldn’t get under it.
I’m sure you thought that was clever.
BDS isn’t an uncommon affliction. Much like toenail fungal infections, very hard to eradicate and unsightly.
To me, “Easy to shift” equals lacking in principles.
Art+Deco: The continuous hatred of GWB by so many (alleged) conservatives is morbidly, sickenly fascinating, isn’t it??
Iraq?? He handed a mostly settled, peaceful and fledgling republic to the despicable le Obama. The Boy King (BHO) paused briefly and then a andoned our hard fought victory. Islamist Sewage flooded the vaccuum and Hell followed.
Trump, who.I voted twice for ain’t worth the manure on GWB’s boots.
Art+Deco: The continuous hatred of GWB by so many (alleged) conservatives is morbidly, sickenly fascinating, isn’t it??
Bush has burned his bridges to his quondam constituency. Didn’t have to, but he did. Bush’s starboard combox detractors did not, prior to 2015, manifest the views of aught but a low-single-digit street level constituency.
Iraq?? He handed a mostly settled, peaceful and fledgling republic to the despicable le Obama. The Boy King (BHO) paused briefly and then a andoned our hard fought victory. Islamist Sewage flooded the vaccuum and Hell followed.
What the surge accomplished was to reduce the level of violence below a certain tolerance level – a mean of about 350 civilian deaths per month. The situation began to deteriorate noticeably in 2012 after American troops had withdrawn. It was only in 2014 that you had a catastrophic fall in security consequent to the detritus of the Syrian civil war. The Iraqi state forces with the aid of some western troops managed to break the back of ISIL in the summer of 2014 and the level of violence returned to what it was in 2009, 2010, and 2011 – about 350 civilian deaths a month. In the intervening four years, there’s been a dramatic improvement in security, and now the civilian death toll has fallen to about 60 deaths a month. Given Iraq’s population (close to 40 million), it’s now a security problem rather than an insurgency, with a deaths-per-million ratio more like that of Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza during the period running from 1987 to 2004 or like Ulster during the period running from 1977 to 1999.
At the time that Obama (VTC: Vast Testicular Concavity) took office there were fewer American deaths by violence in Iraq than in his adopted home turf of Chicago. Millions of purple fingers at the polls…. Oh, and remember how Saddaam had destroyed the lands of the Marsh Arabs .?? Our Army Engineers had restored them with GWB’s blessing.
“The continuous hatred of GWB by so many (alleged) conservatives is morbidly, sickenly fascinating, isn’t it??”
What did GWB accomplish in eight years in office that any conservative, alleged or otherwise, should regard him with anything more than contempt given his words and actions of the past 12+ years?
I mean, just take Iraq. The idea that because the place wasn’t a complete murderous hellscape when Bush left office it should cancel out both all the human death and suffering AND the massive long-term foreign policy problems resulting from Bush and Company’s dreams of empire?
Donald Trump produced more conservative policy victories in four years than Bush the Younger achieved in his entire adult life in politics. That alone should be enough to scrap George W. Bush from the bottom of our boots.
Mike
Bunge, poster child of BDS, states the obvious the DJT is not the same person as GWB.
“Dreams of empire,” such a sweet child, bless his heart, he means well.
I know you’re not bright enough to figure this out yourself, so I’ll do you a little favor. Actually disputing what I write is far more effective than just fapping yourself off if your goal is to defend The Man Who Got Barack Obama Elected President.
Mike
Keep it classy as ever Bunge. Any other high school witticisms? Dive deep into the gutter, you can do it!
You may not have noticed in your ranting, that I’ve not defended GWB’s actions and inactions in the last four years. What a tool, Bunge.
What a person who is in BDS writes cannot be disputed by facts or history or logic. But you reach a new level of BDS even today. It was GWB who got BHO elected? McCain and Romney had nothing to do with that outcome, or the media, or BDS from the left (and from the Bunge)? And what is this empire you speak of, care to spell that out, oh sage of the flyover?
Too funny. Don’t hurt yourself and mind your blood pressure.
Here’s some Inconvenient Truths Reporting For Duty, clues from the past, for a Bunge regarding GWB. Can he figure out the puzzle that faced the country?
I mean, just take Iraq. The idea that because the place wasn’t a complete murderous hellscape when Bush left office it should cancel out both all the human death and suffering AND the massive long-term foreign policy problems resulting from Bush and Company’s dreams of empire?
The human death and suffering was the work of the Iraqi insurgency and later ISIL. Only a modest fraction prior to 2012 was the work of coalition troops or Iraqi state forces (IIRC, the Iraq Body County estimated 15%). To just what ‘massive long-term foreign policy problems’ are you referring?
There were no ‘dreams of empire’, except in your imagination.
The Man Who Got Barack Obama Elected President
Any candidate competing for his party’s 3d turn at the wheel will face headwinds. See Richard Nixon in 1960 and Al Gore in 2000.
The financial crisis was a function of regulatory failure and gross irresponsibility in the business. On the business side, the two most responsible parties were Joseph Cassano and Angelo Mozilo. On the government side, Barney Frank (who worked to sabotage efforts to improve accounting practices at the GSEs), Alan Greenspan, Arthur Leavitt, and Lawrence Summers. On the intersection of government and business, Franklin Raines and others at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. For the most part, these are Democratic appointees or people enmeshed in the Democratic side of the Washington insider nexus. (The exceptions are Cassano and Greenspan).
And then you had the Republican presidential candidate, who hired a pair of grifters (Steve Schmidt and Nicolle Wallace) to run his campaign.
McBungie: Often wrong. Never in doubt.
Po’wittle twit.
@NeoConScum:
“Trump, who.I voted twice for ain’t worth the manure on GWB’s boots.”
Whilst your judgement appears to emanate from a point somewhat removed from the place between your ears, I’m pleased to see that you at least understand the critical importance of what the Confucians call the Rectification of Names.
Carry on!
You know, Art, I’d like to think you’re smarter than this but you’re working REALLY hard to convince me otherwise.
1 – “The human death and suffering was the work of the Iraqi insurgency and later ISIL.”
The United States invaded Iraq. That makes us responsible for EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENED AFTER THAT. Yes, that includes every awful thing done by insurgents and ISIL because they wouldn’t have been able to do any of those things without the U.S. first smashing the existing military, political, and civic structure in Iraq. Is the U.S. 100% responsible? Of course not. But you’ve got to be morally and ethically retarded to believe you can invade a sovereign state, unleash mass death and destruction, and then pretend the misery and suffering which follows is someone else’s fault.
2 – “To just what ‘massive long-term foreign policy problems’ are you referring?”
Seriously? Smashing Iraq did more to empower Iran in the region than anything Clinton and Obama did or Biden is likely to do. There was exactly 0% chance of any U.S/Iran military conflict before because Iraq was right there to deter any Iranian advances. Now, not only is the U.S. itself the major deterrent to Iran but it’s all but impossible to do anything to separate or distance the U.S. from the other frankly horrible regimes in the region.
There’s a lot more, of course, but your obliviousness to such an obvious answer indicates there’s not much use in going over it all.
Mike
^^ He’s right. What he said.
But ignoring any moral considerations for a moment, there are two metrics for success:
(1) The USA does not benefit from endless enmeshment in nasty squabbles in a nasty part of the world full of nasty ancient hatreds.
(2) ____________________________
A child could fill in the blank. And Sesame Street has been brought to you by the Number 2 for so long now that perhaps we ought to reverse the numbering scheme.
An Autistic Child, obviously. One accustomed to being sent to the back of the class to sit in the corner.
Meanwhile the Emperor parades again today setting ever new fashion trends.
Hah, Bunge and Can Do! on the same page.
1. GWB is responsible for Bunge’s BDS too. GWB made Trump kill that respected but severe Iranian Islamic scholar too (Solimini what’s his name), and is responsible for BHO staying in Afghanistan and Trump not leaving Afghanistan either. Where does GWB’s perfidy end? Wait for it …. it never does and never can. LOL Bunge LOL.
2. GWB is responsible for empowering Iran. Pallets of cash and lifting of sanctions, who did that again? Valerie Jared? Who’s she, one of GWB’s minions? Iranian hostage situation in 1979, must have been GWB at work? Bombing Jews in Buenos Aries must have been GWB at work. Those post Shah Iranians have been just a peaceable pack of Persians for the longest time before GWB riled ’em up.
Do tell Bunge and zaphod. Do tell. We can’t make this up, but you can. LOL
1 – “The human death and suffering was the work of the Iraqi insurgency and later ISIL.”The United States invaded Iraq. That makes us responsible for EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENED AFTER THAT.
An understanding of personal and collective agency is something that escapes you. Cannot help you with that.
Seriously? Smashing Iraq did more to empower Iran in the region than anything Clinton and Obama did or Biden is likely to do. There was exactly 0% chance of any U.S/Iran military conflict before because Iraq was right there to deter any Iranian advances. Now, not only is the U.S. itself the major deterrent to Iran but it’s all but impossible to do anything to separate or distance the U.S. from the other frankly horrible regimes in the region.
No clue where you came by this fantastical notion of an objective alignment between the United States and Iraq, nor this notion that the United States is the only power which deters Iran. With a 3-1 advantage in available manpower, Iran couldn’t conquer one Iraqi province during the period running from 1980 to 1988. What they can do is engage in subversion (which they’ve been doing with scant interruption since 1979) and attempt to acquire weapons of mass destruction. Well, you can see what they’ve accomplished in the last 40 years.
There aren’t any ‘frankly horrible’ regimes in the region other than the Alawite regime in Syria, which has been gelded for the time being.
“There aren’t any ‘frankly horrible’ regimes in the region other than the Alawite regime in Syria, which has been gelded for the time being.”
Take down the Alawites and you’re really going to reap the whirlwind.
By the time you geostrategic geniuses have finished us all off, we’ll have to find a new quip for the poor stupid old Bourbons. The learned nothing and forgotten nothing quip applies far better to Neocons.
Who is this “us” you speak of. It may not mean what you imagine.
W’s one conservative achievement: Sam Alito. Which is one more conservative justice than DJT (“Ya gotta vote for me, ’cause judges”) managed to appoint.