Bill Maher article/Bush on Larry King

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2003
Bill Maher article/Bush on Larry King
66
Fri, 08-13-2004 - 8:35am
Did anyone know of the 20 minute photo-op AFTER the seven minutes and "My Pet Goat"? Saw Bill on Larry King and he made a great point that's not in his article. There is a guy who's sole job is to tag along with the President with a briefcase handcuffed to his wrist. The briefcase holds the "Big Red Button" that could launch US nuclear missiles should we be attacked. This is to save time in the event of a strike. Bill said "Is Bush the guy we want in charge of those nuclear codes?" He did nothing on 9/11. I say, apparently the guy with the briefcase can be 7 minutes and a photo-op away and still have time to spare.

Also, saw Bush on Larry King last night. The guy can't pass up a chance to say 9/11. Too bad he didn't have anything else to say and Larry was lobbing him softball questions with no real follow-up. Good thing Laura was there too. She made Bush's fumblings less obvious. I think overall this was a warm-up for convention or debates. Very weak interview, but it's nice to see George step out of his safe Republican scripted campiagn spots. Too bad the press can't really press him for real answers.

Bush blew it the morning of 9/11



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/story/221433p-190107c.html



By BILL MAHER



John Kerry has waded into an issue raised by Michael Moore in his film "Fahrenheit 9/11," namely, President Bush's sitting for seven minutes in a Florida classroom after being told "the country is under attack." Republicans are waxing indignant, of course. But the criticism is richly deserved.

The fact that Bush wasted 27 minutes that day - not only the seven minutes reading to kids but 20 more at a photo op afterward - was, in my view, the most outrageous thing a President has done since Franklin Roosevelt tried to pack the Supreme Court.

Watergate was outrageous but it still did not carry the possibility of utter devastation, like a President's freezing at the very moment we needed his immediate focus on an attack on the United States.

This is an issue about the ultimate presidential duty, acting in an emergency. If nothing else in Washington is nonpartisan, this should be.

But it is not. Republicans are tying themselves in knots trying to defend Bush's actions that morning. The excuses they put forward are absurd:


He was "gathering his thoughts." This was a moment a President should have imagined a thousand times. There is no time in the nuclear age for a President to sit like Forrest Gump "gathering thoughts" after an attack has begun. Gathering information is what he should have been doing.

From the White House press secretary: "The President felt he should project strength and calm until he could better understand what was happening." I agree that gaining a better understanding of what was happening should have been his goal. What I don't get is how that goal was reached by just sitting there instead of getting up and talking to people. Is he a psychic? Was he receiving the information telepathically?

"He didn't want to scare the children." Vice President Cheney has said of Kerry, "The senator from Massachusetts has given us ample reason to doubt the judgment he brings to vital issues of national security." So Kerry's judgment is suspect, but at a moment of national crisis, Bush's judgment was: Better not to scare 20 children momentarily than to react immediately to an attack on the country!

If he had just said, "Hey, kids, gotta go do some President business - be good to your moms and dads, bye!" my guess is the kids would have survived.

I cannot see how someone who considers himself a conservative can defend George Bush's inaction. Conservatives pride themselves on being clear-eyed and decisive. They don't do nuance, and they respect toughness.

But Bush choked at the most important moment a President could have. We're lucky Al Qaeda had done its worst by the time he pulled himself away from the photo op. Next time, it might not be that way.

Maher is the host of HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher."



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iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 08-18-2004 - 3:08pm
Sorry to burst your bubble, but Bush was then in the control of the Secret Service, who takes over total control of the President in any time of danger to him.

They dictate his movements around the country. The same is true for Cheney, and then down the chain of command.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2003
Wed, 08-18-2004 - 3:58pm
But since Lil George was far away in Florida he wasn't grabbed and run off to the hills of West Virginia. He even had time for a 20 minute photo-op with the kiddies. Who knows, maybe he even stopped for ice cream and a pony ride. After all, his staff was taking care of it.

Debateguy, you've really lost your objectivity. I really enjoyed reading your posts, even when we differed, now you sound like truemobile. :-(

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 08-18-2004 - 4:49pm
My objectivity is still there, but perhaps it is not to your liking.

The secret service did its job that day in as much as once the President was onboard Air Force One, they then decided not to go back to Washington DC for the fear that Washington was still a target, and they had no idea if any international planes were of the same fate as the four planes already downed.

This is all I am saying. I dont think the President was hiding out as many on the left try to portray, which is a very sad and weak attack on the President.

From what I have read, the joint chiefs were being made fully aware of the situation, and even NORAD, which is supposed to have control over situations such as this was not totally in the know (which scares me a good deal). The President does react, once he gets the information from those that are supposed to supply it to him, and that is it.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Wed, 08-18-2004 - 7:59pm
I never said he should have hightailed it outta there. I merely said he should have gotten up and used the telephone. Was that being secured by the Secret Service too? He should have gotten up and asked for more details on the situation than the twelve words whispered in his ear. Was Andy Card in some kind of security quarantine? Was the television being checked for bombs?

Your arguement that the President simply wasn't needed during the first attack on American soil since Pearl Harbor is a unique one. I think he probably was.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2003
Thu, 08-19-2004 - 7:49am
My apologies to the board. My comeuppance came in today's NYT editorial - "But it felt good" ;-)

Babies and Bath Water

By DAHLIA LITHWICK

Maybe it's just that I'm having too many long talks with my 16-month-old these days, but I find myself sensitive to the language of "daddies" and "dummies." This is the language of toddlerhood; it's not how we should be framing a national conversation about the president.

It cannot have escaped anyone's notice that much of the current Bush-bashing aims to infantilize him. The most devastating segment in Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11," for instance, features the president - just after he learned of the second attack on the World Trade Center - perched on a chair in a Florida classroom, looking glazed and confused as he listens to a reading of "The Pet Goat." Mr. Bush's aide might well have whispered the news to one of the assembled students to greater effect, and the implication is inescapable: for seven long minutes, the president was Not a Man.

A glance at the top 150 ads selected by MoveOn.org for its recent political advertising contest, "Bush in 30 Seconds," similarly reveals the extent to which childishness is woven into the current Bush-bashing. While children have long been used in political ads to represent the future, many of the MoveOn entries use them to satirize the actual candidate. Several of the proposed anti-Bush commercials use kids to condemn the president for unsophisticated thinking, for an infantile worldview, for the fact that his daddy purchased his every big break and for the fact that he is desperately beholden to the wealthy and powerful grown-ups surrounding him. The clear message is that Bush is more a child than an adult.

What's wrong with continuing efforts to characterize Mr. Bush as a not-particularly-smart third grader? For one thing, it plays to every stereotype of liberals as snotty know-it-alls who think everyone in a red state is anti-intellectual or simple-minded. It answers name-calling from the right with name-calling from the left.

These assertions also insult anyone who voted for Mr. Bush in 2000. Rather than offering an argument for Mr. Kerry, they merely disparage swing voters, who may be tempted to defect to the Democrats over the war or the economy, by sneering that they voted for a kid - and a dumb kid at that.

One of the most enduring memories from the Bush-Gore debates in 2000 was Al Gore, all sighs and eye-rolls, trapped in what must have felt like the middle-school playground fight from hell instead of a presidential debate. Everything about Mr. Gore's demeanor signaled that he felt he was giving a punk kid a much-needed scolding. Which missed the point: a lot of very smart people voted for Mr. Bush in 2000 because to them, he represented a return to honesty and morality. Dismissing him as a stupid child, and these voters as stupid-children-by-association, is no way to win them back.

Furthermore, the campaign to cast Mr. Bush as a bumbling child ignores the very grown-up machine that stands behind him. Infantilizing the president shifts the focus away from the Cheneys, Rumsfelds, Ashcrofts and Wolfowitzes. These are the men who promised us short, easy wars and painless little suspensions of the Geneva Conventions. These are the men of the secret energy-policy meetings. They aren't a bunch of rowdy juveniles. They represent one of the most secretive, powerful administrations in recent memory. Whether the president could outscore your kids on the SAT is a distraction from that fact.

Finally, there is a psychological consequence to labeling the president an incurious frat boy. With each attempt to cast Mr. Bush as a baby, we craft excuses for his childish behaviors. If Mr. Bush misled us into a war in Iraq, it's because children have trouble telling the truth. If Mr. Bush sees the world in too-stark terms, it's because nuanced reasoning isn't easy for children. With each comparison between the president and a youngster, we subtly lower national expectations and exonerate bad behavior.

This election is not a choice between adults and children, and it won't be won or lost with jokes about whether Laura ties the president's shoes each morning before she points him toward the Oval Office. Nothing is gained by offering Mr. Bush even a metaphorical second childhood. Much may be gained by offering our real children a safe and just first one.


Dahlia Lithwick, a senior editor at Slate, is a guest columnist during August. Thomas L. Friedman is on leave until October, writing a book.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2003
Thu, 08-19-2004 - 8:00am
I agree your voting for Bush is very much not to my liking, but I really don't have a problem with people who believe in him to vote for him. My problem is with people who don't vote. My point is that I really enjoyed reading your posts, whether or not they agreed or disagreed with me. I often found them informative and well thought out. Now they seem more like attacks, but as I stated earlier perhaps they're just responses to the extreme left. I'm also an incredibly curious person and I'm dying to know what pulled you off the fence toward the Bush camp. I hope you'll tell us.

As to the other point, I don't think the Pres was hiding out, obviously he had time for his photo-op and such. He certainly wasn't whisked away as the media said they weren't fully aware of the situation until they were in the air on Air Force One and they knew they weren't headed back to DC. I don't have a problem that he was taken to a secure location, just as Cheney and many Senators and Congressmen were too. I agree that the Secret Service did their job. I'm just not convinced the President did. Nor do I believe he had a clue what to do. I've tried to honestly answer what I would do if in his place. Again, I'm an incredibly curious person. I would want to know a whole lot more than the six or seven words whispered in my ear. I also wouldn't leave everything up to my staff. No matter how experienced and thorough the staff, the boss makes the decisions and asks the questions. Maybe it's the difference in management style but there comes a time when every manager/leader is "hands on". When the chips are down and the decision is critical, the true leaders "want the ball".

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Thu, 08-19-2004 - 10:53pm
I basically have been lurking in the Bush camp since 2000.

I voted for him then, based on his message of compassionate conservatism, and have been somewhat disappointed thus far. I however, could never bring myself to vote for a Northeast liberal of the cut and manner of a Ted Kennedy or even a John Kerry (who has been mentored by the aforementioned Kennedy, which is what scares me).

Many of my posts are responses to attacks by the left (mainly the extremists) and I am not too fond of the extreme right either. I listen to Ann Coulter, but think that after a few minutes of making sense, she turns cooky and goes overboard, so I stop. The same applies for Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh. They too can make a good point, but take it too far.

With regards to what happened on 9/11, I dont know what I would do in such a situation, except want to launch a nuclear attack and kill everyone responsible for the attack on our country, along with every living relative of those people (sorry I know that is overkill but that is my anger speaking as I witnessed what happened in NYC first hand). All I can say is that I am thankful that I do not have that kind of responsibility, and do not envy the person that does.

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2003
Mon, 08-23-2004 - 12:26pm
As I said I'm an incredibly curious person. Do you mind telling me the last time you voted for a Dem or Independent or Green, etc? If you voted for Bush before you might be a right-leaning Independent - but I'd like more than one vote to decide (but also don't want you to have to list everyone you've ever voted for! :-) )

Reason I ask. THis is the first time I'm heavily involved and I truly don't understand how anyone can vote for Bush. You as an Independent, more to the center - not Repub or Dem (at least that's what I was thinking), could maybe offer some insight as to why so I could at least understand it. But if you lean more to the right anyway, I'm thinking you still won't be able to help me get there and maybe this explains why I was disappointed with some of your recent posts.

And as an addition, I can understand those who were already extremists, those whose only issue is abortion or gun control, etc - one issue voters, or even those who just always vote party lines regardless of the person, but after these groups, why would anyone else vote for Bush. That's why I come to this board and I just haven't seen a reason I understand. Facts and ideas are thrown out there but I can refute with information I have read and such. I guess it's the Quest of the Holy Grail and if I figure it out it'll explain the bigger question of why the counry is so polarized.

Thanks!!!

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Mon, 08-23-2004 - 2:36pm
I voted for Bill Clinton (gasp) in 1992, but not in 1996 as I perferred Bob Dole (I guess the scandals had something to do with it)

I also voted for the re-election of Joe Lieberman, but not for Dodd, and did vote for Ed Koch when I lived in NYC.

I am all over the place with my votes, and will try to elect who I feel will do what is best for the city / state / country.

I guess I am of the Rudy Giuliani mold who is just a registered Independent. I really dont fully conform to all of what the Republicans stand for nor the Democrats, as I try to blend a little from each party. I am a true moderate (probably as in the middle of the road as you can get) in most things I guess you could say.

I dont like extremists from either side, unless I want to get a laugh out of their version of the truth, like Anne Coulter or James Carville.....they are so out of tune it is actually funny, as they are both intelligent people, but somewhere, the wiring inside isnt connected properly.

I am sticking with Bush because I dont like what Kerry stands for, which so far is everything and nothing at the same time. Kerry cannot seem to take a stance on an issue and stick with it for more than a couple of weeks at best, which bothers me a lot. I wish that someone like Gephardt could have won the nomination because then I would truly have a legitimate choice. I may not agree with a lot of what Gephardt believes in but at least he is steadfast in his beliefs, and you know where he stands and can decide from there.


Edited 8/23/2004 8:41 pm ET ET by debateguy

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-16-2004
Mon, 08-23-2004 - 3:23pm
Wow, I've never seen more Armchair Monday-morning quarterbacking than I've seen from the anti-Bush people in this thread. You guys should all run for office - maybe you can save the country from destruction since you guys know it all so much better than the president. I suppose all these "Bush-should-have-done-something-immediately" people can tell me exactly what Bush could have accomplished in the seven (or 20, or 30, it keeps changing) minutes that would have changed the course of 9/11 or its aftermath. And don't give me any of this "we needed a leader" business - no one had a problem with this seven minutes thing until the election came along. If so many people were unhappy with Bush's performance during 9/11 and if he was as lousy a leader as so many on this board claim, why did his approval ratings reach almost 90% during this time?

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