The Huffington Post | The Blog— Letting a woman camp out for weeks on end in front of his place is bad enough. But why exactly does Bush need a FIVE WEEK vacation during the middle of a war? This has been bothering everyone including me. Meanwhile, this analysis brings up other weird issues.
As a psychoanalyst who has been studying Bush’s words and behavior in hopes of better understanding his mind, I’m heartened that so many critics have drawn the nation’s attention to Bush’s need to repeat points and phrases — even after their inaccuracy has been established. Now critics see clearly his distaste for having to meet with the people whose lives he has forever changed.
But recognition only raises the deeper question: why, in the face of incontrovertible evidence to the contrary, does Bush persist in this way? How does it help him to continue repeating himself to a nation that increasingly believes he is lying on several fronts? How does his refusal to meet with Cindy Sheehan help him?
There is a two-part answer to this question: First, as far as Bush is concerned, he is telling the truth; as Madeleine Albright recently said to Columbia Magazine: “the most serious problem is that George Bush now believes what he says.” Like many of my hospitalized patients, Bush has created a vast, detailed but vague delusional system he feels compelled to maintain at all costs. This system helps him manage the terrifying anxiety that threatens to make his already endangered inner world more chaotic.
The second answer is made clear by his reaction to Cindy Sheehan: he believes his lies because he feels his survival depends on it. He cannot help her mourn; he cannot take responsibility for his destructiveness. If he could he would. His inner need to be right would not just be modified; his entire internal mental structure would be shattered.
found by H. Fuller
— as Madeleine Albright recently said to Columbia Magazine: “the most serious problem is that George Bush now believes what he says.” —
Hmm. Just wondering if anyone can relate the above sentence to the movie “Downfall”…
http://www.downfallthefilm.com/
“Bush wasn’t wrong. Bush’s decision wasn’t wrong; rather, it was a mistake.” – George – 8/17/2005 @ 3:45 pm
Sorry George… Dictionary.com says he’s wrong.
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=wrong&db=*
PRES. BUSH HAS ALREADY MET WITH CINDY SHEEHAN WAKE UP GUYS!!!!
AFTER THEIR MEETING CINDY HAS BEEN QUOTED AS SAYING BUSH WAS SINCERE IN THE LOSS OF HER SON.
NOW THAT SHE HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER BY LIBERALS SHE HAS CHANGED HER VIEW. WHY MUST BUSH MEET WITH HER AGAIN? SHE IS OBVIOUSLY AT HIS RANCH FOR THE LIBERAL LEFT (AND ITS WORKING LOOK AT EVERYONE WHO THINKS THEY HAVE NOT MET).
I FOR ONE FEEL BAD FOR MRS. SHEEHAN BUT HELLO ITS A VOLUNETARY ARMY. PEOPLE DIE IN WAR YOUR SON VOLENTEERED.
Funny…..the difference between meeting him with a group of other people, just weeks after his death, and now….has been explained
“Sheehan met with Bush in June 2004 but said she deserves another meeting since there have been so many recent revelations about faulty pre-war intelligence.”
Look, Jack, she’s NOT “working” for the liberal left. That’s a way to trivialize it. The war is a pathetic joke. The rest of the world is seeing US as war mongers and irrational. We are not in the “right” (meaning correct position) here….and, the president is doing his best to put his fingers in his ears and say “lalalala” really loudly. He greets everything with a SMIRK and insincerity (try watching him with the SOUND OFF). He seems to not be there…..like “lights are on, no one is home” kind of not there. Meanwhile, we are sending troups to a country that is in the midst of civil war, and ignoring that there are eons upon eons of distrust and anger between the various sects and tribes….and somehow, by ignoring a few, and focusing on the ones that will accept our bribes….that we will somehow LIBERATE a country. I’m sorry, but didn’t we try this in Viet Nam? Didn’t we learn anything?
We’d do better splitting the country into many….and putting each tribe in control, and stepping away quickly…..
Then get OUR house in order. We’re spending billions, trillions on a war on the other side of the world while we have deplorable education, cutting social services to the poor, aged, and mentally disabled…. we have incredible poverty, we have soaring health costs, and we have an aging and crumbling infrastructure in most of the urban centers. Meanwhile, we have an open boarder with Mexico that is bringing in crime, (organized and not), and flooding our workforce with cheap, inefficient labor…. ignoring our own unskilled laborers. (If you doubt this….then at least wonder then why 10,000 people just showed up to apply for 400 jobs at a new Walmart in Oakland, CA.)
Our country is disolving under our very feet…..fracturing….and our “leader” is about as “in tune” with the people as Donald Duck is with how trousers should fit.
Jack, George…you guys are doing nothing to help. Move more towards moderate and open your eyes.
Hey Jack,
The dictionary def of Liberal is “One who is open minded”. Try it.
1. This woman wanted another meeting – the Duhbya has meet with parents on more than one instance – of course they were Duh supporters to begin with. Maybe he’s afraid.
2. Yes her son was one of the many good kids that made the decision to put their frail bodies between the country and its enemies – all the more reason to use them as you would any precious resource – with wisdom and fore thought.
And BTW – don’t SHOUT AT ME AND OTHERS THROUGH YOUR ENTIRE POST ITS RUDE – just a few ucase words usually get the point across.
“I might disagree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.” — Voltaire (you know one of those French guys)
Thank you Jack for that reading from the Republican party talking points about Cindy Sheehan email.
Those guys aren’t conservatives. Conservatives wouldn’t favor a fascist “president” who starts wars preemtively while creating more Orwellian government bodies to intrude on people’s personal lives. They also don’t blow out the budget. Jack and George, besides obviously having their thoughts beamed in from a Fox News antenna, are corporate apologists who don’t mind corporations taking over their country = fascists.
Good points meetsy.
And you’re right on how to solve the issues in Iraq. Give the Kurds the North oil fields – give the Shiites the south oil fields and give the sunni’s the shitty middle. Then – get out of Dodge. That was the way it was in the beginning. If we had done this in the begining we would be out and smelling like roses.
Sigh… I think most of us by now realize that Bush himself is just the front man, the anchorman, and about as informed as Ron Burgundy. He’s the guy they prep with the messages to go out and fill up the media with the daily tripe. He’s a “leader” alright: a “cheerleader”. He may or may not believe what he says; it helps him sell it when he happens to. Heck, half the time, he probably doesn’t even understand what he’s selling. He’s not stupid by any means, it’s just that it’s not his job to deeply understand what he sells. It’s his job to APPEAR tough and consistent and principled. It’s a marketing program, not a presidency. The sad thing is that this is what most of America wants these days.
George,
You’d be doing yourself a favor to search out the intelligence reports (including ones signed off on by Condoleeza Rice) from that time which have gotten out to the press. Actually read them … it’s fascinating stuff. The National Intelligence Estimate and declassified CIA reports (with pictures even!) come to these huge conclusions about WMD they are sure Iraq has … based on pretty much zero evidence. Reading the reports one is struck by the fact that all factual evidence says Iraq has no WMD … right up to the point where the conclusion says they absolutely do have WMD!
All of the experts outside the intelligence community at the time were saying the whole thing was a crock. This included people like Scott Ritter, Hans Blix, Mohammed Al-Baradei. People who had, y’know, been on the ground and seen the place.
It is clear, to me anyway, that existing ‘we know this, this, and this .. which isn’t very evil at all’ reports were rather hastily doctored to add ‘We’re sure Saddam has WMD and wants to use them’ conclusions at the top, and this was the pretext for war.
You may disagree. But do yourself a favor and look at the source documents, not just what the talking heads on the evening news have to say. At least then you’ll be in possesion of real facts rather than the pre-chewed pap you’re getting from the clueless ‘we report it, we don’t analyze it’ media.
Why should it be so supprising that George Bush is a true beliver? For a president with an untreated learning disorder repetition and nicknames seems to work fine. If you can frame everything in black and white or absolutes you don’t have to do any deep thinking.
I wonder if many Americans realise what a laughing stock Bush has made of their country in the past few years.
Speaking as an ‘outsider’ it seems incomprehensible to me that such an outright nutjob could ‘win’ the presidency in the first place, but especially how he was able to retain that job after all the damage hes done.
Yes yes, I know hes just a puppet (and a rather silly looking one), but people still trust the guy.
Simply staggering!
How about this for a scenario. Bush is ‘declaired’ impared (not as bad sounding as incompetent) based on the items in the article. He was so affected by the ‘revelation’ that we went to war and too many good men and women died based on a lie that he slowly lost it. Chaney becomes president, but his health isn’t good and being president may kill him, yet he struggles valiantly to finish out the term. Overcome by sadness and appreciation for the sacrifice Bush (his sanity) and Chaney (his health) made for the country, the easily swayed American public, out of sympathy, votes into office whatever Republican that runs in 98..
Given all that has happened in the last decade, tell me this is really that crazy.