If he can’t take the heat…

September 1, 2005

I’m curious, can anyone think of a time the president was faced with an immediate crisis to which he rose to the occasion? Ever?

When given an intelligence briefing that told him, “Bin Laden Determined To Strike in US,” Bush barely blinked and decided not to cut short his month-long vacation.

When told on 9/11 that the nation is under attack, Bush read “My Pet Goat” for seven minutes, before hiding for the rest of the day.

When the war in Iraq began and “shock and awe” got underway, Bush left town for an uninterrupted break at Camp David.

When the world was rallying to help South Asia after a tsunami devastated the region and killed tens of thousands, Bush, a full three days after the crisis began, rode his bike and cleared brush.

And when Hurricane Katrina was ravaging the Gulf Coast, Bush hesitated for days and pretended to play some guitar before surveying the damage — from a few thousand feet.

I realize that not everyone responds well to pressure. Faced with a crisis, some people’s “fight or flight” instincts are unhelpful. But why on earth would someone who handles crises so poorly want to be president of the United States?

CB, the thing about him playing a guitar reminds me of a Seinfeld bit:

“I think he converted to Judaism just for the jokes!”

“And this offends you as a Jewish person?”

“No, it offends me as a comedian.”

I think this president prentending to play guitar doesn’t offend you as a citizen as much as it offends you as a guitar player. Am I on to something?

  • I think this president prentending to play guitar doesn’t offend you as a citizen as much as it offends you as a guitar player.

    You know, Chief Osceola, I can always count on you for outside-the-box thinking.

    For what’s it’s worth, I’m pretty sure I’d be just as troubled if Bush was pretending to play, let’s say, the drums.

  • yam,

    That’s not fair, no one is pretending that 9/11 or Katrina was a crisis on the order of magnitude of a Terri Schiavo….

  • Who knew people would expect him to actually “deal” with stuff that the campaign hatchet men who are his only aides have no clue about?

    Or that problems don’t disappear just by wishing them away?

    Or that people would actually hold him responsible for the consequences of his stupidity?

    That last one hasn’t happened yet, but it will….it will.

  • Who cares where the president is, anyway? He’s just gonna fuck it up like everything he’s ever touched in his entire life. Where are the Democrats. Why aren’t they tying that picture of Nero with the guitar around his neck? Where are the howls of indignation over the unpreparedness of the gov’t?

    No, no, no. Musn’t politicize this.

    Bite me. Not like this administration left 9/11 alone. Hell, they’re still planning on throwing themselves a little torchlit parade — even today.

    I’m so angry I can’t speak and my stomach is in knots over this. He should be impeached or in jail. A foul-up this large is criminal.

  • In the midst of this thread I’m struck by one thing, one thing that’s been turning up in our research – What’s the vision we have for the future, and who are the leaders and heroes who will carry the torch? When a series of Democratic activists were asked to name their living political heroes and describe their vision of a wonderful future, they were not able to do so. If the grassroots is unable, how can our leaders?
    My vision is of a country in which all citizens share the responsibility for protecting our country equally. The victims of Katrina are primarily people of color and poor. These are the same communities who send their best and brightest to Iraq. These are the families whose tragedies pay military contractors bonuses. Is this fair? Do Americans want this?
    If we eliminate Bush, there are many more who will fill his shoes. Do we want them to shirk their responsibility or fulfill it?

    How do we imagine they will share responsibility? I want a corporate responsibility commission, and a cabinet level position to ensure that the American people are never again taken to the cleaners!

    Heroes: Governor Brian Schweitzer of Montana. David Sirota.

  • I think Bush’s new motto should be “After me, the deluge.” It’s starting to pour now, America. First New Orleans and soon, very soon, the rest of the country. Better get your wet weather gear on, guys, it’s going to be
    getting rough. Be afraid, be very afraid.

  • To borrow D Pecan’s phrase: In the midst of this thread I’m struck by one thing….the appearance of ‘Ms Carpetbagger’??????

  • Evel is not a man in a black cape, or a moster from a nightmare. Evil is indifference to human suffering.

  • If he can’t take the heat…

    Impeach him out of the kitchen.

    This illustrates how unprepared DHS is. I’m suprised there isn’t a New Orleans plan since it’s a major port. Homeland Security means more to me than just protection from terrorists.

    The worst failure is not trying.

  • Carpetbagger said: For what’s it’s worth, I’m pretty sure I’d be just as troubled if Bush was pretending to play, let’s say, the drums.

    I’m troubled by everything that Bush does, but as a former drummer I can’t even fathom this. I’m sure Bush trying to play a 4/4 beat would be much like Steve Martin trying to keep time in the movie The Jerk. You have to have soul to play music, this automatically excludes our dear leader.

  • One more thing. He probably cut his vaction short when he
    realized there was a lot of money to be made from
    this disaster. For him and his base.

  • Bush, apparently, knows very little about the nuts and bolts of organization and government. In these moments, I remember those scenes from the movie, Patton, where the old man would go down into the field and “kick some ass.” There’s that great scene, where the balding colonel is studying a map by the side of a river, trying to puzzle out where he might cross, and Patton yells at him — from the other side of the river! And, of course, there’s Patton directing traffic, and Patton shooting the mules, which have held up the column, allowing it to be strafed.

    A President can have a huge effect on governmental effectiveness, just by asking people to tell him what they are doing. A good President, watching Katrina bear down on the Gulf Coast, would have asked General Myers to brief him on what the military was doing in anticipation of being asked to help — what hospital ships, helicopters, etc. were on alert and being readied to move in? He could have asked FEMA the same question.

    Richard Clarke, a bureaucrat’s bureaucrat if there ever was one, said as much, when asked what should have been done in response to the famous “Bin Laden determined to strike” briefing. Clarke held up Clinton’s response to the Milennium bombing threat: make various federal agencies brief at the White House daily on what they were doing, what they had found out. Shaking the trees, Clarke called it.

    Two things — two aspects of character — are possible prerequisites. One is that you know that is your job, as the head of an organization, to ask questions aimed at prompting and encouraging vigorous action. Two is the imagination and curiosity to allow you to formulate penetrating questions. The second is something you can and should hire advisors for, because no one’s curiousity covers the full breadth of the federal government’s range and depth. The repeated criticism of Bush’s policy process — or lack of one — is really the criticism that he lacks this second prerequisite.

    Whether he knows what his job requires, is, to some extent, answered by that lack of “policy process.” If he knew that was his job, the policy process would be there. It is also answered by the long vacations. Like his father, the man is not just passive as a matter of political philosophy; he is downright lazy. He feels no ambition or drive to accomplish things, so he doesn’t bother to prompt others to accomplish things; he just wants them to leave him alone. If has to have a briefing, he wants it to be short.

    For Democrats, the biggest task is always to get across to the less educated, less aware half of the American people, that politics matters. The Republicans will try to obscure that. Democrats need to connect the dots, right now, when how much politics matters, is on full display.

  • Maybe they are just trying to keep him out of the way so that they can try and get some work done…..

  • What’s that, a cable or something in the background
    of the Nero pic? See Jared’s link. Has anyone noticed
    it?

    It looks like a long, snakelike forked tongue coming
    out of Bush’s mouth.

    Reminds me of the cheat sheet/shoulder pack Bush
    wore during (one of) the debates. Did the media
    just give him a pass on that, ultimately, like everything
    else?

  • What should we expect from a man who has never accomplished anything in his life other than being his daddy’s son, available to the highest bidder for bailing out of his failures?

  • I’ve been asking this question at various points, and it’s harsh but I’m completely serious:

    Why hasn’t the Cabinet invoked the 25th Amendment?

    It’s gone beyond mere incompetence or corruption or even willful ideological blindness. This is pathological.

  • > But why on earth would someone who handles crises so poorly want to be president of the United States?

    That’s easy.

    1) To show he’s just as good as Daddy.

    2) ‘Cause his (oil) friends said he should.

  • I’ve said it before on other sites, and I’ll say it here. This is a man who has by this point spent over 330 days — somewhere around 20% of his entire Presidency on vacation. I realize that there are few jobs more stressful than that one even at the best of times and that whoever holds it needs to have time off in order to deal with it — especially since it’s a 24/7 proposition. However, there are also lots of people in this country who work much more then 40 hours per week and/or hold down more than one job — many of them also work evenings and weekends too, even simply by taking care of the household (which GWB doesn’t have to do), and they don’t take even a quarter as much vacation as this man does. There’s only one word for someone who takes this much time off from work, and that word is SLACKER! If anyone in the private sector tried this sort of thing, they would get fired, and justifiably so.

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