‘If I were the scheduler, maybe I’d do things differently’

March 3, 2006

President Bush has been routinely criticized for his lack of curiosity, but his visit to India this week has magnified just how little the president cares about foreign countries and their culture.

Newsweek’s Richard Wolffe and Holly Bailey noted that when Clinton visited India in 2000, he spent a week touring the country, “famously visiting rural villages and wowing Indian politicians during a speech before the Parliament.”

And then there’s the current president, demonstrating his interest — or lack thereof — in a fascinating country with a burgeoning culture, rich history, and diverse population.

Bush’s visit this week will be speedy and meticulously coordinated. Indeed, the president won’t even visit the Taj Mahal — an omission he blamed on the White House scheduler. “If I were the scheduler, maybe I’d do things differently,” he told a group of Indian journalists last week.

It’s something that has puzzled the locals, at a time when Bush hopes to deepen economic and political ties with the world’s largest democracy. It also frustrates his own aides, who have repeatedly pushed the president to spend time on the softer, cultural side of his foreign travel. According to those aides, it is the president — not his scheduler — who cannot be convinced to carve out time to respect the local culture.

I find it impossible to relate on a personal level, but Bush apparently just doesn’t seem interested. No museums, no cultural or historical landmarks, no meaningful interaction with Indians. For that matter, the fact that he’d blame his aides is not only dishonest, it’s cowardly — he’s arguably the most powerful man in the free world, but he won’t visit the Taj Mahal unless his scheduler tells him it’s okay? Does he expect people to believe this?

The India trip wasn’t unusual in this regard. In November, Bush took a week-long trip through East Asia. As he barnstormed through Japan, South Korea and China, the president “visited no museums, tried no restaurants, bought no souvenirs and made no effort to meet ordinary local people.”

There are, to be sure, security concerns. Before any president can wander into a store or a restaurant, precautions have to be taken, and that no doubt limits Bush’s options. This does not, however, fully explain the president’s lack of curiosity. After all, Clinton spent a week in India exploring different parts of the county and engaging in conversation with as many regular people as he could.

The difference, it seems, is that Bush just doesn’t care. Why this man asked to be a world leader, despite having little to no interest in the world, is something I will never understand.

If I were the scheduler, maybe I’d do things differently

Pinnochio’s Lament
Bush the wooden puppet president bemoans his fate to Jimminy Cheney.
“I wish I were a Real President”.

  • Why this man asked to be a world leader

    He didn’t ask. He was asked. Or more likely told by Cheney and Rummy and Bush Sr. “Here’s what we want you to do. Do it and you will be rewarded.”

  • Well, most of the time I hate to Dis anyone, but in our Dear Leader’s case I have to say that he is Disinterested, Disengaged, Disconnected and shows Disdain for anything beneath him.

  • I think that Bush doesn’t visit museums and interact with the people of other countries for all the reasons you mentioned. But I would add that he appears to be universally disliked wherever he goes and probably would encounter protests or people challenging him if he were to make an effort to meet ordinary people (which he has no kinship with as Clinton does). To maintain “the bubble” and the facade that he is a respected world leader he has to remain isolated, in a make believe boy king world.

  • Bush is trying to gloss over the reason his schedulers didn’t arrange for him to do any siteseeing. Outside of the Indian halls of government there probably weren’t many places where it would be safe for him to show up.

    In just 5 short years Bush has possibly – no make that definitely – become the most most reviled man on Earth.

  • He’s a CEO, plain and simple, and not a good one. The good CEOs give a crap about the people who are affected by his decisions, and the bad ones don’t. I think almost everything Bush has done wrong can be attributed to him seeing himself as only the CEO of the United States Company, instead of a world leader and intuitive human being.

  • Karen and marcus have got it right. There’s just no where this asshole can go–even if he wanted to.

  • His lack of popularity isn’t an excuse for his self-imposed isolation or lack of curiosity. Bush travels with a small army protecting him — I read there were a few thousand people working security for his visit to India. If he had chosen to see the sights, the Indian government could have accommodated his “bubble” needs by finding a few polite, if not syncophantic, locals. There’s just something not right about that man mentally.

  • … the fact that he’d blame his aides is not only dishonest, it’s cowardly …

    Speaking of lying, there’s a great piece up over at firedoglake about Bush and the Philly cheesesteak lie.

    “This is the 32nd time I’ve been to your state of Pennsylvania,” he told the Boeing crowd, “and, you all know the reason why, don’t you? It’s because I like my cheesesteaks Whiz Wit’.”

    Apparently, that’s not true. He prefers American cheese, and he lied about it! This man will lie at the drop of a hat, about anything and everything.

    I can hear him now, as a child, running away from his scary mommy, lying … “I didn’t do it, mommy, I didn’t do it.”

  • Well, let’s not forget the last time he tried to take in a bit of culture – St. Petersburg 2002. He leered at a painting of Venus in the Hermitage and fell asleep at the gala performance of the Nutcracker at the Mariinsky Theatre later that night.

  • It’s the bubble, CB. Bush is weak in his convictions and knows that any of that cultural travel would challenge them, and that’s difficult for him to accept. So he interacts as little as possible, so there is as little challenge to his narrow little worldview as possible. It’s the same reason why he only viewed New Orleans from an airplane five days later and never met any flooded-out residents/refugees on the ground.

    That and the fact that while Clinton was met with song and dance and flowers, Bush would probably be met with protests and riots and Molotovs. Like Karen said, Bush is as universally disliked as Clinton was universally liked.

  • Tens of thousands of “Bush Go Home” protestesters in India would dampen his already dim sightseeing curiosity… but wait till he goes to Pakistan, after giving India our nuclear technology….
    The bubble just got smaller.
    Bush, the cartoon president, might just destabilize governments, in a land where they take cartoons seriously.

  • “Incurious George”. I’m suprised that I haven’t yet seen any chopped images of that Curious George movie poster, replacing the monkey with the monkey-king, etc.

  • Bush isn’t curious about his own nation, its culture or history, so why should he give damn about some “ferriner’s”? Even his own “ranch” is a fraud by local Texas standards. Bush cares about one thing, and one thing only: his subordinate role in the Bush Crime Family.

  • Blaming it on an anonymous scheduler is kinder than saying you just aren’t interested. So I don’t fault him for that.

    It’s hard to exactly “fault” him for not being interested, for that matter. I mean, you are or you aren’t. We’ve known all along that he isn’t. This kind of thing is obviously excruciatingly boring to him. Now if these countries are interested in making deals with him, and buttering the guy up, they need to point him in the direction of some great bike trails or whatever it is that he likes.

    Is it stupid of us to have a president who is so incurious? You bet. But there was ample evidence of it even before the 2000 election, and apparently some people think it’s even stupider to have a lawyer for president.

    Makes a little sense, though. Museums and culture are really a nice perk that the upper middle class gets governments to fund. Appealing to lawyers. But how many blue collar guys do you know who make it a point to visit museums and the theater regularly? And we all know that Bush was really meant to spend this life as a gas station attendant….

  • Ed, I think the proper title for the Bush spread would be ranchette. Wouldn’t it be a kick if the MSM started calling it that?

  • In Bush’s defense, Clinton was popular and respected abroad. Everybody wants Bush to Go Home or Drop Dead…

    Kinda impacts his mingle-ability

  • Bush’s excuse for not going to the Taj Mahal (the nasty ol’ skejler wouldn’t let me) is the quintessence of Bush – deceit, cowardice, and the shirking of responsibility at a world champion level.

  • I recall that Dubya had done ZERO international travel before running for president. I think he may have made a single foreign trip. And that’s the person we elected and that’s the person we got as president. Incurious, incredulous, incompetent at international relations.

  • I go along with Ed. Bush has no interest in culture.
    Period. Anybody’s. He doesn’t read, he doesn’t
    ask questions. He’s as empty a human being
    as anyone could possibly be. Too bad it doesn’t
    stop there. It’s what he is that’s really dangerous.

  • Catherine, Bush as gas pump attendant…wow…what an image…

    It’s worth quoting Bush’s entire comment about “the scheduler” that CB mentions (as noted in AP writer Deb Riechmann’s article):

    “Look, if I were the scheduler, perhaps I’d be doing things differently. But you want me doing one thing. I’ll be the President, we’ve got the scheduler being the scheduler. I’m going to miss a lot of the really interesting parts of your great country.”

    This tortured speech is so typical and so telling. Bush starts with the brittle, challenging “Look” that he always uses to show he disagrees and doesn’t like what the other person just said. Then he moves on to his classic line about “doing” “one thing”, “being President” (whatever that means) and blaming “you” (everyone else) for making him that way. In the process he affixes blame to a straw man and avoids a direct answer, while saying nothing other than that he’s the President — he doesn’t even mention the Taj Mahal in his answer.

    His inarticulateness goes hand-in-hand with his incuriosity about the world. The man has a learning disability.

  • I think Bush is just racist. He’ll go and hang out when he’s in Russia but he won’t if it’s India, Japan, or Korea? Is that what I’m hearing?

    As with a lot of racists nowadays (who have to work with whoever they have to work with), it’s a semi-permeable membrane. He’ll deal with some African Americans if the person is a woman who’s kissing his ass (strokes his ego / makes a good photo-op) or if it’s a practical necessity (has to have some token persons working for him / has to do appropriate photo-ops).

    How many Americans are going to read about his more-or-less routine trips to foreign countries? Our national culture is so self-centered that most people won’t scrutinize that and won’t notice that this guy shuns the company of brown people. Unless you’re a rich oil baron, in which case he’ll hold your hand in front of the TV cameras.

  • From todays news : Students rallied in Islamabad, burning an effigy of Bush. Some carried signs that said, “Go back, go back big Satan Bush.”

    He is kind of a uniter, and he does evoke passionate political expression.
    He may not be curious, but he does inspire wonder in other people asking how could America elect this man president?
    He is the master of unintended consequences.
    Theocracy is on the march.

  • The inattention and slurred speech are symptoms of the alcohol poisoning from his wasted youth. Don’t expect any improvement. It only gets worse. Good thing president Rove is there to keep him in line.

  • I wroteL

    How many Americans are going to read about his more-or-less routine trips to foreign countries?

    I meant to refer to trips that are not made for some specially interesting reason, of course, rather than to suggest that he goes to other countries a lot, which he doesn’t.

  • Even after having flown there, I’ll bet that the Bush still can’t find India on an unlabeled world map. Maybe even a labeled one.

  • But he’s good at finding money. I’ll bet he scarfed up new connections for his Big Money Friends to outsource American jobs during his brief stay.

  • It’s because, notwithstanding his efforts to distinguish himself from his father, his relationship to the presidency is much the same as G. H. W. Bush’s.

    That is, neither father nor son were really interested in being president. Rather, what both wanted was to be “Mr. President.” Their interest is not in job, but in the *prestige* of the job. Each was working out the neuroses bequeathed him by the narcissistic Bush family romance.

    This became clear in the context of Katrina. Where a president who was really challenged by his job would have instantly–and eagerly–cut short a tedious political and money-raising trip and returned to Washington to be at the center of the action, Bush actually *preferred* to continue his glad-handing tour–where he could expose himself to his supporters’ adulation–rather than actually do the *job* he was elected to do.

  • Nancy–

    Well, yes, but you can’t blame them for that.
    But you can blame us for picking him.

    (Mind you, George, Sr., has a lot more going on, so it’s possible there was more to it for him.)

    I’m suddenly imagining an American public with 2 resumes in front of them, deciding who to pick for a job. And the job is one that sets public policy, so the liberal or conservative bent of the person is also relevant to your choice. It suddenly seems unfair that they should only have 2 resumes to choose between. Surely if they had more this travesty wouldn’t have happened?

  • “Bush just doesn’t care.”

    DING DING DING DING! We have a winner!

    Exactamundo. He doesn’t care. If it ain’t from Texas, it’s beneath him.

    Now if they had barbecue brisket in India– or better yet, oil–, that might interest him some.

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