I wasn’t able to tune into Bush’s press conference last night until forty-five minutes into it; just in time to learn that we had found “fifty tons of mustard gas on a turkey farm” in Libya. (So where was the mayo?) And it went downhill from there.
My friend Brian said he listened to the whole sorry mess. It reminded of him of the dorky guy applying for a job for which he is way underqualified, answering simple questions with disjointed thoughts jumbled together in a string of dependant clauses followed by campaign slogans. There were no real answers to specific questions; for example, who’s going to take over Iraq on June 30. “You’ll see,” is what you tell a five-year-old who keeps bugging his parents for a pony. It is not the answer to a question on international relations. And he fumbled the basic interview question that everyone gets – what’s your biggest mistake? The answer is that you’ll win a lot more support if you own up honestly to making an honest error, learning from it, putting it behind you, and going on.
I’m sure that Bush’s supporters think he really rung the bell; someone on NPR said that Bush’s poll numbers will go up after his “strong performance.” But after hearing excerpts and reading some of the answers, it’s clear that this is a man who can’t think on his feet without looking at his notes. And it makes me want to ask my friends who are Bush supporters (I have a few, surprisingly) how they can honestly listen to this man and entrust their life, their fortune, and their future to somone who can’t put together a coherent paragraph.
But at least he didn’t lie about his sex life.