Bush really did look like an idiot, regarding The Pet Goat

[Ignacio Upton]

In all honesty, I was in that 90% camp of people who believed in following the "support our President" etiquette. I remember on 9/11 itself (and I hated Bush long before 9/11) I was talking to someone about what the government was doing in response to the attacks. The person I talked to just said: "Bush isn't doing anything, he's just sitting around in Florida" or something to that effect. I responded by saying something along the lines of needing to support him and the government in responding back (yeah it was a stupid thing of me to say in hindsight, but tell that to 80%-90% of the public that was scared shitless that day and didn't know where else to turn to.)
I saw the footage of Bush's Pet Goat incident while watching F 9/11 when it was in theaters two years ago, and while it got me a little uneasy, I felt "he probably didn't want to scare the children he was reading to." But in all honesty, those kids were going to find out about the attacks sooner or later. Sitting around for seven minutes while America is under attack is NOT the best thing to do, but unfortunately I only gradually came to understand how incompetent his action was. I also forgot until recently when I was thinking back to what I was doing on 9/11, that someone I knew was criticizing Bush for staying in Florida ON 9/11 ITSELF. I also remember hearing people that day saying that Saddam Hussein was involved in the attacks. From remembering those incidents, I feel that in hindsight I got a foreshadowing of the next five years.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

1. No worries

Confession time: I felt the same way you did. I didn't like Bush but I thought we should get behind the President in a time of crisis. I even criticized the Dixie Chicks for what they said in England!

Natalie, Martie, Emily: I'm so sorry :cry: :cry: :cry:

[Ignacio Upton]

2. Well I didn't go that far

I supported Bush more or less until I heard/read about Tora Bora and I would see Rummy get on tv and deny that Osama was even there! A few weeks (or I think it was a month) later, I saw a news report about how Karl Rove had circulated a memo detailing how the Republicans should politicize the 2002 midterm elections. Up until that point, I genuinely believed that 9/11 had brought about a sense of unity and bipartisanship, and that people in both parties were acting in good faith. No more! When I heard about the Rove memo in early 2002, I came back to my senses...although I was on the fence about the Iraq War, as I supported a "wait and see" approach in allowing the inspectors back in, while at the same time I thought that an invasion should only happen with a real coalition and credibility.

[Syrinx]

5. I remember feeling a similar way

When 9/11 first happened, I remember saying "I don't like Bush, but now we have to stand behind the president."

My psychosis cleared up way before the Dixie Chicks thing. :D

[mikelewis]

9. Oh, I loved him....

So don't feel bad. I honestly had absolutely no clue. I had Rush and Glenn Beck telling me everyday on the radio how brilliant I was because I understood him. Man, that kool-aid starts to get bitter after a while... but I woke up and that means the others can too.

[bamademo]

31. I immediately knew it was *'s fault.

I felt so lonely because I was a 10 percenter.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

3. many of us were blinded by the shock and the pain...

Congratulations for not letting your emotions overcome logic.

:toast:

[Bucky]

14. Yeh, but "many of us" didn't have the job of protecting the country

Moments of crisis are extremely revealing of hidden realities. The thing I always found significant about the My Pet Goat moment isn't that Bush didn't spring into action while the country was under an attack of unknown dimensions. It's that nobody on his team with him felt it was necessary to secure and mobilize the supposed commander-in-chief as soon as the attack became clear. They secured and mobilized Cheney--they knew who had to make the decisions and who wasn't important.

[Syrinx]

4. When I first say Fahrenheit 9/11, I thought he looked guilty

When Card whispered into his ear, I saw a look of complete guilt in his face.

[sandnsea]

6. I was glad the country came together

I actually was glad Gore wasn't President because I knew Republicans wouldn't support him the way Democrats did Bush. And true to form, they immediately started babbling about how they were glad Gore wasn't President because he wouldn't fight or know what to do, bla bla ba. So I gave Bush the benefit of the doubt, how hard could it be to invade Afghanistan and then rebuild it to prove to the world we weren't monsters??? Pretty fuckin' 'hard', it turns out. He's going to go down as one of the all time worst leaders, not just worst Presidents.

[Bucky]

12. It's worse than that. Many Republicans actually said it your way...

I remember when the unity & manners started to fade, several Republican operatives started to say they were glad Bush was president because if it was Gore, the country would've been divided and torn apart by blaming games. It was a pretty stunning admission of just how seasonal their "patriotism" is.

[JI7]

19. it certainly says a lot that their view of something to be proud of

is having a person be in charge during a disaster. in some other nations it would have led to calls for resignation.

"i'm so glad 9/11 happened under Bush's watch because 9/11 under Gore would have been horrible. under Bush 9/11 was just great"

[OneBlueSky]

7. an even more interesting question is . . .

why didn't the Secret Service hustle his ass out of there when they learned (supposedly for the first time) that "America is under attack?" . . .

either they completely failed at their jobs that day (HIGHLY unlikely, given the nature of the agency), OR they knew that Bush was in no danger . . .

what I'd like to know is HOW they knew -- and who told them . . .

[mikelewis]

11. Logic like that is unacceptable and should never be uttered again!!!!

Heretic!!!! America Hater!!!! Only a homosexual or a Macaca tries to get other people to believe "Conspiracy Theories".

[Bucky]

20. According to CooperativeResearch.org, there may've been an attempt on Bush

In their article (linked to by the trustworthy WhatReallyHappened.org), "An Interesting Day: President Bush's Movements and Actions on 9/11", CooperativeResearch.org explains that a suspicious, but never publicized, event on the morning of 9/11 fit the M.O. of how al-Qaeda hit one of their enemies in Afghanistan two days earlier. My guess is that they probably are covering up just how inept Bush's stand-by security detail really was that day.

An Assassination Attempt?

At about the same time Bush was getting ready for his {morning} jog, a van carrying several Middle Eastern men pulled up to the Colony’s guard station. The men said they were a television news crew with a scheduled “poolside” interview with the president. They asked for a certain Secret Service agent by name. The message was relayed to a Secret Service agent inside the resort, who hadn’t heard of the agent mentioned or of plans for an interview. He told the men to contact the president’s public relations office in Washington, DC, and had the van turned away. {Longboat Observer, 9/26/01}

The Secret Service may have foiled an assassination attempt. Two days earlier, Ahmed Shah Massoud, leader of Afghanistan’s Northern Alliance, had been murdered by a similar ruse. Two North African men, posing as journalists from “Arabic News International,” had been requesting an interview with Massoud since late August. Ahmad Jamsheed, Massoud’s secretary, said that by the night of September 8, “they were so worried and excitable, they were begging us.” An interview was arranged for the following day. As it began, a bomb hidden in the video camera exploded, killing the two journalists.

Nearly three hours after the incident at the Colony, another Longboat Key resident reported a run-in with possibly the same men. At about 8:50 (when reports of the first World Trade Center crash were first broadcast), while standing on the Sarasota bay front waiting for the presidential motorcade to pass by, this man saw two Middle Eastern men in a dilapidated van “screaming out the windows ‘Down with Bush’ and raising their fists in the air.” The FBI questioned the man, but it’s not known if this was the same van that had visited the Colony.

[Rainscents]

8. Is he reading the book upside down?

:scared: He actually went to college?

[Bucky]

10. I like how he has a yellow post-it note in My Pet Goat...needed a bookmark

I mean, you didn't expect him to finish My Pet Goat all in one sitting, did you?

[mikelewis]

13. At first I thought he was just high.. then I thought he was scared...

Now, I know he was just complicit. Fucking traitor.

[sandnsea]

16. I thought it was bafflement

That look always got to me, but I didn't realize at first how long he had actually sat there. I thought it was a momentary bafflement, like 'whoa this went way wrong', then off on his airplane ride. Another thing that sort of strikes as pretty stupid, being the only airplane in the sky on a day we're being attacked from the sky. I don't think they planned it, they truly are too stupid. But it wouldn't surprise me to find out they let it happen, they are monstrous people.

[DoYouEverWonder]

21. What went wrong was Flight 93 left over 1/2 late

and Bush, Rummie, Cheney and the rest got stuck having to stall until the Pentagon was hit. If wasn't until after 9:30 AM before anyone of them responded to the ongoing attack.

[mwb970]

28. That vacant, empty look is truly disturbing.

I see it as "My God, Cheney actually pulled it off. I assumed they were kidding."

[Skarbrowe]

15. I was in shock like everyone else, but I never stopped hating Bush.

My second reaction after the shock of the disaster was.."Oh my god, Bush, who we all know had an awful administration record building at the time, was going to ride this to the epitome of political power heaven.(hell?) " I have never wavered in my visceral dislike for this man. Ever. I'm proud of myself. I haven't been wrong about him yet. He has not fooled me for a second. Although, I have to admit, if he was merely a local sheriff of a small town somewhere I think I could find him quite inadvertently humorous. Barney Fife with a speech impediment.

[sandnsea]

18. I don't think they're mutually exclusive

It's completely possible to hate the man and hope he does the right thing anyway. I STILL hope he has some sort of epiphany and does the right thing. Even if he did, it wouldn't make me like him, it would just be overwhelming relief that perhaps a few less people would die. I will never become so cynical that I don't allow for the possiblity of some spark of goodness in even the worst people.

[JI7]

17. his looks shows a complete lack of concern for the people

there are looks which are full of fear plus concern and worry.

but this one is more of a guilty person who is afraid they got caught doing something bad type look.

[Dem2theMax]

22. That's because he IS an idiot.

;)

[darkmaestro019]

23. Scare them?

Boy, it scares ME that he just sat there.

Smile and say "I'm sorry, kids, something very important has happened and it's my job to take care of it." Four seconds? Less?

Kids have seen teachers get pulled out of the room for a sec by other teachers, they've seen Mom or Dad have to take an important call at dinner, they'd shrug it off. Grownups do mysterious things like that all the time. Later, they could have it explained a little more clearly and they'd understand of COURSE the President had to go right now, it was an emergency! If they can understand a fire drill, they can understand that, at least well enough not to panic or anything.

EDIT: I know you're not excusing his actions, that sounds more like an attack at you, OP, than at Bush. It's all aimed at Georgie, I promise. : )

[WinkyDink]

24. DOES THIS MAN LOOK CONCERNED? HELL, NO. He KNEW

there were to be hits ONLY in the NE/Mid-Atlantic. He KNEW, even though his school visit had been publicized, that HE WAS NOT a TARGET.

Because an INNOCENT man, let alone the President of the United States, would have NOT KNOWN if there were a HUNDRED more planes ready to become kamikaze flights. An INNOCENT man, let alone the President of the United States, would have IMMEDIATELY acted to protect those CHILDREN.

It is THIS moment, beyond ALL OTHERS, which PROVES Bush's foreknowledge and thereby his COMPLICITY.

I believe his later claim to have earlier seen the first plane attack---an actual impossibility---is his memory of having seen a top-secret war-games simulation.

As for even beginning to look concerned or caring about the VICTIMS---for obviously, accident or not, there were AIRPLANE VICTIMS DEAD AS DOORNAILS---well, Bush's psychopathy and narcissicism preclude such human feelings.

He's probably struggling NOT TO SMIRK.

[seaglass]

25. I saw nothing but a coward on 9/11. I was glued to the TV all

day, watching the disaster unfold minute by minute and Bush was nowhere to be found. No really, no one knew where he was. Then the first time he was shown on TV was on tape (from a stopover in LA?) and he looked scared to death.

That was the impression I had of him all day - a scared bunny. He DID NOT inspire confidence as a leader.

Look, my husband is a firefighter - I know what bravery is, I know what people who have courage do when they are faced with an emergency. They don't even think, they act - they do not selfishly think of themselves, they think of others - it's in their character.

Bush needed to get his shit together and lead a country in crisis, but he didn't and he NEVER does (think Katrina).

I had hope for him that day and he failed miserably.

I guess I was in the 10%.

[Cocoa]

26. reminds me of a Groucho Marx quote

He may look like an idiot and talk like an idiot. But don't let that fool you, he really is an idiot.

[flordehinojos]

27. bush looks paralized...like someone sitting on a toilet

wanting to expel excrement and not being able to. what shit was passing through bush's mind that paralyzed him so? maybe the fact that he knew he had to wait for all of the "american Reichstags fires" to get carried through to completion so he could begin rolling out the chains of repression which he has indeed not stopped rolling out since the 9/11 CRIME against the towers.

[ima_sinnic]

29. cowardly little s**t-head didn't care at all what happened to US

--from Day 1 it's been ALL ABOUT HIM. A competent leader would have become "possessed" by the urgency of finding out what in hell was going on and what kind of danger the country was in. After all, in a national crisis, who is SUPPOSED to be "in charge" of EVERYTHING, mobilizing anybody and everybody who might be needed, and all equipment and resources? A disaster, a crisis, the outcome is entirely in the hands of the ultimate leader. The little shit-for-brains is sitting there thinking, oh no, how am I going to handle this? what should I say? how can I appear "president-shul"?

"Scaring the children"?? what a lame-o excuse that is! like the President of the United fucking States might not have "important business" at a moment's notice! what a fucking load of crap. Sheesh, if the freepers and bush bots are willing to accept that as an excuse for their lives being in danger because of the clueless, ineffective, dumbass indecisive cowardice of their Glorious Leader, they deserve whatever does come their way. Stupid-ass cowardly useless morans! (no reflection on OP intended)

[Libby2]

30. That's because he really is an idiot.

[Joanne98]

32. I thought it was an inside job sometime in the first 48 hours...

Too much wierdness. It smelled big time. Pictures of the hijackers whipped up, passports that didn't burn, strange notes in cars, Bush flying around in AF1 and most of all Bush using the word WAR! It all looked PLANNED to me. I knew what they wanted and boy, they had the whole frigging list up in no time at all. I'm glad that 36% of the public now thinks the same thing. I just hope we get justice someday.