The Other Lies of George Bush

While we're all sitting on the sidelines and watching the unfolding of a Presidential scandal that may very well be the beginning of the end for Bush (one hopes, anyway), it's worth considering the fact that our chief chimp has lied about far more than pseudo-uranium from Niger. Nation editor David Corn writes in an excerpt from his book The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception.

But Bush's truth-defying crusade for war did not mark a shift for him. Throughout his campaign for the presidency and his years in the White House, Bush has mugged the truth in many other areas to advance his agenda. Lying has been one of the essential tools of his presidency. To call the forty-third President of the United States a prevaricator is not an exercise of opinion, not an inflammatory talk-radio device. Rather, it is backed up by an all-too-extensive record of self-serving falsifications. While politicians are often derided as liars, this charge should be particularly stinging for Bush. During the campaign of 2000, he pitched himself as a candidate who could "restore" honor and integrity to an Oval Office stained by the misdeeds and falsehoods of his predecessor. To brand Bush a liar is to negate what he and his supporters declared was his most basic and most important qualification for the job.

His claims about the war in Iraq have led more of his foes and more pundits to accuse him of lying to the public. The list of his misrepresentations, though, is far longer than the lengthy list of dubious statements Bush employed--and keeps on employing--to justify his invasion and occupation of Iraq. Here then is a partial--a quite partial--account of the other lies of George W. Bush.

Corn then goes on to recount in great detail Bush's lies about tax cuts, the environment, and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Toward the end of the excerpt, Corn wonders:

Does Bush believe his own untruths? Did he truly consider a WMD-loaded Saddam Hussein an imminent threat to the United States? Or was he knowingly employing dramatic license because he wanted war for other reasons? Did he really think the average middle-class taxpayer would receive $1,083 from his second tax-cut plan? Or did he realize this was a fuzzy number cooked up to make the package seem a better deal than it was for middle- and low-income workers? Did he believe there were enough stem-cell lines to support robust research? Or did he know he had exaggerated the number of lines in order to avoid a politically tough decision?

It's hard to tell. Bush's public statements do suggest he is a binary thinker who views the world in black-and-white terms. You're either for freedom or against it. With the United States or not. Tax cuts are good--always. The more tax cuts the better--always. He's impatient with nuances. Asked in 1999 to name something he wasn't good at, Bush replied, "Sitting down and reading a 500-page book on public policy or philosophy or something." Bush likes life to be clear-cut. And perhaps that causes him to either bend the truth or see (and promote) a bent version of reality. Observers can debate whether Bush considers his embellishments and misrepresentations to be the honest-to-God truth or whether he cynically hurls falsehoods to con the public. But believer or deceiver--the result is the same.

For the entire excerpt, click here.

I've pretty much reached the conclusion that Bush is something of a half-wit, repeating the words of his advisors. He was a C student. His career as a businessman was, by most accounts, largely unsuccessful and sustained by cash infusions from Bush family friends. He even sounds like a moron. This means that the President may actually believe his own lies: he's a front, a bad actor playing the part of president, a frat boy having a good time. In other words, the US has been governed these past couple of years by an exclusive and secret committee.

Scary, huh?

If this scandal goes down the way it should, pretty soon Bush may find himself very much alone, wondering just what the hell is going on. His closest advisor, Karl Rove, was fingered earlier today (thanks to Eschaton for this link). Who's next?

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