NYT: Talk of Bubble Leads to Battle Over Bulge

[kskiska]

By ELISABETH BUMILLER

In these closing weeks of the presidential campaign, the talk at an edgy White House is of polls, turnout, swing voters and polls. There are also two story lines from the presidential debates that to the exasperation of President Bush's advisers won't go away: the bubble and the bulge.

The bulge - the strange rectangular box visible between the president's shoulder blades in the first debate - has set off so much frenzied speculation on the Internet that it has become what literary critics call an objective correlative, or an object that evokes large emotions and ideas.

The bulge is in many ways related to the bubble, which is the word Mr. Bush himself uses to describe the isolation of the presidency. In this case, Mr. Bush's critics argue that he has so walled himself off from dissent in his bubble that he was ill-prepared to take on the challenge of Senator John Kerry in their three debates.

Therefore, Mr. Bush had to make use of the bulge, which is most popularly rumored to be a radio receiver that transmitted answers from an offstage adviser into a hidden presidential earpiece. In the last two weeks, the bulge has taken on a life of its own to become a symbol to Mr. Bush's critics of all that is wrong with his presidency.

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http://nytimes.com/2004/10/18/politics/campaign/18letter.html?pagewanted=print&position=

[truthisfreedom]

1. oh man, you just gotta love it. good ol' new york times. endorsing Kerry

and burning the heck out of bushco.

[loathesomeshrub]

2. Is that a real picture? Because idiot looks very weird n/t

Never mind - I can see that its not

[shaolinmonkey]

29. he looks like dorf on golf.

[PartyPooper]

3. Did Junior shrink?

:D

[txindy]

19. Junior looks like he's about to burst into song in that picture

"Follow the Yellow-Brick Road!" He's either morphing into a Munchkin or an Oompa Loompa. ;)

[JoFerret]

23. They burned "disastrous" Bush but just as important

they identified Kerry as a man of strength, accomplishment and a strong moral compass.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

4. Apparently Bush has all Oval Office visitors sign 'loyalty pledges'

he is completely unable to hear dissent. Physically or intellectually.

[cosmicaug]

8. No doubts allowed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/17/magazine/17BUSH.html

Actually, I wonder if Bush might not be suffering from some manner of rapidly progressing mental illness.

What are his siblings like? They're holding up O.K., right? What's his mom's family like? Is there such a thing as late onset schizophrenia, is he just fucked up from earlier drug use? Just what's the deal with the guy?

[reprobate]

16. Re: his siblings. It's a little known fact outside of florida,

but Jeb has been seen on the capital building in tallahassee catching flies with his extendable toungue. That of course was when he ran out of his medication. All the bushes are aflicted with REPTILIA FANATICOSA, an ailment that causes them to revert to their original lizard form without their meds.

Might also be why the famous fotos of georgie walking on the walls and cieling were supressed.

[cosmicaug]

21. They live!

reprobate wrote:

All the bushes are aflicted with REPTILIA FANATICOSA, an ailment that causes them to revert to their original lizard form without their meds.

I understand, however, that you can see their true form if you wear special glasses.

[daleo]

5. The Battle of the Bulge

It stopped a pretty big fascist one other time.

[Rose Siding]

6. Okay what have they done with the real Ms Bumiller?

[kskiska]

7. McAuliffe's remarks

(snip)

Terry McAuliffe, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, was considerably more caustic. "I think George Bush lives in the twilight zone,'' he said after Wednesday's debate.

As for the bulge, Mr. McAuliffe said that "if he had an earpiece on during that debate and those are the best answers that he could do, then he should be impeached and everybody who works for him should never be allowed to work again.''

Finished with his sound bite, Mr. McAuliffe grew serious. "I honestly don't think the man is going to risk his presidency taking a transmitter into the debate,'' he said. "I just can't imagine.''

[Dover]

22. Kind of a damned if he did, damned if he didn't situation if you ask me.

Which is the bigger risk; to be caught as an imposter incapable of stringing two coherent sentences together with no grasp of the subject matter or to be caught with a reciever? Well...he WAS caught with a reciever, which is a lot easier to lie about than a pathetic performance (which would have left no question in people's minds that he was a puppet boy).

[truthpusher]

9. I was thoroughly creeped out today watching the * spinsters...

...trying to brush the bulge off like it was some goofy Internet thing. One of the * guys actually said 'We have big news...we discovered that the thing on Bush's back is a radio receiver that is picking up messages from outer space...ha-ha-ha-ha-ha'

Extraordinarily creepy...

[reprobate]

17. And you think he was joking????????

[The Magistrate]

20. Indeed, Sir

Hide in plain sight. The very best way to conceal an un-admitable thing is to say it aloud in jocular tones....

"He is only dangerous when he smiles."

"LET'S GO GET THOSE BUSH BASTARDS!"

[grasswire]

10. crapola, crapola

"I know that the Internet claims it was all different things, but to my knowledge, it was just a poorly tailored suit,'' said Andrew H. Card Jr., the White House chief of staff.


The tailor was Washington's Georges de Paris, tailor to presidents for decades.

Also tailor to Andrew Card.

Mr. Card? How do you explain the fact that it was there three times? THREE POORLY TAILORED SUITS???

[grasswire]

11. now it's the tailor's fault!!

From Tim Russert's Sunday show:

MR. MEHLMAN: I'm not sure what it was, but the gentleman responsible for the tailoring of that suit is no longer working for this administration.


B.S. B.S. B.S.

[grytpype]

15. Finally, someone gets fired from the Bush Administration.

Just a tailor, but it's a start.

[grasswire]

18. yeah, but it ain't true

Georges de Paris is an institution. Bigger than the spinners. He isn't fired.

[KoKo]

27. Exactly. We already know he has a French tailor customizing his suits and

wasn't it Salon who talked to an exclusive tailor in GB who said there's no way a crease in a suit could be square or rectangular? Salon had photos, and other photos have been posted here. There is something on his back.

A DU'er posted a pix of a defibrillator. That seemed to be closest to the shape. Remember the "Pretzel" incident and falling off his bike?

Could be a heart problem and they refuse to admit it. It's amazing that they can get away with everything. But, the story keeps getting reported and with Russert bringing it up, I wonder if something more isn't going to come out about this. :shrug:

[Philostopher]

12. Saying there are claims of "all different things"

on His Highness's Internets is disingenuous, too. I've only seen three serious theories espoused -- that it's a radio transceiver of some kind, that it's a bulletproof vest, and that it's a medical device. Some have said back brace, some have said some other kind of delivery device, but it seems to coalesce into three main streams:

Bush was too stupid/hung over/inarticulate to debate on his own and needed coaching.

Bunnypants is so scawed he needs a Kevwar to even go out on a stage alone.

The Naked Emperor is somehow ill or injured and lying about his physical condition.

They can play it off as conspiracy theory all they want, and perhaps they're right -- but by not acknowledging that it's anything, they play their same old game of lying when the truth might not hurt them. I'll play my Howard Dean talks about 9/11 reference again: if they don't address it, however ridiculous or outlandish the conspiracy theories may be, it's their own damned fault the conspiracy theories exist because something clearly isn't right and they're blowing it off.

[daleo]

13. "to my knowledge"

Sounds like he's using a weasel phrase, to wiggle out of saying the plain truth.

[Spider Jerusalem]

14. Yes, right. A "poorly tailored suit".

Which happens to "pucker" (as they described it) in a regular, rectangular shape which stays in the same place when the fabric shifts. Right.

[Supersedeas]

30. PARIS??? Why can't the President wear 'Merican instead of Euro suits

[JoFerret]

24. On Saturday's Op/Ed page

they had a collection of photos of people on the street found with mysterious bulges like Bush's.

[teryang]

25. The guy's plain stupid

...that's the gist of it. It has to be spun into some big story to disguise the truth.

[JoFerret]

26. Has Bush lost his reason?

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,1329254,00.html

<<So what is up with the US President...?

It is thus hard to avoid the conclusion that Bush's cognitive functioning is not, for some reason, what it once was...

But I have heard wild speculation in Washington that he is suffering from a neurological disorder, or that the years of alcoholism might finally be taking their toll on his brain.

...

It does not help that Bush now lives in a positively Nixonian cocoon. He does not read newspapers; he sees television only to watch football; he makes election speeches exclusively at ticket-only events, and his courtiers consciously avoid giving him bad news. When he met John Kerry for their first bout on the debating platform, it was almost a new experience for the President to hear the voice of dissent.

A senior Republican, experienced and wise in the ways of Washington, told me last Friday that he does not necessarily accept that Bush is unstable, but what is clear, he added, is that he is now manifestly unfit to be President.

This, too, is a view that is widely felt, but seldom articulated and then only in private, within the Republican as well as Democratic establishments in Washington. Either way, the choice voters make on Tuesday fortnight should be obvious: whether he is unstable or merely unfit to be President - and I would argue that they amount to much the same - he should speedily be turfed out of office.

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[Benhurst]

28. As I recall, during the Vietnam war, Lyndon Johnson told the

Austrian Ambassador he was getting instructions from God.

During Watergate Richard Nixon wandered the halls of the White House at night talking to the portraits of dead presidents.

Gerald Ford had a serious drinking problem.

Under great stress, Jimmy Carter claimed a rabbit had attacked his fishing boat, even though no one else saw the killer bunny.

Ronald Reagan had Alzheimer's, manifesting symptoms as early as the first months of the first year of his first term.

George Herbert Walker Bush had a thyroid problem which was kept from the public and was said after the election to explain some of his odd behavior during his unsuccessful campaign.

Bill Clinton under stress sought solace from the fat girl in the office.

And Dubya ....

Maybe we need to take a good hard look at the Presidency and the effects of such isolation and aggrandizement on even healthy psyches.

Should anyone to be applauded for merely entering a room?