What is the Origin of *?

[Jon_da_brockman]

I am relatively new to DU, and I am curious, how did * become interchangeable with Bush?

[Must_B_Free]

1. pictogram

[graywarrior]

2. Kurt Vonnegut's rendition of an asshole?

[MuseRider]

3. I saw it here first

but I think it was used in Doonesbury cartoons.

[tritsofme]

IIRC in a dissenting opinion to Bush v Gore

one of the justices wrote that Bush would forever have an asterisk next to his name.

Someone can correct that if its wrong.

[Dave Reynolds]

4. He will always show in the history with a "*"

by his name, because the SCOTUS picked him in 2000.

[Spider Jerusalem]

5. The asterisk denotes that he wasn't actually ELECTED to his first term...

but appointed by the Supreme Court. Similar to the asterisk Roger Maris' 61 home runs used to have in baseball record books because he got eight more games than Babe Ruth to do it in.

[Blue_In_AK]

7. That's why I always call him ** because he wasn't actually

elected TWO times.

[BayouBengal07]

6. The way I've always reasoned it

* resembles a puckered asshole.

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

8. It comes from the cartoon "Doonesbury". After the 2000 election because

of the controversial, corrupt outcome in Florida determining the election outcome, an asterisk has to appear by his name/presidency. Trudeau the cartoonist depicted him with a * as his actual person.

[DBoon]

10. Didn't Doonesbury show Bush Sr as a feather

and what could possibly be less substantial than a feather - and asterisk!

[evilkumquat]

12. No. That Was Quayle.

Bush the Elder was depicted literally as "nothing" since he was not his own man (at least as far as I could tell, that was what Trudeau meant by the symbolism).

By "nothing", it was almost like the * symbol.

Evil Kumquat

[cdsilv]

11. Bush (*) is the chocolate starfish - in other words....

... an asshole. Hence the representation.

[SammyWinstonJack]

9. Unelected. n/t