Bush-Watchers Wonder How He Copes With Stress

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: White House Memo
Bush-Watchers Wonder How He Copes With Stress
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
Published: December 25, 2006

WASHINGTON, Dec. 24 — President Bush marched into his year-end news conference last week with the usual zip in his step. As always, he professed little worry about his legacy or the polls. As always, he said the United States would win in Iraq. The nation might despair, but not Mr. Bush; his presidential armor seemed firmly intact.

Yet a longtime friend of Mr. Bush’s recently spotted a tiny crack in that armor. “He looked tired, for the first time, which I hadn’t seen before,” this friend said....

***

His friend, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Mr. Bush still believed that Donald H. Rumsfeld “did a great job over all” as the secretary of defense, despite the president’s decision to replace him after Democrats swept the November elections.

“I think he knows it’s bad over there,” this person said, “but I’m not quite sure he fully appreciates the incompetence of what’s gone on.”...

***

“I got the sense of a man who feels very heavily the weight of history,” said Robert Wexler, president of the University of Judaism in Los Angeles...“but I didn’t get the sense of someone who feels he’s doing the wrong thing."...That conviction may simply be a necessary part of the presidential armor, a kind of psychological protection against what Doris Kearns Goodwin, the historian and biographer of presidents, calls “the unbearable burden” a commander in chief would have to face if he came to the painful realization that he wrongly sent troops into combat....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/25/washington/25memo.html

[WritersBlock]

1. "I’m not quite sure he fully appreciates the incompetence..." We sure as hell do, George. Yours!

"I think he knows it's bad over there" ???!???!?!!!?!!?

Words just fail.

[izzie]

4. I guess we hoped for more from a leader but I am not shocked.

All history is full of such people and one only has to look around their own small world to find more just like him. They seem to be-able to set things they do and what goes on out side their own minds even when they bring them on. I would say it is more our fault for voting him in and then backing it up with putting in Congress men that have stood with him and were sort of the same type. We seemed to have forgot the lessons that people can not trust power so have to use the rules they set up to watch them at all times.

[WritersBlock]

5. He wasn't voted in either time.

But the waking up to that fact for most Americans has been far too long in coming. I agree with your last sentence whole-heartedly!

[izzie]

27. Maybe with the court 's help but he came in under the law.

I would say more did not want him than did but with how we put Presidents in and a little help from Court he sits in the WH and it was done under a legal form. I felt the court was wrong my self and should have picked what most voters wanted but they found a way around that and it fitted the law. So here we are and no one or hardly any one wants to fight it. The scary part to me is I feel if we got rid of Bush the legal way we would end up with Chaney and I think he would take and keep power with the service behind him.

[midnight]

28. I'm no legal expert, but the courts stopping of the recount was

unconstitutional, and doesn't seem to have been lawful at all.

[izzie]

34. Could be but it is hard to get the judges to redo the judgment they made.

I was shocked they made him President. I thought the whole state should have been recounted and not just parts of it. Frankly I think they did and Bush won but so many votes for Gore just were not done right. Looked to me the people wanted Gore but they voted wrong. Not for a person but just used the mark in the wrong place. By a silly error we got paid back for who we either voted for or did not vote for. GOP has to put up with these two nuts in the WH also. Hard to believe that they have even made a mess of the Coast Guards. They must have heard it worked very well so now they have even fixed that. One finds it scary to turn on the news and find out what these two guys are now up to.

[rpannier]

2. If he believed in personal accountability

he'd have made it his business to find out how bad it is.

[az chela]

3. What a crock of shit.Bush doesnt care about anything except

his ego and his rich base of supporters.He is an evil cold poor excuse for a human being

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. Warning: Bring a barf bag

before reading the whole article.

Nice to see we can still count on the NYT's to keep putting out the puff pieces for their lord and savior George Bush.

[Philosoraptor]

11. No doubt.

I heeded your warning, but read it anyway, and I really am sickened by it.

[leftchick]

23. yes indeed

they apparently have a lot of Judy Millers on their staff.

:puke:

[Lasher]

7. Copes with stress? What stress?

Born into wealth and privilege, everything arranged and fixed for him his whole life. As president he's had a free hand for six long years with a complicit lapdog Congress. More time on vacation than any other president. Bitches if he has to stay up past his bedtime at lavish receptions. Tools around the world in his own personal customized jumbo jet. He has two of them, just so he won't get stressed out if one of them is in the shop. Each one costs $325 million.

Crowds of zombies are hand picked for him so that he will be exposed only to swooning and hero worship. The US news media has always given him a pass on everything. Just like this article that obsesses about how he feels when 3,000 US troops feel dead thanks to him.

So where's the stress? Did some foreign correspondent rub his nose in the truth for 2 minutes?

He's not "...a man who feels very heavily the weight of history." I'd like to see him use the word history in a sentence without his earpiece. What I want him to feel is the weight of judgment.

[AzDar]

10. Post O' The Day, imnsho, Lasher! Spot-on. n/t

[Lasher]

12. Why thank you, AzDar.

Hold my hand. Breathe in, breathe out. Still trying to chill down from the rant.

Merry Christmas to you! You probably won't be seeing any snow there in AZ but I'm sure that's OK with you. Phoenix is a wonderful place to be in February.

[flordehinojos]

8. "a necessary part of the presidential armor ... against what Doris Kearns Goodwin calls, 'the

unbereable burden' a commander in chief would have to face if he came to the painful realization that he wrongly sent troops into combat ..."

so ... bush doesn't want to face the painful realization that he wrongly sent troops into an invasion and occupation? he doesn't want to carry the unbereable burden ... the consequences of his greed full act of sending troops to invade and occupy a country ... but thousands of American families have to as well as many thousands more of collateral iraqi families? something is wrong in bush's brain--and something is wrong in kearns goodwin excusanating the bushes!

[Philosoraptor]

9. Aww, the poor widdew commander in chief is conflicted.

What freakin' planet are we on again?

[Lisa]

21. that would assume he is capable of feeling compassion, guilt, and shame

That's what would make it such "an unbearable burden", and a "painful realization".

Unfortunately, I haven't seen much evidence of that.

[Vinca]

13. He's a sociopath - he has no stress. nt

[AlienAvatar]

19. Exactly!

He's already told us he sleeps well at night.

[stansnark]

14. “He looked tired ....which I hadn’t seen before,”

lol. he looked insane, which I HAVE seen before.remember the goldwater slogan-in you heart you know he's right? dems counter with "in your guts you know he's nuts"

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

17. Oh my!

:rofl:

Welcome to DU!

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

15. Easy. He goes to Egypt and dives deep into a big river over there. -nt

[babylonsister]

16. Tired, George? Time to hang it up and bail from yet another venture

you undertook that went to shit. Please, bail! This venture is costing many lives, and THAT will be your legacy.

[Crunchy Frog]

18. Amazing, all the things that people can project onto a blank slate.

Bush has no stress to cope with, since he is utterly ignorant of, and uncaring about, what is happening in the world. He thinks his legacy is going to be determined by how much money gets thrown at his presidential "library" so that's all wrapped up too, as far as he's concerned.

If he seems to be exhibiting a little stress right now, it's probably just that he's getting sort of bored and cranky after 6 years of presidentin'. He doesn't even have to worry about future employment prospects, since he'll be getting a healthy pension at our expense.

[Lisa]

22. I still can't believe he's being paid $400k a year, plus expenses, for THIS

Even if he were just some glorified version of Paris Hilton, and didn't have to do any work or show any talent, just prance around in front of the cameras in a tailored outfit and regurgitate some words off a Teleprompter now and then -- that much money might even be worth it, but he can't even do that job right!

p.s. what you said about "bored and cranky" is right on -- why are there so many right-wing politicians who cheat and lie to get a leadership position, then get tired of it so quickly, like spoiled rich kids abandoning a toy? Here in Canada, we had two premiers (governor-equivalents), of Alberta and Ontario, who both got bored and started to skip meetings and moan about how they just didn't feel excited about governing. Leaving the voters wishing we could just go back in time and elect somebody else who WOULD be honored and delighted to lead several million people!

[Riddler]

20. By now, he should be able to cope with stress very well. After all, he has NEVER had to attempt to

cope with success, so this should be old hat to him.

[Ishoutandscream2]

24. How he copes with stress? Oh, that's easy

"Gulp, gulp, gulp, gulp. Snort, snort, snort.

Ah, much better. Goodnight, Pickles."

[Imagevision]

25. Remember, Cheney has stated the Iraq war must be won, regardless of what americans think and feel

so junior is merely parroting Cheeney!

[tinfoilinfor2005]

26. Sociopath.

These people do not suffer stress, they only cause it.

[Tracer]

29. Oh, he feels stress!

He just lies about not feeling it --- just like he lies about everything else.

Look at him.

Compared to 4 years ago, he has aged considerably. Bags, sags, blotches. A confused "mind" that can't put a simple sentence together. A complete reliance on bits and pieces of shopworn phrases. Weary and exhausted, his boredom with his "hard werk" shows in his every public appearance.

He deserved every bit of stress he's got. The miserable S.O.B.

[Rob H.]

30. "...I didn’t get the sense of someone who feels he’s doing the wrong thing."

Well, of course not--the man has no conscience!

[AnotherMother4Peace]

31. Bush considers himself a religious martyr - his fundamentalism dictates his actions.

And in the thinking of radical religious clerics and their followers, there is only one way, and the ends justify the means. No, I don't think he's bothered. I think he believes he's doing his religious duty.

[lies and propaganda]

32. shares Pickles scripts?

[maxsolomon]

33. nice objectivity, sheryl

a textbook example of the limits of traditional journalism.

bush has a "longtime friend"? i doubt it.

and the president of the U of Judaism looks into his soul?

:puke:

[opihimoimoi]

35. Bush is the Abusive Narcssisant Bully...he has all three of the big time disorders....Damn