An amazing piece of video:
I never thought I’d see the day that an American President would be treated like this, without even perfunctory diplomatic courtesy. It’s a hopeful sign, in a way, that the blame for the ludicrous behavior of the past 8 years appears to be sticking to Bush personally, and the Republican party, rather than the US generally. But it’s still astonishing, that in 8 years we could reach a point where close allies of a half-century or more would publically refuse to acknowledge the President of the United States.
… Ack. Foiled again. still, I believe this only serves to confirm my original point.
November 22, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Well, BagNewsNotes says it’s not what it looks like.
Still looks pretty bad, but since they were just posing for a picture, I suppose I can see what happened.
November 22, 2008 at 1:31 pm
Onion layers of context and bias involved, eh?
If Bush was the host, perhaps some of them fellas hadn’t shook hands yet. A lot of hand-shaking required to get everyone shook. A square-dance or old courtly dance would have been useful.
If you watch the video full-screen, you can see Bush grinning and quipping with many of the people who apparently snub him.
I’ve often pondered what ‘act professional’ means. Best I can tell, it means a) always put on a polite face and b) avoid indiscretion.
Bush is a professional: he’s a politician. So are the rest.
So for me, the main story here is that the so-called liberal media has finally begun to live up to its name in some respects, because Bush-bashing is now safely profitable. While I suspect that most of those summit leaders have less than more respect for Bush, the story is that the public to which CNN panders has a measured majority contempt for the little prick.
The most interesting ‘acid test’ I can think of for this is to know what, if any, attention FOX news has paid to this video or its message?
November 22, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Well, he doesn’t offer to shake hands with any of them, and I think that would be more telling, if he was left hanging. I’m more inclined to think he doesn’t care (shocking, I know) and is just going through the motions.
November 22, 2008 at 1:46 pm
Read scarshapedscar’s link. It’s pretty persuasive. These people are professional diplomats and public figures. If they’re not shaking his hand, it’s because they’ve already done it. There may even have been a rehearsal for this beforehand.
But where’s the footage of them hitting him on the head with that salami? “There isn’t any?” Uh-huh…
November 22, 2008 at 1:54 pm
How many years do you think we are from a Nixonesque rehabilitation of this clown? It’s bound to happen.
November 22, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Wake me when the South Korean prime minister kicks him in the nuts.
November 22, 2008 at 3:31 pm
Hey The Editors, any way we could get a link to that old piece on David Brooks, William Safire, and ice floes? I can’t seem to find it in the Wayback Machine. That would be fucking awesome if you could.
November 22, 2008 at 3:41 pm
“How many years do you think we are from a Nixonesque rehabilitation of this clown? It’s bound to happen.”
Nixon was crazy paranoid delusional, and in an intelligent manner. He also was impeached. Despite Ford’s pardon, he still was publicly pilloried, thus forgiveness was an option after some time.
Bush is just dysfunctionally less-than-bright, and far more the puppet of Cheney than Nixon ever was of Kissinger. He hasn’t been convicted of anything and will retire from office peacefully. He is simply despised by 3/4ths of Americans and probably 9/10ths of foreigners.
Nixon at least accomplished things perceived positive even at the time.
Bush?
So the problem with rehabilitating Bush’s reputation is that
a) there’s nothing to rehabilitate it from, and
b) there’s nothing to rehabilitate it with.
He has been exceptionally bad for the nation, indeed the.worst.president.ever, but has done so in plain and uninteresting ways. Worse, he is followed by a political superstar whose prime mission will be to fix Dubya’s fuckups*.
If Hee-Haw makes a comeback (almost a certainty in today’s self-recycling nine levels of media hell; in fact, it’s probably happened and I just don’t know), he would make a great candidate to fill the overalls of Junior Samples.
Beyond that, I see little opportunity for him in the eyes of history. Even Warren G. Harding will stand ahead of him in that punchbowl line.
*This reminds me, for all the times I’ve heard pundidiots remind us that another 911 hasn’t happened on Dubya’s watch, I’ve not heard them acknowledge that the.worst.attack.on.American.soil. happened on Dubya’s watch.
November 22, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Sadly, to coin a phrase, no.
Rachel Maddow pointed out on her show last night that Bush had just finished shaking hands and posing for pictures with each one of them, so in fact it would have been sort of sill for him to walk down the line greeting them like he hadn’t seen them in, oh, 10 mintues.
November 22, 2008 at 3:49 pm
…or even silly.
November 22, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Far be it from me to come to the Chucklehead in Chief’s defense, but I think he just might have become a little germaphobic (a la Howard Hughes) during his stay at the white house. There was a story about Bush using hand sanitizer immediately after shaking Obama’s hand when they first met. So maybe, instead of snubbing, they have been requested to not offer their hands to avoid an awkward situation.
November 22, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Bush doesn’t like shaking people’s hands – he’s got that phobia – same as Howard Stern – everyone knows about it – except the public. He shook Obama’s hand then offered him disinfectant directly afterwards.
It makes perfect sense – Bush thinks he’s screwed up the world and everyone hates him – he suppresses it – and now he breaks out in hives whenever he touches someone. Or, he’s been in his “bubble” for so long he literally can touch anyone.
November 22, 2008 at 6:21 pm
“. . . a great candidate to fill the overalls of Junior Samples.”
Bush is not worthy to fill those overalls.
November 22, 2008 at 6:50 pm
All terrorism, whether it comes in the form of a shoe bomb or that of the giggling G20 leader one upping the Bush bashing graffiti in the toilet stall, all terrorism, will always be The Left’s fault. Jonah has proven this with superb conservative logic and highly sophisticated recursive blog linking techniques.
November 22, 2008 at 7:07 pm
You inspired me to look up the Jonanaiser’s latest.
“Indeed, liberals have long idolized the 1930s as a decade of great unity. It wasn’t. The 1930s was a miserable decade of poverty, domestic unrest, labor strife, violations of civil liberties and widespread fear. If liberals really loved peace, prosperity and national cohesion, they’d remember the 1920s or 1950s more fondly.”
You KNOW how much liberals hate F. Scott Fitzgerald, the Charleston, early Louis and Bix. And lord, the vitriol we have for Leave It To Beaver is legendary. Not to mention our hate for Jack Kerouac.
Essentially, the article is a continuous string of non sequiturs punctuated by red herrings and straw… things.
If Jonah lives anything like he writes, he was born old and dead and will die crawling up his mother’s twat. I have never read anything so deliberately bass-ackwards.
November 22, 2008 at 7:49 pm
peorge: Nixon was pardoned, but never rehabilitated. There was a half-hearted attempt to rewrite history on that, usually right before more tapes of him blaming Jews and homosexuals, or revelations he was trying the psych the Russians into thinking he was a nuclear mad-man, were leaked.
Perhaps the closest he’s come to rehabilitation is losing the “Worst President Ever” title. He’s moved down a rung on that list in recent years.
Perhaps if he’d realized he actually needed to give Checkers back in 1952, he could have carved a different destiny for himself.
November 22, 2008 at 9:41 pm
Well, I suppose CNN deserves to gloat, when you consider how they’ve fought tirelessly against everything Bush has done to this country and the world.
Tonstant weader fwowed up.
November 22, 2008 at 11:02 pm
shrub’s a germ freak.
November 22, 2008 at 11:12 pm
What Mr. Wonderful said. As the host, it seems likely that W has already greeted everyone before this.
November 23, 2008 at 12:18 am
On account of the magnificent finale of comment #10, I vote that Livermaile gets guest contributor privileges (though only if he learns to use the correct term “Jonanist”). The Editors has apparently been rubbing off on more than his Airwolf betamaxes lately.
November 23, 2008 at 12:54 am
neal pert (12) is right. he uses anti-bacterial hand lotion after every handshake. I would like to hear the pop-psych take on this habit. I would guess it has something to do with a misbegotten sense of superiority and a more general fear of others.
November 23, 2008 at 9:50 am
Wake me up when they give the shitbag a swirlie and fuck his ass with a plunger.
November 23, 2008 at 11:52 am
“Bush is not worthy to fill those overalls.”
I *did* write “overalls”, didn’t I? Escuse me: I meant ‘dunce cap’.
November 23, 2008 at 11:53 am
“betamaxes”
You Greek philosophy majors: always showing off.
November 23, 2008 at 12:05 pm
“I would like to hear the pop-psych take on this habit. I would guess it has something to do with a misbegotten sense of superiority and a more general fear of others.”
J’oblige or something:
I think that Dubya really *really* REALLY has a hard time being ill, particularly at his age, when getting sick tends to get one sicker than in one’s younger years.
Dubya is not, obviously, inclined to contemplation. Dubya is psychologically precarious, as most of we recovering alcoholics are. When Dubya’s too sick to work out and get his endorphin fix and sense of physical engagement with the world(balls on the exercycle, hands on the ‘vroom-bars), I suspect he experiences gruesome depression.
I mean, it’s not like he can hang around on any decent blogs, or is gonna watch reruns of West Wing. I’ll bet he’s a major Colombo fan, though.
(We should hold a contest for costumes in Bush’s Fantasy Room wardrobe.)
November 23, 2008 at 10:51 pm
Fuck all this. Where’s the god-damn cute kittens. More kittens, god-damnit! Shit.
November 24, 2008 at 2:48 am
He had just shaken the hands of the same people in a prior photo-op.
How anyone could say something mean about that beautiful man is beyond me. I thought Gerald Ford was amazing but Bush shall surely be a name that lives forever in delicious infamy in a good way which infamy does not mean.
I cant wait to vote for the next Bush product as soon as possible. I hope he maintains a daily website where President Bush can illuminate the issues of the day so this nation doesn’t drift to far off course whilst he’s off his watch. I bet if you asked most Americans would tell you that they would really like to amend the Constitution to allow President Bush to run and win again. I love him and you are a monster. And thats;’ just how I feel!!1!
You used to be funny, but since Obama got elected, you’re just shrill.
November 24, 2008 at 2:52 am
Also, we need a three-quarters of a trillion stimulus package managed by Dennis Hoff and his Moonlite Bunny Ranch team of money making experts. I shall act as a sort of liaison. For which I will only accept a 2.5% fee. 2.5%! That’s like totally nothing America! Most lawyers take between 12-22.5%! Your average political consultant will take 30,50, or 100 grand plus 10% of all media buys. Just think about it, USA.
Did I mention, “!”?
November 24, 2008 at 9:05 am
“You used to be funny, but since Obama got elected, you’re just shrill.”
We should now support Theed in his/their time of exhaustion: a pony geyser was requested, a pony geyser was given. Mortals were not meant to survive such miracles.
The strain on Theeds’ soul(s) or Lorazepam prescription was surely grueling. Look in their/his eyes. Can you not see the blank stare of an exhausted warrior?
To put it mildly, Teed is/are bushed. Now we must be teh funny.
Therapy for Shell-Shocked Citizen Journalists
November 24, 2008 at 1:39 pm
… Ack. Foiled again. still, I believe this only serves to confirm my original point.
Yes, the fact that this story was so plausible only proves the validity of the narrative that this story was supposed to evince.
November 24, 2008 at 5:39 pm
You know, “Alpha Bravo Charlie”? It did the trick.
November 24, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Cooler then a Guangdong internet cafe—> http://www.gamereclaim.com/2008/10/128/
November 24, 2008 at 10:36 pm
cut dubbleduh some slack, yo! he jus’ be tryin’ not t’ fall on he drunk ass
November 24, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Heh. This is funnier:
“Oh, for crissakes. Are you kidding me? Are you friggin’ kidding me?” asked Obama. “Of course I betrayed those goddamned idiots. Have any of you actually spent five minutes with them? I have, unfortunately. Nothing personal, but I wouldn’t trust these internet windowlickers with a plastic spork from Taco Bell, let alone a freaking $3 trillion dollar budget global superpower. Look, I may be naive, but I’m not stupid. And if Kose or Koz or whatever the fuck his name is thinks for one second I give a rat’s ass about who he wants in charge of the Treasury Department, he’s even stupider than he looks.”
http://iowahawk.typepad.com/
November 25, 2008 at 12:11 am
I’ve rarely seen someone in public who so obviously has a sharp stick up their ass.
Read somewhere that Laura’s going to insist on seperate houses after they leave the White House – if true it’s a damn smart move … once the gaggle of sycophantic suck-ups aren’t around anymore to toss his psychic salad, that ugly little man-boy is going to have lifelong rage-issues that’ll make McCain look like Mister Rogers.
November 25, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Best post-impeachment belittlement of Nixon was some 80s comic on, like, Johnny Carson, who described Nixon, at San Clemente in beach-shorts, wandering the sands with a metal detector.
Dubya’s Line-Dance training classes oughta be a big hit on the lecture circuit.
I envision a post-POTUS career something like post-Star Trek Shatner without the redeeming rescues of records with Ben Folds and the inspired casting/writing of Boston Legal.
Hey! Summa mah beyst frendz’ur secret service agents!
November 25, 2008 at 1:36 pm
“Yes, the fact that this story was so plausible only proves the validity of the narrative that this story was supposed to evince.”
…which only proves Doughpants’ point? Or one that smells just like it? ;)
November 29, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Nixon was crazy paranoid delusional, and in an intelligent manner. He also was impeached.
No, he wasn’t. I can’t believe no one has pointed that out yet.
He resigned in disgrace, because of the threat of impeachment, but he was not impeached. Ford pardoned him for his criminal involvement in the Watergate escapades.