SGR

Yeah, that's the thing - it's impossible to know if we play with hypotheticals. If Trump was president in 2001 after 9/11, would he have made the same decisions as GW Bush? Maybe, maybe not. A lot of variables. The hypothetical might be different if 9/11 happened in our current time.

Trump does this act where he brags himself up, talks about how intelligent he is and all that ****. I'm no psychologist, but it might be because he's insecure about his knowledge and capabilities as President- in other words, he knows privately that he's in over his head and doesn't have the experience to take in the information and make decisions accordingly.

GW Bush, on the other hand, had this act where he'd portray himself as this goofy uncle/grampa sort of character. He'd say **** so dumb that with any other regular person, you'd be confident that said regular person was just a dumb ass. I don't buy Bush's act, I think he was more aware of what he was doing than is often portrayed. I think Cheney was obviously a negative influence, but I don't think Bush had no idea of the possible consequences of his actions and I don't think Cheney was the one pulling the strings. In his speeches before he was president, he was a lot more articulate. I think Bush did this act to make himself more endearing and to make people more forgiving of him when his legacy is assessed, because after all, he was just a bumbling buffoon right?

I don't buy the act, and I think Bush was just a straight up evil mother****er. Trump has his faults, and he has many, but he hasn't started a war that has resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands (or hundreds of thousands) yet.

OccultHawk

Bush Jr was a vindictive mother****er.

I loved how he murdered Saddam’s kids and put it on the telly. That **** was Jesse James raw af.

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SGR

I was honestly a little disgusted when liberals all over Twitter were praising George W. Bush after Bush released that little Covid speech thing he did. Saying stuff like: "Now that's a real president right there" and "See? This is what we need - a president with empathy". I swear, these people either have a really short memory or are too young to remember the Bush years.

On another note, I hope the Dems aren't counting on the youth vote if we all vote-by-mail. Young folks today don't even know how to send things in the mail.

"Wait, I need a stamp? Okay - and where can I get one of those?"

jwb

.. you think Bush faked being a bumbling idiot cause he knew the negative reaction all his policies would get but wanted to deflect the blame? That's a hell of a theory.

Like I said though we've gotten way off point. Replace GW with Jeb Bush and the point is the same.

OccultHawk

I think he tried to play it off like he was regular Texas good ol boy when he was really a Yankee intellectual.

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jwb

That's true enough but I don't think he faked being dumb/clumsy with words. I think his stupidity was over exaggerated but I don't think the "fool me once can't be fooled again" type gaffes were staged.

And I think he honestly expected Iraq to be much more successful than it was.

Anteater

Bush really was that stupid. Cheney was the scary one.

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SGR

I should be careful with my words. I don't think he 'faked' it per se, but I do think he purposely cultivated that image (and did so successfully as you can see from Anteater's post above), especially as it became more obvious that the war was not going well.

jwb

Cultivated it how?

SGR

Here's a speech he gave in 2001 in which he spends the majority of said speech in reading from a "Bushisms" book.



Struggling to figure out how to put on a rain poncho during Trump's inauguration.



And of course, his vocal love for one of his favorite hobbies, painting cute pictures.



Of course, my opinion on him cultivating this image is somewhat of a hot take. There's no way (at least now) to know for certain, but I do think he was smarter than people give him credit for and I do think he cultivated the image of him being an idiot to disarm people and make them more forgiving of his legacy. Me, personally? I think he's a war criminal that should be in jail. And even if Jeb was running against Trump, I'd still vote for Trump because **** the Bush dynasty. America has had enough Bushes. It's easy for most Americans to forget about Abu Ghraib - in fact, I'd imagine less than 10% of Americans would know what it is if you took a massive poll - but the Bush government oversaw some absolutely horrendous abuses of human rights. If one were to tell me that Bush didn't know about these black site torture camps, I'd be as convinced and persuaded if one were to tell me that Stalin didn't know about the gulags or that Hitler didn't know about Auschwitz and Dachau. If it were up to me, Bush Jr. would be painting his puppies from a prison cell.





Reminds me of something Nietzsche once said:

"Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster... for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche