Attorney-gate could get interesting

hayden
Sat, 31 Mar 2007 10:30:29 +0000

I don’t think George Bush is “nice” in the conventional meaning of the word. In fact, I don’t think many politicians who want to be president tend to be “nice”. Not saying there aren’t nice people in Washington; but I think the term, even though often applied to Bush, is not accurate at all.

I’ve always thought his father was way too nice - read “All’s Fair”, the part written by Mary Matalin - and that his mother is not particularly nice at all. One of my good friends has seen Barbara Bush up close and personal way too much, and her stories aren’t about a very nice person. I think George 2nd took after his mother, and Jeb took after his father. George was, after all, the hatchet man in his father’s administration - not usually a job parcelled out to the sweet and forgiving. His habit of assigning nicknames is a trait that is really a type of passive bullying. And remember when one of the press corps addressed the president of France in French? Bush refused to speak to him for about a week. That’s nice?

And remember the 2004 presidential debates? I don’t have the link, but in Time Magazine’s coverage, a commentator asked a Bush advisor why the President came across as brusque, bad-tempered and snappish. The Bush advisor replied that the Bush campaign hadn’t picked up on that, since he generally acted that way behind the scenes.

Of course, as I said, nice isn’t necessarily a characteristic either required of, or present in, presidents/presidential candidates from either party. [I do, however, believe that Bush is smart, so I guess I’m in the minority on all fronts!]