Bush league

George W. Bush is too stupid to be president

by Susan Ryan-Vollmar

Anyone who's watched both presidential debates and still claims to be undecided doesn't deserve to vote.

I mean, come on! George W. Bush is so clearly out of his league that it's almost cruel to subject him to another one of these nationally televised debates. Quick, someone get the Debate Commission on the phone and see if we can get them to cancel next week's -- good God -- talk show format debate in which both candidates will be required to answer questions from the audience and stroll around with microphones. Let's hope Bush doesn't electrocute himself. On the other hand…

Last week, Al Gore eviscerated the Texas governor with facts and figures. Were some of them -- as the Bush camp has been whining about for days -- exaggerated? Yes. You know what? I don't care. At least the vice president had done his homework. Bush couldn't even distinguish in any sort of way - much less an intelligible one -- the differences between the two candidates' tax proposals. As Gore put it near the end of last night's round table debate in Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina when Bush again complained of Gore's propensity to exaggerate about his GOP tax proposal: "I wasn't the one having trouble explaining it."

To be sure, much has been made of Bush's unfortunate tendency to mangle words and mispronounce syllables - or, as Bush joked last night, "sill-LAB-bells." Heck, my personal pet peeve with the man is that when he talks, he sounds as if he's got a wad of wet cotton wedged between his cheek and back molars. Phrases like "just such" come out of his mouth sounding like "chust zuch"; "powerful" sounds like "paw-oir-full." His pronunciation of words like interest, judicious, generosity, registration, strengthened, association, Texas, and taxes, leave me feeling as if I've been sprayed with spittle. All of this is unfairly used as evidence that Bush isn't, as Ann Landers would say, the sharpest knife in the drawer.

But this obsession over Bush's demeanor (couldn't someone have given the man a tissue before he went on stage and asked him to blow his nose?) obscures the fact that this isn't a joke -- Bush really is stupid. Here's a prediction: given that Bush's demeanor during last night's debate came across as relaxed, comfortable, even charming, no one is going to pay attention to what he actually said (see "Default Mode"). Everyone's waiting for him to say something really stupid, so much so that they don't notice the stupid things he's already saying. A good example is when he whiffed last night on a foreign policy question that could have been answered in yes-no format. Gore got the question first: Did he agree with previous adminstrations' decisions to intervene with military force in Lebanon, Grenada, Panama, the Persian Gulf, Somalia, Haiti, and Kosovo? Gore answered by talking about each situation -- Lehrer ran through the list for him. His responses was clear and concise. Faced with the same question, Bush flashed a deer-in-the-headlights look a là Dan Quayle (I think he was nervous about having to recall moderator Jim Lehrer's list of countries) and was silent for a few seconds before Lehrer laughed and asked if he needed the list of countries repeated again.

He blew two other topics as well: hate crimes legislation and children's access to health care in Texas. With the first, Bush said that Texas had a hate crimes law and that the three men who killed James Byrd Jr. were going to be put to death as result of it. (Let's leave aside the question of Bush's smug demeanor when talking about putting people to death. As Lehrer would say: new subject, new question. While we're at it, let's leave aside the fact that only two of the men convicted of killing Byrd were sentenced to death; the third was sentenced to life in prison.)

The more important issue here is how little Bush seems to know about the hate crimes debate that recently took place in Texas. In truth, advocates of such legislation tried to use the publicity from the Byrd crime -- in which Byrd, an African-American, was tied to the back of a pick-up truck and dragged to his death by a couple of recently released graduates, er, inmates of the Texas prison system -- to get a hate crimes law passed in Texas. Bush opposed it because it included provisions for crimes motivated by homophobia. Gore gently reminded Bush of this (that he had let the measure die, not that he had done so over objections to including the phrase sexual orientation - an interesting omission on Gore's part, but again, new subject, new question). Bush sputtered that his state did have a hate crimes law on the books (must be something left over from Reconstruction) and that he didn't know how to punish people more severely than putting them to death. Actually, what he said was, "It's gonna be hard to punish them any worse after they've been put to death." Damn straight it is!

Gore, who was so restrained last night that Tipper must have pumped him full of Prozac before allowing him on stage, let this pass. But can you blame him? Gore's attempts to have a conversation with Bush, much less a debate, look like those of an adult trying to convince a child that there's no such thing as the tooth fairy. Which of course is mean. Which of course is Gore's problem (see "Grading Gore"). But that's a new subject, new question.

On the issue of how many children in Texas have access to health care - Gore charged that the state is one of the worst in the nation on this issue -- I don't know what the truth is. But it's clear to me that Bush doesn't either. Gore talked about a judge's ruling that ordered the state of Texas to spend more money on health care for children. I suppose he could have made that up. But I doubt it -- otherwise, wouldn't Bush have called him on it? Gore also said that Bush had used an unprecedented state surplus to give a tax break to Texas oil companies instead of spending the money on children's health care. I suppose he could have made that up as well. But I doubt it -- wouldn't Bush have called him on it?

I could go on, but I'm starting to spray spit myself. So I'll wrap this up. After watching last night's debate, I'm left with one question: how can anyone take seriously the notion that Bush is a credible candidate for the presidency of the United States? As Commander in Chief, there's no reason to believe he'd be anything more than what he is now: uninformed and unprepared. Actually, last night's debate leaves me with one additional question: what are the undecided voters thinking? I suppose, though, that's a new subject, new question.