Thursday, December 08, 2005

The Emperor’s Clothes? What Clothes?


[[M E D I A]] * Wouldn’t it be nice if real journalists, such as longtime 60 Minutes reporter Mike Wallace, could ask serious questions of George W. Bush, rather than the prez persistently protecting himself behind staged rallies at military bases and carefully screened town hall events? Of course, he might not like the sorts of questions he receives. During an interview with The Boston Globe, interviewer Suzanne C. Ryan asked the 87-year-old Wallace what he would most like to ask Bush, given the opportunity. Wallace replied:
What in the world prepared you to be the commander in chief of the largest superpower in the world? In your background, Mr. President, you apparently were incurious. You didn’t want to travel. You knew very little about the military. ... The governor of Texas doesn’t have the kind of power that some governors have. ... Why do you think they nominated you? ... Do you think that has anything to do with the fact that the country is so [expletive] up?
No wonder the prez isn’t knocking down Wallace’s door for the opportunity to be interviewed.

DOES HE EVEN KNOW THE RULES? Given the blatant right-wing bias of FOX News (“fair and balanced,” my sweet fundament), I don’t usually turn there for news about the reality-based world. But the FOX Web site has posted an interesting story about how Bush’s partisan, pro-war speeches at military bases “put troops in the awkward position of undermining their own regulations. A Department of Defense directive doesn’t allow service members in uniform to attend ‘partisan political events.’” Read on.

JUST ANOTHER WEEK IN BUSH’S AMERICA. Writes The Carpetbagger Report’s Steve Benen: “[W]e’ve reached an interesting point in Bush’s presidency in which serious controversies, some of which point to possible crimes, have become so common, they hardly cause any excitement at all. It’s become routine to see a half-dozen stories or more in any given week, each pointing to significant improprieties, that hardly raise an eyebrow anymore.” Read on.

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