Yeah, I agree, give poor Gord a brake.

Part of the problem is that we’ve become more superficial preferring to heard what we want to hear as opposed to what is real.
Is it any surprise that in a world where more people can identify Britney Spears and Paris Hilton as opposed to the leaders of the G-8 countries that we are getting media coverage of the asinine rather than the substantive?

Good catch, David. What a non-story this is. It shows how there are certain topics that are considered “safe,” part of the official narrative. Usually there’s some sort of grounding for it, as in the Bush gaffes stories, but sometimes there’s not, as the Vanity Fair article about the 2000 campaign points out.
The one that I’ll find personally offensive for the rest of my life is the way that Adm. Stockdale is remembered by many as some sort of buffoon. Granted, he looked terrible in his first debate. There’s no way around that. But he was about as courageous and accomplished a human being as you’ll ever find. Shouldn’t that have factored into coverage somehow?
And, as you point out, we get this foolishness instead of, say, discussions of how Bush was received by most Australians, or how America’s image abroad has changed in the past decade.
Ugh.

Prime Minister Bush is write on so meny issues. We shood not forget that.
Any Christian should be proud to have him as a personal friend after he repents for the mistakes made in the Iraq war. Which of course is just running a war like a war and not a politically correct experiement. You can love your enemy in war while shooting him (or her) in the chest. That is not a judgment of their soul, just their actions and behaviors.
What Christians should never forget is that President Bush is more in keeping with a “Red Letter Christian” than most of the versions the Left props up. His actions in Iraq for instance ended the genocidal wars on the Iraqi people by Saddam Hussein and his sons. It is not President Bush’s fault that Sunni’s and Shiites desire to kill each other without cease.
Remember the hundreds of thousand of innocent Iraqi’s killed by Saddam Hussein?
Hello? Sojouners? Et al?

I agree. What were we talking about, again?

On second thought, the book Alexander and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day is far more substantial than most news stories so maybe this actually is a step in the right direction.

Actually, “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” was one of me and my siblings favorite childhood books. We still use the term “Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day” on a pretty regular basis.

Au contraire. President Bush’s many gaffes are perfectly legitimate news stories. First of all, when he travels abroad he is representing America, and I would argue, selling American values and interests. For this reason alone it is important that he knows the name of the country he is visiting. Do we all make mistakes? Of course. But not all mistakes have equal consequences. Bush hurts his credibility, and America’s, when he bumbles around on stage like an American Idol reject, or confuses 21 Pacific rim nations with a famous oil cartel. What other conclusion can the world draw from these miscues other than “Bush doesn’t have his head in the game”?

As Heraldblog states, these stories are important, especially juxtaposed with your prior post on Bush’s lack of humility. He is seen, and rightly so, the world over as being not only a warmonger but also as being not very smart. That is not a good combination of qualities, and the voters should be reminded of that fact at every opportunity so we don’t repeat that mistake.
It used to be that we elected the best and the brightest to represent us. A candidate’s intelligence – knowledge of history and world affairs, economics, the US Constitution, and so on – should be given greater weight than “hmmm…would I like to have a beer with this guy?”

OK, Patient Witness, I agree with your conclusion, but shouldn’t a candidate’s intelligence, knowledge of history, intentions thoughtfulness and so on also be given more weight than his gaffes? Granted, there’s no comfort for the President in that, but isn’t confusing Australia with Austria less important than the administrations assorted and sordid other failures?

Too many of the President’s assorted other failures are a product of his insular world view, which was on display in Sydney.

Carelessness, an attitude of callousness to detail and responsibility, is the great sin and reason for downfall of the careerist in F.S. Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby”.

Hi Doug,
That’s a good point. I’d bet that almost every one of us has made plenty of verbal gaffes like that; I know I do. And yes, a leader’s real mistakes and the real successes should be the main focus instead of little miscues. Which makes me ask myself why I took such delight in reading about Bush’s little mistakes here. After all, I’m a Texan, was here when Bush was governor, knew he was a lunkhead back then. Maybe Bush just reminds me of my dad. Perhaps I’d better grab a cigar and re-read some Freud.
I’m joking, Doug, but just a little. You did give me something to think about.
And again I also agree with Heraldblog. Bush does seem to have a quite limited and indeed black-and-white view of the world and its goings-on. It seems to me that he’s had only 2 periods of success in his various careers. As Texas’ governor, he had very limited responsibility. The real leader of the state is the Lt. Gov. who, under Bush, was a Democrat. And Bush was quite liked by many who saw him as affable and harmless.
His other main success was in buying part of the Texas Rangers baseball club and reaping substantial rewards as his investment grew. Now, some say that he bought in with some under-the-table dealings but the point is he made a nice fortune. How? By doing nothing. He let those who knew the business run the team while he enjoyed the games.
So the two periods in his career which are viewed as successes are when he was a figurehead, friendly but not too bright, someone who could cash in on his dad’s connections to help the team. Will history judge Bush’s worst mistake as President to be surrounding himself with the wrong people?

David,
You’ll get “substance” from your comboxers when you get any from yer “president”. he can go first.