Posted on 06/16/2004 1:47:53 PM PDT by finnman69
Literary mugging: Vanity Fair's James Wolcott gives the women closest to President Bush a very rough going-over in the latest issue - portraying mom Barbara Bush as a nasty piece of work, wife Laura as timid and ineffectual, former Bush aide Karen Hughes as a wacko and a liar and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice as a weirdly worshipful "professional wife." But, surprisingly, Wolcott concludes with a backhanded compliment for daughters Jenna and Barbara: "I've come to have a grudging regard for the Bush twins. Jenna and Barbara may be spoiled brats - tarty party girls - but at least they're not perpetuating false pretenses, being used as attractive props and tweeting noises they don't believe."
http://blogcritics.org/archives/2004/06/14/112552.php
So What's Wolcott's Point?
Posted by Punditz on June 14, 2004 11:25 AM (See all posts by Punditz)
Filed under: Et Cetera, Et Cetera: Media, Et Cetera: Politics
Reading James Wolcott is like watching someone who just swallowed a can of drain cleaner and is in the process of vomiting up a lung, the errant kidney, and the entire contents of his lower intestine. Well, maybe that's a little strong. Actually, Wolcott isn't as funny. In his article from the July 2004 issue of Vanity Fair Magazine, it's clear why Wolcott has earned the title "acid-tongued." The thing is, he's long on the acid and short on a point.
It's difficult to grasp what exactly Wolcott's point is in his "The Bush Bunch" diatribe against the women who voluntarily spend time near George Bush. It's clear from beginning to end that if one is a woman and if she puts Bush somewhere above pond scum, that is definitely NOT a good thing. But just in case one is dumber than a post, Wolcott makes it clear that women who actually like Bush, like his mother, his wife, or his advirsors, are large-footed, unattractive, stupid, murdering, George Washington look-alikes. The thing is, most of this is not original. The point has been made ad nauseum that some believe Barbara Bush looks like George Washington, and it's even been included -- while he was crossing the Delaware. (Washington must have looked different while he was crossing the Delaware than he did at any other time.)
I did not know, however, that Karen Hughes wears size 12 shoes. I also did not know that while she can take out entire ant colonies is a single step, she is also a psychological lunatic who has lost touch with reality but who has retained a shrewd "devious intelligence". Now THAT'S quite an accomplishment!
I just wonder what happened to the days when it was supposed to be a good thing to be a strong, intelligent woman. When did that become an object of derision? In one fell swoop Wolcott takes down Barbara Bush for being a feisty outspoken woman, Laura Bush for having no mind of her own AND being a librarian, Condoleeza Rice for being a well focused, respected, intelligent career woman, and Karen Hughes for being a Christian AND for having the audacity to have big feet.
Well, that's not 100% true. In addition to playing on the chauvanistic drivel of the macho man threatened by any female no matter what her shoe size, he's really doing his hatchet job because all the women he mentions support George Bush, so that automatically makes them suspect. And evil. And high maintenance fashion accessory drains on the family budget.
But there are two exceptions to whom Wolcott cheerfully assigns a far better status. First daughters Jenna and Barbara Bush. It's his view that these two young women are outside the box of Bush influence, so in spite of the "fact" that they're both spoiled brats, they rate better overall scores for intelligence.
It should be noted that daughter Barbara Bush gets higher marks than her sister Jenna because Barbara is against capital punishment, and she was particularly against the execution of Karla Faye Tucker. Karla Faye was executed in Texas because she brutally killed two people. It didn't help her case that she admitted to having orgasms as she struck the fatal blows to her victims. But, see, Karla found God AFTER her conviction and sentence, so it doesn't matter how Karla got herself onto Death Row. Karla's sorry now; ergo, ignore the law and the finding of the jury and believe that she isn't making any of this up to save her sorry ass from extinction. Bush did not order a stay of execution for Karla, and she was executed. This makes him a cold hearted bastard because he didn't allow his daughter's difference of opinion to decide legal matters in the state of Texas.
I must admit that Wolcott's article did give me some food for thought aside from noticing how acerbic it was. When he mentioned Laura Bush's incident when she was 17 years old in which a man was killed, and no charges were filed against her, I was reminded of the Daddy of all vehicular man-slaughter, Teddy Kennedy, who to this day sits in the Senate of the United States.
Laura Bush became a librarian after her experience. Teddy Kennedy became a huge canker on the butt of the US Senate. When Wolcott finds fault with First-Mother, Barbara Bush's comments, I'm reminded of Lillian Carter's famous words which ended up in a popular trivia game, "Sometimes when I look at my children I think I should have remained a virgin." When Wolcott points out the differences in politics that the Bush Twins have with their parents, I'm reminded of Amy Carter who kept getting herself arrested, Patti Davis who chose a very public way to grind her axe with both her mother and father, Ruth Carter Stapleton who aligned herself with Larry Flynt to stomp for Jesus, Billy Carter who relieved himself on a wall in Libya, Al Gore's son who got himself arrested for pot possession, Howard Dean's son who was arrested for burglary, and John Kerry's daughter who gave us a wicked look at some pretty nasty Jahoobies. The point is, lay off the family stuff, Wolcott, because you have no point to make that's worthwhile hearing on that score.
In spite of all this, I am glad I read Wolcott's article. He's convinced me that I'm correct about the agenda writers like him adhere to in this election year. It's not important to folks like him to base what they have to say on points of logic or sound conclusions. The important thing is to keep repeating that message... I Hate Bush, I Hate Bush, I Hate Bush... and so should you.
Sit down and shut up Wolcott. You're making a fool of yourself, and you don't have big enough feet to stand on.
Let's see; this is a New York Daily News article. Gee that will probably be read by 84 people, all who are in NYC which GW isn't going to carry anyhow. I say don't spend a penny of campaign money in NY, CA or Massachusettes. Use our resources ($$$, time and energy) in battleground states.
What say ye?
What! Karen Hughes a liar? Oh, brother. The lefties just don't quit.
old lloydd can kiss my ass
LOL.....consider the source. A Michael Moore wannabe.
Al Gore's son has been arrested more than once.
Actually I think Lloyd was merely pointing out what as ass Wolcotts article is.
Has he ever done an article on Hillary?
Wolcott's "analysis" is an almost demonic inversion of reality: he blasts all the women of substance, and reserves faint praise for the daughters who (so far) seem the least admirable of the whole bunch.
read post 2
Aren't the Bush twins doing a photo spread for Vanity Fair this summer?
Seems to me that someone in the WH would check out what kind of mag they give interviews to.
In praising the Bush twins and damning all the other women in the Bush clan, I can only conclude that Wolcott has a fear of strong women.
All I can say is "Good Grief!"
I almost bought that rag today. Glad I saved my $$.
Yeah, and her son & husband like
to torture puppies & kittens while
watching John Wayne or Ron Reagan
Movies. Or else Dr. James Dobson's
"Focus on the Family"
Yeah, the Clinton women were a classy bunch, weren't they? [irony]
some other pre-9/11 choice comments by Wolcott about Bush. He has hated W from the very beginning.
http://slate.msn.com/id/2000281/entry/1008096/
It seems so right that George Bush should spend part of today lending his sweat equity to Habitat for Humanity in the Texas heat, a transparent charade to recast himself as a compassionate conservative for all those moderate Republican women voters who are less inclined than men to see the world reduced to ash. I can just hear him now, gripping a hammer and telling reporters, "I'm a builder, not a destroyer. That's what my presidency is all about. I know it's hot, being president is about being able to take the heat." Heat may come to be the defining condition of his sham presidency. I've noticed that there have been three stages in the response to global warming from the conservative pundits and policymakers who stock Bush's cookie-jar head:
1) Global warming doesn't exist. It's a myth, a false scare cooked up by environmentalists. When too much scientific evidence came in for even these ideologues to ignore, they went to a fallback position, which was,
2) Global warming may exist, but it's the result of long-term climate changes, not the product of industrial pollution. I.e., if it's happening, it's happening, but there's nothing we can do about it. That fallback position collapsed and now we're at the fallback to the fallback position, which is,
3) Global warming may exist, and it may be mankind's fault, but to take drastic measures would wreck the economy and weaken us competitively and who are a bunch of snooty, jealous, ungrateful foreigners to be telling us, the last remaining superpower, to buckle our belts and cooperate with the rest of the world. WE ARE THE WORLD.
To me, the most arrogant thing about Bush is his rugged humility. That earnest tone he pipes into his voice when he talks about consulting our allies on the challenges ahead or expresses concern about an issue that he clearly isn't going to do anything about. I don't believe he's a nice, caring soul because a nice, caring soul wouldn't have mocked Karla Faye Tucker's pleas before her execution to a reporter. There was an incident reported recently in the New York Times where a man in Philadelphia politely expressed his disappointment with some of Bush's decisions, and Bush snapped, "Who cares what you think?" That, I believe, is the true Bush. He doesn't care what any of us think because we're not the ones he's taking instructions from.
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