I watched the presedent’s recent press conference on the web today, surprisingly intact and accompanied by a text transcript on the White House web site.
Living here in Japan I don’t have the same ready access to US media that I, er, enjoyed while living in the States, and it’s perhaps because of this that I’m so consistently shocked at the state of political leadership and discourse there today. I mean, is there anyone who watched that and didn’t think Bush is either blatantly evasive or just plain stupid? How on Earth can this halfwit be the leader of the free world? Unable to memorize even a single line of his pre-packaged speech, he speaks using a monotonous stream of five-second spurts punctuated with lengthy glances downward to read the next line. For God’s sake, the man is retarded. What kind of country could have this man as their leader and not feel anything but shame and overwhelming guilt and having put him in the White House in the first place?
Chances are I expect too much from today’s politicians. I look back at US leaders from years ago–Kennedy, Teddy Roosevelt, Lincoln–and marvel at their erudition and intellectual fortitude. Towering men, these, giants capable of moving mountains with little more than the conviction of their ideals and irresistable leadership abilities.
I have trouble finding a single US leader today (albeit through my narrow CNN media window) capable of mustering a grammatically correct sentence, must less the respect of thinking people at home and abroad. We’ve become the laughing stock of the world, a nation of bubbas driving pickup trucks with prominent gun racks, ready to stomp a mud whole in any ol’ peckerwood that wants a piece.
Just make it stop. Bush and Co. need to go, and the sooner the better for all of us. It’s clear we made a monstrous mistake putting them in power in the first place, so let’s can the bastards and move on.