> About your column "Bush's Eggnoggural Address"...
> By the childish tone in your column, you seem
still
> upset at the results of the election -- since
your
> man, algore, lost. Well, the fact is that Bush
won and
> you're just going to have to get over it. It's
the way
> our system works. Sometimes you win, sometimes
you lose.
> The fake speech wasn't that great. I didn't
laugh and
> I doubt anyone thought it was funny. Not to
castigate
> your talents or anything, but it just didn't
make any
> sense misspelling words and so forth, when
your
> attacks on his intellectual capacity have been
> disproven -- not that they ever were proven
-- by the
> fact that he won the election fair and square,
> Constitutional and lawful.
> Nick
Relax, Nick! Your side won. Not the popular vote, certainly.
Probably not
even the electoral vote -- we'll see. But the 5-4 vote in the
Supreme Court
is all yours. It was a very special decision, applicable to
Bush v. Gore
only -- not nearly good enough to serve as a precedent, but just good
enough
to serve up a president. Without that "Constitutional and
lawful"
decision, who knows who would be taking the oath of office tomorrow?
Still, it's Bush's presidency, however he managed to get it. I
don't know, it
seems to me you should be happier, and not nearly so defensive.
(I laughed
off all those soreheads who complained about Bill Clinton getting only
42%
of the popular vote in 1992, because 42% was much more that either
George H.
W. Bush or Ross Perot managed to get. But that was way back in
1992, when
vote counts in an election meant something.
I realize you can't make yourself feel better about Dubya's victory
in the same way,
but remember: five justices to four, in favor of the man who thought
that the presidential
election should be kept out of the courts.) Surely you're enough
of a big boy to ignore
the mild jokes of people who think a presidential candidate should
wait until all the votes
are counted before he has his kid brother declare him the victor.
OK, you didn't think the speech was funny. I know you must have
a very keen
sense of humor, by your reference to "algore" -- are you the person
who made
up that name? But where's the joke? When you give someone
a nickname, it
should relate to a characteristic of the person. For example,
a bush baby
is a monkey, and George W. Bush is the simian son of George H. W. Bush.
See how that works? So, what's an "algore"?
You really shouldn't blame me for "misspellings." Some lines of
the speech
come directly from speeches made or interviews given by George W. himself.
"I think we agree, the past is over." - on his meeting with John McCain,
Dallas Morning News, May 10, 2000. He didn't just misspell
"misunderestimated" -- he made up that word, out of two perfectly good
ones.
(Making up words is considered very cute by adults, but only when children
do it.)
He said "resignate" when he meant (I can only surmise) "resonate," and
he said it twice.
He referred to "Grecians" when he meant "Greeks."
He doesn't know the difference between "preserve" and "persevere."
People whose brains are fully engaged, people who read books with more
text than
pictures in them, just don't make those kind of mistakes, Nick -- and
Dubya does it
again and again, without a glimmer of understanding that "mistakes
have been made."
Even when Dubya can get a few familiar words to come out right, he still
says nothing:
"It's clearly a budget. It's got a lot of numbers in it." -- Reuters,
May 5, 2000.
What can we do when we hear such nonsense, but laugh? The Supreme
Court made
George W. president, but the justices had no power to expunge
the record of his public
utterances, so I think there's plenty of room for doubt about his "intellectual
capacity."
Come on, Nick, you know he's no mental giant. But what does that
matter to you?
He never needed to be smart, or to work hard -- he was George H. W.'s,
son.
Now he's going to be the President. And Jay Leno just signed
a new contract.
You really need to loosen up, Nick. You have to remember all the
chuckles
you've had these past eight years. Well, now it's your boy's
turn in the barrel.
You'll hear so many jokes that you're just bound to enjoy at least
one or two of them.
Margaret Shemo