Did the press corps save GWBush from total embarassment?

Great Debates
41

Neurotik - excellent points. You’ve made me look back at the article, and it seems to have all of the hallmarks of an Urban Legend - no date for the alleged incident, no context (where were they meeting? Why were they meeting? Who else was there?), etc.

I’m going to try to resolve this by submitting the article to snopes.com and see if they come up with anything.

rjung, something else struck me when I re-read the article, and the commentary on gwbush.com - where did gwbush come up with their assertion that “the White House Press corps witnessed” this exchange? There is absolutely no mention of that in the article, which appears to be gwbush’s only source for this story. Could it be that a partisan website gasp is lying??!! No, couldn’t be. :smiley:

Sua

42

I must take umbrage to this comment. You see, Jessie Ventura is the governor of my state.

43

Gobear – cmon, now. Back up in the thread Sua and December basically argued that it didn’t matter if he said it or not, it doesn’t mean Georgie boy is incompetent. Obviously, they, like me and you, are equally assuming that “W is dumb enough to have said it,” and we are all arguing just how dumb a thing it is to say.

We’ll find out if it’s actual truth, soon enough – Duh!

In the meantime, we can contrast how the “Bush is a gaffe-prone moron” assumption is backed by available facts and prior acts to the RW’ers assumption of guilt and prosecution of the entire Clinton administration on evidence much flimsier than a German newspaper. Remember Troopergate much?

44

I am usually quite skeptical of these things, but based on the source I assumed that it was true. But I see that in addition to the excellent points that Sua makes, the blurb is in a section that seems to be Der Spiegel’s special interest and gossip section. Definitely sounds like a UL that slipped past the editor.

45

Let me start off by saying that I am not a Bush supporter by any means. However, I think that most of Dubya’s questionable statements are malapropisms (i.e. the “century and a half” of peace with Japan as opposed to half-a-century) and not out-and-out utter stupidity. Yes, there are exceptions, but this has been the trend for his gaffes. So although I’m not a fan, I don’t think he’s “dumb enough to have said it”.

C’mon, reread the Spiegel article and then do a search on “Taliban” and Bavarian Brass Band"- nothing. Search on “Cardoso” and “learning phase”- nothing (I even tried it in spanish and portugese). These could be translation problems but I would think that the anti-globalization types in Brazil would’ve had a field day with this, as would The Guardian, Yellowtimes, etc… Add to this the fact that (from what I can tell) Bush hasn’t been to Brazil in over 6 months and my money’s on Urban Legend.

46

Two things popped into my head on hearing the word “Spiegel”:

1: All prizes won by contestants on the show can be found in the wonderful Spiegel catalog.
2: The German newsmagazine notorious for featuring topless women on its cover.*

*which doesn’t mean its articles are necessarily wrong, but it would be nice to have dates and places to back up this particular allegation.

Other thoughts - this would have been a dumb thing for Bush to say, not because he necessarily would have been expected to know the answer, but because you try not to look ignorant in front of world leaders.
“Rice helped Bush from the leave in the lurch” (caption to the English version of the der Spiegel story) is my favorite mangled translation of the week.

This may represent an Olympic record for leaping to an unjustified conclusion from a shaky standing premise.**

I just got word that a Pakistani-born co-worker will be inviting us over to his house for dinner. Does this mean I shouldn’t expect a pig roast and cocktails?*
*I already made the mistake of attempting to shake hands with his wife upon being introduced; I don’t want to screw up again.

47

I agree with Neurotik’s as usual excellent post – if it didn’t make the Guardian, it may be a UL. But you know what makes Urban Legends, right? Credibility.

But telling me that Bush never makes out-and-out dumb statements – um… …

"“Down in Washington they’re playing with Social Security like it’s some kind of government program!”

“It is clear our nation is reliant upon big foreign oil. More and more of our imports come from overseas.”

“I was raised in the West. The west of Texas. It’s pretty close to California. In more ways than Washington, D.C., is close to California.”

48

Wow, them kids over at Snopes are fast. They have ranked this story as “undetermined.” I think the link is http://www.snopes2.com/ If that doesn’t get you to the piece, it’s under “additions” on the Snopes web site.

In sum, Snopes doesn’t have anything yet to concretely refute it, but from their comments, they think the story is bogus.

Sua

49

Figgered it out. Here is the direct link http://www.snopes2.com/quotes/brazil.htm

Sua

50

I emailed the link to the Snopes take on the story to gwbush.com. It will be interesting to see how they respond.

Sua

51

Well done, Sua.

52

Well, that’s why I didn’t start the OP with something like “irrefutable evidence the media is covering for Shrub!” :slight_smile: I mean, between the unreliability of gwbush.com (I like those knuckleheads, but I sure don’t mistake 'em for CNN), and my unfamiliarity with Der Spiegel, I didn’t know how much credence I should give to the darn thing.

53

But as the OP asks, could it be that Bush’s malapropisms and political gaffes are now being more or less ignored/under-reported by the media? If not for 9/11 , would the recent incident involving David Gregory in France hit high up on the headlines list?
I know there are more important things to report and discuss, but I really don’t see the media discontinuing frivolous news reports. It does seem like a (sub)conscious unspoken effort to not pick on Bush.

54

Ace,

Have you ever had every conversation and statement that you have said recorded and then analysed? I bet you haven’t.

I worked as a second and third level tech for a large company and had many of my phone calls with techs recorded. I heard some of these conservations played back and, man, I said some really stupid things. The number of stupid things was a small percentage If those small gaffes I made were the only focus on my proformance I would never have been promoted (note, I got every promotion I applied for).

The point is that all kinds of people make stupid statements from time to time. And for every Bush gaffe I can find one to match it by Gore, Clinton or any major politician of either party.

As far as the OP, this reeks of UL, especially since the Dems would be all over it. Think what Al Sharpton would do if this was true.

Slee

55

Well, litost, it’s amazing you even heard about the David Gregory “incident”, in which the NBC White House correspondent challenged Bush at a news conference regarding his popularity in Europe and Bush had a tart response (when Gregory posed similar questions to French Pres. Chirac in French). I guess it’s that 'ol American media self-censorship - except I read about it in the paper this morning and it’s been the subject of editorial commentary, if not large black front-page headlines.

How terrific it would be if certain opponents could ditch their obsession with minor bullshit and concentrate on the detrimental aspects of his administration which really count. But I guess it’s more fun sneering about “gaffes” than tackling Bush’s failures on environmental policy, lack of a coherent energy plan etc.

“I know there are more important things to report and discuss”.

Damn straight.

56

I did a little research on my own. Now bear in mind that I don’t speak Portuguese and have a marginal comprehension of the language when it’s written, but I am fluent in French and speak some Spanish, so I can generally get the idea from written Romance languages. That said, I submit to you exhibit A, from the Brazilian web site JB Online:

http://jbonline.terra.com.br/jb/papel/brasil/2002/04/19/jorbra20020419011.html

As you can see, President Cardoso clearly refers to Bush as “an apprentice.” We know for sure that that happened. Also check the date of the article: April 24, 2002. The article in Der Spiegel was dated May 19.

What can we conclude? Well, it’s safe to say that Cardoso thinks that Bush is an apprentice when it comes to Latin American politics. Specifically, Cardoso said Bush ''ainda um estágio de aprendizado em termos de como lidar com a América Latina," which translates as Bush “is as yet in an apprenticeship stage in terms of how to cope with Latin America.” (I’m pretty sure. If anyone can offer a better translation, please do.) So Cardoso doesn’t think Bush is up for the job of dealing with Latin America. Grass is also green. The sky is blue. You get my drift.

But that’s all we can conclude. My theory? Well, I smell ein Spinnenspiegelspiel. In other words, I think someone made up the story, lifting an actual quote from President Cardoso. Someone pointed out on this thread that he or she didn’t think Bush had recently met with President Cardoso, and to tell the truth, I don’t recall his having done so, either. He did go to South America a few months ago, but never to Brazil.

I’m 85 going on 90% sure that this story is a fraud. Sure, it’s tempting, particularly since it does seem like the sort of thing that Junior would say, but the lack of corroborative evidence and now this Brazilian article have pretty much convinced me that there’s some sort of hoax coming on. Chancetradamus predicts that tomorrow, May 31, will show us all a solid debunking of this story.

57

Man, did Bush ever trash Gregory.

For those who don’t know, Gregory asked Bush a question, and then said, in French, that he would also like to ask something of Chirac. This was Bush’s response:

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20020527-78351630.htm

A reasonable point, actually. There was no reason for an American reporter to address Chirac in French, when Chirac was getting a translation piped into his earpiece anyway. He was grandstanding.

IF the press is backing off Bush a bit, I think it might be because they are discovering that this is an administration that bites back.

Anyway, back to the OP. If Bush really didn’t know something like the general demographic of the country he was in, it wouldn’t just be a failure of his intellect - it would be a failure of his state department, because he is supposed to get briefings that cover material like this. I guarantee you that when he was on the plane heading there, his advisors were briefing him on these details.

Urban legend. I’d bet on it.

58

Oh, and SuaSponte: I completely disagree with you about whether the president of the United States should know a few things about the racial makeup of Brazil. While it is asking a little too much if you expect every American man, woman and child to comprehend it, the president of a country like ours, that has so much of its history tied up in Latin America, should know some things. I think the quote of Ms. Rice in the probably-fictitious Der Spiegel article is probably correct: Brazil probably does have the highest number of blacks of any non-African nation. Be that true or not, Brazil does have a significant black population, and was actually the last country in the Western hemisphere to ban slavery (unless you count Cuba, which permitted slavery until 1903, but only as a Spanish possession and as an American protectorate, not as an independent nation.)

I mean, if you’re going to be president of the United States, you need to understand a few things about the world, and I think Latin America is one part of the world you should understand particularly well, as an American president. And, as others on this thread have pointed out, even if you’re a complete ignoramus, you should at least call Ari Fleischer to run through the Brazil flash cards before you meet with any dignitaries from that country.

Of course, many Republicans don’t believe that it’s necessary for the president to know anything about the world and how it works. He has, as they’ve often said, surrounded himself with others who do, so why does he need to know anything? (Note to all the irony-impaired: please reread this paragraph carefully. Thank you.)

59

Chance, on reflection, I withdraw my first post in this thread. My bad.

Sua

60

Actually, the way I see it, he had every reason to adress the french president in his own language in his own country if he could do so.

According to me, he was being polite…