# President-Appoint Shrub. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 13, 2000, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387 "2000-12-13T19:08:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chance_the_Gardener)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/1 "2000-12-13T19:08:21Z")
Well, it’s official: Gore is conceding tonight and Junior gets to be the 43rd president. The election has successfully been stolen due to delays imposed in the state of Florida. Considering that Katherine Harris was the leader of Bush’s Florida campaign, isn’t it a little unfair that she was the one who interpreted the decision of the Florida Supreme Court? I mean, if the governor of Florida weren’t Shrub’s brother, he might have seen fit to throw this out on the grounds of conflict of interest. That’s what they would have done in a real democracy as opposed to a third-world government. Like Florida’s, for example. Kick and scream enough and you’ll get your way. Isn’t that right, Shrub? Fun new trivia question! Q: Who were the only presidents of the United States who weren’t elected to office? A: Gerald Ford and George W. Bush. ---
**Author:** ![Freedom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Freedom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freedom)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/2 "2000-12-13T19:18:59Z")
> [@](#): > > Kick and scream enough and you’ll get your way. Isn’t that right, Shrub? This seems much more descriptive of Gore to me. From the debates to now he has done what he wanted and tried to ignore all the rules. I’m sorry that the rule of law is such a burden for you guys to live by. I guess we should just roll over and die whenever you want something. BTW… About this Shrub thing. Was this nickname ressurected from the past? Was his father called shrub as well? Or is this a new name for the family to deal with? ---
**Author:** ![Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chance_the_Gardener)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/3 "2000-12-13T19:34:28Z")
Um… no, Gore was pushing for a recount since the election results were clearly not reliable. I certainly have no problem with the rule of law, provided the law is fair. Clearly this law was not equipped to cope with this crisis. Furthermore, I don’t hear you refuting my assertion that Katherine Harris and Jeb Bush should have stayed out of this mess due to clear conflicts of interest. I guess the rule of law works for you as long as it’s convenient for you, isn’t that right, **freedom2**? In addition, the Jim Crow laws were tough, too. How do you feel about all those who complained about having to live under the rule of _that_ law? Were they just a bunch of “crybabies,” too? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/4 "2000-12-13T19:38:54Z")
**F2:** \*About this Shrub thing. Was this nickname ressurected from the past? Was his father called shrub as well? Or is this a new name for the family to deal with? \* Dubya has been nicknamed “Shrub” at various times in the media for a number of years, I believe: certainly since his presidential campaign got going. It’s the title of the recent biography by Molly Ivins and Lou Dubose. The nickname seems to have originated in the name of one of Dubya’s failed oil-exploration companies, Arbusto, which he chose because it’s more or less Spanish for “bush”. However, as Ivins points out, Spanish dictionaries usually translate “arbusto” as “shrub”, so some people (probably starting in Texas, possibly starting with Ivins herself) began calling Dubya that. AFAIK his father (not being directly involved in Arbusto) has never been called “Shrub”; it’s not a family nickname. ---
**Author:** ![Screwtape](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Screwtape](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Screwtape)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/5 "2000-12-13T20:01:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chance the Gardener \* > \*\*Well, it’s official: Gore is conceding tonight and Junior gets to be the 43rd president. \*\* Too bad. I was hoping that he’d never concede. After all, when you concede you’re saying that you lost a fair game - which this wasn’t, by any means. They couldn’t beat him on the field, so they ran out the clock. But hey, we get to see the really interesting times that will ensue when (sniff)Bush starts running the country like he ran Texas. ---
**Author:** ![jeel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/71e660/32.png) [@jeel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jeel)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/6 "2000-12-13T20:07:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Screwtape \* > **Too bad. I was hoping that he’d never concede. After all, when you concede you’re saying that you lost a fair game - which this wasn’t, by any means.** Now I agree with that part of your post! Counting double-votes and under-votes is not fair. Gore had more people show up to vote for him, but Bush came out with more countable votes. That’s it. ---
**Author:** ![Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chance_the_Gardener)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/7 "2000-12-13T20:13:43Z")
_Dubya has been nicknamed “Shrub” at various times in the media for a number of years, I believe._ I’m curious: what media is that? Seems the derision of the name “Shrub” came more from the vox populi than the media. What news outlets were so unprofessional as to refer to Young Bush as “Shrub”? If any were, that would be a scandal in and of itself, I’m sure. Maybe you’ll recall the New York Times quoted George Wallace in Southern dialect back in the 1968 election. Nearly every other professional media outlet in the country was outraged and blasted them for it. Funny, but I haven’t heard any such outcry this time. Maybe the disgust was drowned out by the reverberations of the media’s Altzheimer’s jokes they’ve been making about Ronald Reagan, or the persistent heart attack jokes they’re making about Dick Cheney. Or maybe the blow job jokes they make about Bill Clinton? Devil in a blue dress, anyone?.. ---
**Author:** ![zwaldd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a9adbd/32.png) [@zwaldd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zwaldd)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/8 "2000-12-13T20:23:01Z")
> [@](#): > > But hey, we get to see the really interesting times that will ensue when (sniff)Bush starts running the country like he ran Texas. i moved to texas from nj in '93 and lived here during dubya’s entire administration. i can assure you, there is nothing interesting about how he ‘ran’ things. ---
**Author:** ![Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chance_the_Gardener)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/9 "2000-12-13T20:36:10Z")
We’ve got a Republican governor here now **zwaldd** , and she’s proof positive that you don’t have to be an idiot to be a Republican governor. I think it would be damned cool if Christie Todd Whitman left the governor’s office in Trenton and challenged the Bush presidency in 2004. Hell, I’d vote for her. Five getcha ten, though, that New Jersey’s governor Whitman is going to run for president in 2008, or at least vice president. The most likely future Republican presidential candidate? Pennsylvania’s governor Tom Ridge, whom I would also vote for. If it’s any consolation, at least Texas has a better governor now, whoever the hell he is. ---
**Author:** ![zwaldd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a9adbd/32.png) [@zwaldd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zwaldd)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/10 "2000-12-13T20:46:29Z")
while i question whether bush is prepared to be an effective president (ok, i don’t question it - he isn’t), i have no issues with his governership. what’s wrong with how he ran texas? he ran things the way texans wanted him to. that was his job. what did he do wrong? ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/11 "2000-12-13T20:51:35Z")
> [@](#): > > What? Media? > Dubya has been nicknamed “Shrub” at various times in the media for a number of years, I believe. > > I’m curious: what media is that? Seems the derision of the name “Shrub” came more from the vox populi than the media. What news outlets were so unprofessional as to refer to Young Bush as “Shrub”? If any were, that would be a scandal in and of itself, I’m sure. FTR, I believe she did in fact coin the nickname the shrub, or at least seen her use the phrase more than a few times. she’s a columnist for the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/12 "2000-12-13T21:32:12Z")
**Chance** replied to me: \*Dubya has been nicknamed “Shrub” at various times in the media for a number of years, I believe. I’m curious: what media is that? Seems the derision of the name “Shrub” came more from the vox populi than the media. What news outlets were so unprofessional as to refer to Young Bush as “Shrub”? If any were, that would be a scandal in and of itself, I’m sure.\* Uh, sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that news announcers or lead articles were starting off with sentences like “Today, Governor ‘Shrub’ Bush of Texas said…” But I’ve seen columnists and so forth such as Ivins using the nickname, and [this Washington Post article](http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/2000-02/17/091r-021700-idx.html) confirms **stuffinb** ’s assertion (and my guess) that Ivins did coin it. _Maybe you’ll recall the New York Times quoted George Wallace in Southern dialect back in the 1968 election. Nearly every other professional media outlet in the country was outraged and blasted them for it. Funny, but I haven’t heard any such outcry this time._ Well, I hardly think that a nickname as mild as “Shrub” being used by columnists and cartoonists and the like is matter for a national outcry, even in our hypersensitive media environment. After all, the same media voices have been calling our President names like “Slick Willie” for quite a while now, and that doesn’t seem to have triggered the outrage-o-meter. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/13 "2000-12-13T21:42:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Screwtape \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by Chance the Gardener \* > > \*\*Well, it’s official: Gore is conceding tonight and Junior gets to be the 43rd president. \*\* > > Too bad. I was hoping that he’d never concede. After all, when you concede you’re saying that you lost a fair game - which this wasn’t, by any means. They couldn’t beat him on the field, so they ran out the clock. > > But hey, we get to see the really interesting times that will ensue when (sniff)Bush starts running the country like he ran Texas. \*\* I have to tell ya; as an external and relatively disinterested observer - not even an American - I can’t help but notice that Bush _did_ win the vote, and the recount. Whatever your take on the USSC decision, the votes were counted twice and Bush did win. If you count them 1,000 more times Gore might win a few counts, but I don’t see any reason to believe those counts would be any more accurate or valid, and considerable reason to believe they would be less accurate and valid. Going into this, I had an extremely poor impresison of Bush, and an okay impression of Gore. My impression of Bush isn’t much different, but my impression of Gore has soured. He lost twice. It’s time for him to move on. Chancy and yucky as the election has been, according the to law of the land, Bush won. Twice. Shit happens, close elections get decided by technicalities, and that’s part of living with the rule of law. ---
**Author:** ![Freedom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Freedom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freedom)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/14 "2000-12-13T21:44:59Z")
Thanks for the reply. I have to admit that that was more detail than I had ever dared hope for:) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/15 "2000-12-13T23:46:21Z")
No prob **F2** , it’s why we’re here. [cutting another notch in the ignoranceswatter] ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/16 "2000-12-13T23:51:54Z")
hijack/ Interesting thing about the nicknames our pres wannabes have, it seems that Algore is not a Rush invention but a Warner Bros invention. The other day I was watching Pinky and the Brain, and they did this take-off of Winnie the Pooh. Christopher Walken (sp?) was Cristopher Robbins. Eyor the mule, was AlGore (said algore) in a mule outfit…maybe that more than you guys wanted to know. Oh yeah, I meant to say my kids were watching, yeah…that’s it. /byjack ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [December 13, 2000, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/17 "2000-12-13T23:56:03Z")
Chance-um, no offense-but TOM RIDGE? I take it you don’t live in Pennsylvania… Ugh…_shudders_ _note-this is NOT meant to be a flame…just a my disgust at Ridge…ugh!_ ---
**Author:** ![The\_Ryan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7feea3/32.png) [@The\_Ryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Ryan)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2000, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/18 "2000-12-14T00:09:21Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Chance the Gardener \* > Fun new trivia question! Q: Who were the only presidents of the United States who weren’t elected to office? A: > Gerald Ford and George W. Bush. Shows how much you know. Both Ford and Bush were elected. > [@](#): > > I guess the rule of law works for you as long as it’s convenient for you, isn’t that right, **freedom2**? Isn’t that _exactly_ the position you’re taking? You have no problem with the law, unless it gives a result you don’t like. And just how are you defining “steal” if not “to procure through illegal means”? > [@](#): > > I’m curious: what media is that? Seems the derision of the name “Shrub” came more from the vox populi than the media. Just what makes you think that the vox populi isn’t part of the media? Do you even know what the word “media” means? ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2000, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/19 "2000-12-14T01:56:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by The Ryan \* > **Both Ford and Bush were elected.** After Spiro Agnew resigned as Vice President, Gerald Ford was nominated as Vice President by Richard Nixon. The nomination was approved by Congress. After Nixon resigned as President, Ford became President. Ford served the remainder of Nixon’s term and lost the 1976 election to Jimmy Carter. IOW, Ford was NEVER elected President. ---
**Author:** ![Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@Chance\_the\_Gardener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chance_the_Gardener)\ **Post date:** [December 14, 2000, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387/20 "2000-12-14T04:50:56Z")
**The Ryan** said: _Shows how much you know. Both Ford and Bush were elected._ **jab1** cleared this one up. You really don’t know your recent American history, do you? **The Ryan** said: _You have no problem with the law, unless it gives a result you don’t like._ Is that right? And what makes you think that? Was there anything in my post that shows me defending the law just because it provides an immediate benefit to me? No. You’re projecting, wishing that I’d said something to that effect to make your work much easier. Work harder, pal. Your accusation is completely groundless. You’re making up facts, just like Jerry Ford’s “election.” **The Ryan** said: _Just what makes you think that the vox populi isn’t part of the media? Do you even know what the word “media” means?_ Sure, I know what the word “media” means. It’s the plural of “medium,” as in a _medium_ of expression, i.e. newspapers, television, radio, town criers, etc. However, from your post that I quoted above, you obviously don’t know what “vox populi” means. Now please, for future reference: read what others post before you criticize them. No one appreciates when people try to put words in their mouths. Thank you. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/president-appoint-shrub/45387.md?page=2)