Doesn't seem like 'low-expectations' was the underlying point of the NYT article. Rather, that newspapers have a similarly less dedicated audience.

But attitudes towards Bush's newspaper-reading habit has been a tasty slap in the face, mainly because his misplaced pride of the fact has backfired so greatly. If we all had his daily briefings, we might be tempted to toss off the newspapers. But newspapers would certainly help Bush take better check of the nation's pulse.

"He [Bush] does not dwell on the newspaper, but he reads the sports page every day," Mr. Card said with a chuckle.

'Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory.' - John Kenneth Galbraith (1908 - 2006)

You know, sometimes we can be too literally minded.

This article is ridiculing the president, not reporting on anything the Times considers particularly newsworthy.

NEWS FLASH! generally precedes an article that isn't a news flash.

Running three actual and utterly incoherent quotations from Bush is meant to heap scorn on him, not inform the public about anything newsworthy.

The worm has turned. At least it's gonna be a long two years for him, too. In 2003 this would have run as an article about how down to earth he is.

Woodward giveth, and Woodward taketh away. I believe that State of Denial was a tipping point.

So proud of his ignorance.

All the news and reality needed is already there in his head!

Will all of you libs back off Shrub - The poor Roi only recently completed a correspondence course in "Speed-skimming". It is hard, hard, hard work Mismanaging a nation.

Actually, dzman49, I think was part of a multi-tiered strategy to minimize the role of the press in national affairs.

Jay Rosen puts it this way Press Think

The game hasn’t changed, you [James Harris] contend. We’re still in a recognizable, fourth-estate, meet-the-press, rather than beat-the-press universe. Those — like me — who accuse Bush of taking extraordinary measures to marginalize, discredit, refute (and pollute) the press are said to be exaggerating the cravenness of this Adminstration and ignoring the parallels and precedents in other White Houses, including the Democratic ones.

Actually, I may have understated the magnitude of the change Bush and company have brought to your world, because I didn’t connect the pattern we can find in journalism to the Bush Administration’s treatment of science, its mistreatment of career professionals and other experts in government, and of course its use and misuse of intelligence. All have to be downgraded, distorted, deterred because they’re a drag — also called a check — on executive power and the Bush team’s freedom from fact.

When Bush said he didn't read newspapers, he was trying to advance a narrative that says what is printed in newspapers is both unimportant and unreliable.

(It's worth reading the entire Press Think piece.)

'One of the words they use to characterize what he cares about now is "honor", but in fact the Iraq War was never "honorable". It was a sleazy, ill-planned act of arrogance, as much a longshot as gambling your house on the 99 to 1 horse in the Kentucky Derby. And without reading the Daily Racing Form.' - Jane Smiley

Agreeing with jayackroyd, and also want to add that in context when Bush is responding to VP Cheney being called to testify in Libby trial - when Bush says "he read about it in the newspaper" he's not really saying anything about his own reading habits; he's saying that he and his people have such little concern, and such total absence of worry over the Libby trial, that they don't talk about it, don't keep track of it, and he wouldn't even know about it if he hadn't seen it in the news. Whether he uses the word "read", or the phrase "seen the headlines" is hardly the point (and Bush does not have much skill in the finer points of word usage and meaning). Look at the tone of the quote, and it's simple disdain.

Ah, Kevin.

Is there no pleasing you people?

Now Bush reveals he does in fact read newspapers, and you go ballisitic. Is it because it disagrees with your preconceived notions, Kevin? IS IT BECAUSE IT DISAGREES WITH YOUR PRECONCEIVED NOTIONS?!?

After 6 years, I know only one book that Bush has read, and that one was a children's book about a goat.

There's this mistaken idea I sometimes hear that CEOs get their information from summaries and reports from other people, from "experts" in the company. While that's true, I've yet to meet a high-level manager or a CEO of the small-to-medium businesses where I've worked that didn't know what was really going. Part of the reason is that those CEOs have worked their way up through one or more companies.

Bush is the guy who was born into being a CEO (literally and figuratively) and has no idea what people who make things really run and work have to go through. He has no idea of the world.

The question isn't so much what he reads (and it seems obvious that the man doesn't read at all), but what does he really know? He seems to have no personal knowledge or insight about any topic. As far as I can tell, his expertise is in campaigning, where keeping things simple and sticking to 3 topics is an advantage.

One would hope that Shrub does more than Speed-skimming when he reads, in the Washington Times, (the other 3 papers are for the WH's litter box) that one of our troops was killed on Christmas day in Iraq.

One would hope that the word "peruse" has entered his limited consciousness, at least for the death of a soldier or marine.

Of course, he can then utter "shit happens" and move on to the comics.

Egbert,

Get the fuck lost. Kevin is not here. He hasn't been here for a few days. He will not be here for several days. Apparently, you have the same reading and comprehension skills as GW. That's not a compliment.

I think the other low expectation we've come to expect is "competence."

Steve, maybe as a suggestion, you can find examples where doing the bare minimum in a competent way has been written up as a resounding success by this administration.

I'd do it, but I'm still trying to figure out how to look busy at work. You know, when I was a kid, this week was traditionally down time and nowadays, I just don't know how productive I can be between now and January 2nd.

Is it because it disagrees with your preconceived notions, Kevin?

Um, it's because it disagrees with what the president has said in the past.

But this is a bizarre meta-meta-discussion. Nobody believed him when he said he didn't read newspapers. This episode, starting with witlessly publishing the claim that he doesn't read newspapers. The observation that four newspapers are delivered daily to the White House could have either been pointed out to the president at the time, or included in the article.

Reporting this stuff as literally true helped the administration in its marginalizing of the press.

My preconceived notion has always been that Bush follows political news closely, through Rove and on his own, but that policy questions are left to lower level officials. He can't do that without reading newspapers. It may be that they get clipped for him--that some assistant of Rove's goes through the newspapers and prepares a news briefing for the day.

This is all very silly. Yes, he reads newspapers. Yes, he always has. What he says about his newspaper reading is meant to minimize the power of the press. And, as el points out, having spent the last six years rendering the press as marginal and unreliable, he now uses that rendering to dismiss the importance of the Libby case.

Ah, Kevin.
Is there no pleasing you people?

Ah, egbert--

Is there no end to how ridiculously incompetent Republicans are with regards to reading comprehension and understanding basic logic?

The observation that four newspapers are delivered daily to the White House could have either been pointed out to the president at the time, or included in the article.

Not to mention an entire news gathering and research staff that assembles virtually everything written about the administration, especially as it pertains to editorials and columns, regardless of where it is published, either domestically or abroad. Inside their archives, there is no doubt that they have a system of assessing what editorial writers say about various policies or proposals and then that information is then organized and presented to the political operation inside the White House.

They use extensive research and polling to acquire their information, most likely made much easier now that every newspaper in the world has a website, and there are briefing books handed up the food chain to the President on a daily basis--excepts of newspaper stories or editorials should regularly be included in those briefing books.

This is just more of the attempt to seem like regular folks when in fact they are rabid consumers of specialized information.

Whether Kevin is here or not is not materiel to the argument.

What is importatn is that Kevin (or this Steve Beneen character) seem to pounce on every Bush doing, even if accords with their political philosophy.

FWIW, I refuse to read "newspapers" in solidarity with the president, preferring such independant publications such as the Weekly Standard and Drudge.

Karl Rove stole a page out of Ray Kroc's successful method at McDonalds - The Keep It Simple Stupid, or Kiss method.

When Kark hand picked Shrub and used the Kiss method of having him repeat 4, count 'em, 4 talking points, he won the Guv's chair.

Karl should have gotten Shrub a job at McDonalds in Midland - He would have only fucked up hamburgers, rather than the state, the nation, a war, a region. He has, indeed, perfected the Kiss method.

This is just more of the attempt to seem like regular folks when in fact they are rabid consumers of specialized information.

Yes, that too. This is one more manifestation of insider versus outsider views in DC. Everybody in Washington knows what's going on. Maintaining insider status means passing on the narrative, nudging and winking along the way.

BTW, that's why they hate us dirty, fucking hippies, because the wires are increasingly visible.

Conservatives were outraged that Clinton had sex in the Oval Office. I find it more obscene that Bush plays video games in the Oval Office. A sitting president that finds time to play Super Mario Bros. on the job, as Bush allegedly does, is guilty of dereliction of duty and needs to be removed from office. This retard has no comprehension of what he is doing and is wholly unfit to govern.

>>I just don't know how productive I can be between now and January 2nd.
Posted by: Pale Rider

Just be grateful that you don't have the onset of Mardi Gras season to deal with as well. We've got another 2 months or so of King Cake madness to endure down here in the bayou country.

We'll be beset by hordes of people so buzzed on dyed sugar that they're essentially unable to function. By their multi-colored fingers you shall know them.

Diagnosis of diabetes crises will soar. There are dry cleaners who advertise their expertise in removing colored sugar stain from ball gowns.

Bon temps and all that jazz or Zydeco or whatever.

"FWIW, I refuse to read "newspapers" in solidarity with the president, preferring such independant publications such as the Weekly Standard and Drudge." - egbert

Thank you egbert for demonstrating precisely why Bush says what he does about his newspaper reading habits.

Looking at male escort ads and seeing another article is not the same thing as perusing the news.

Just be grateful that you don't have the onset of Mardi Gras season to deal with as well. We've got another 2 months or so of King Cake madness to endure down here in the bayou country.

Here's what I don't understand--if you live in Louisiana, Mardi Gras must be a huge pain in the ass. There are things like inaugurations, national demonstrations, etc. that I have to deal with here in the DC area, but it cannot even approach what you have to deal with. I mean, several hundred thousand drunken people exposing themselves in public? Perish the thought!

Heh.

Try being 7 blocks north of the end of the St Patrick's day parade in NYC.

With an Irish pub half a block away from your building.

Whether Kevin is here or not is not materiel to the argument.

Uh, yes it is.

You took exception to him, by name, for something Steven Benen wrote. You made a glaring factual error when trying to denigrate the point that was made for your own benefit.

Accuracy, fairness, actual facts and accountability--never heard of these things, have you?

Good Lord, yes.

Drunken Irishmen? Drunken Irishmen?

I realize that God invented whiskey to keep the Irish from ruling the world, but did he have to invent lutefisk to keep Norwegians like me from controlling the universe?

"materiel to the argument"

Heh. Funny malapropism...or not?

Yeah. It's only one day, though. But I get nervous when there are a lot of drunken cops around.

And then night descends, and the vomiting begins.

I mean, several hundred thousand drunken people exposing themselves in public? Perish the thought!
Posted by: Pale Rider

Hey! Ain't gonna happen. This is Acadiana - not the Vieux Carré. We do a generally G-rated Mardi Gras for the most part.

FEMA says the beads are in the mail.

I realize that God invented whiskey to keep the Irish from ruling the world, but did he have to invent lutefisk to keep Norwegians like me from controlling the universe?

Have you read Mark Kurlansky's book about the history of cod? It has recipes interspersed with the history, including lutefisk.

Does Kurlansky explain why bacalao was invented? Because it sucks, no matter who's making it.

And if y'all knew what I knew about Icelanders picking myriad worms out of cod in the processing plants...well, now you do.

jayackroyd - Closest I've come to that experience was when the TX-OU crowd used to descend on downtown Dallas in their inebriated thousands. The nicer class of employers would let you go home at lunchtime.

The NOLA version of St. Paddy's Day parades featured float riders pelting the drunks with cabbages. A few concussions are always a feature.

Have you read Mark Kurlansky's book about the history of cod? It has recipes interspersed with the history, including lutefisk.

Didn't have to read it--I've lived it.

This is Acadiana - not the Vieux Carré. We do a generally G-rated Mardi Gras for the most part.

With Kool-aid and Disney characters? Sounds more evil that way.

When you bring up Bush's 2003 admission that he doesn't read newspapers, I am reminded of the following quote from the December 2, 1999 Republican primary debate in Manchester, New Hampshire:

**

MR. HUME: . . . Could you tell us, sir, what do you read every day for information?

GOV. BUSH: What do I read?

MR. HUME: What do you read for information?

GOV. BUSH: Well, I read the newspaper.

MR. HUME: Which?

GOV. BUSH: I read the Dallas Morning News, I read the New York Times, I read the Wall Street Journal and I read the Austin American Statesman.

I'm not so sure I get a lot knowledge out of there, but I read them every day.

**

I remember watching the 1999 debate and thinking that this was a pretty obvious lie, and later recalling it when Bush made his 2003 statement about newspaper-reading. Sadly, the media never connected the two statements and never yet has, so Kevin, if you could belatedly publicize this a bit that would be a plus.

And by the way, NOBODY is busier than a Presidential candidate, and that most assuredly includes a President, who by comparison has oodles of leisure time. So the idea that Bush actually read all these newspapers in 1999, yet had abandoned the habit so completely by 2003 as to not even mention it as a past habit when stating then that he didn't read newspapers, is a non-starter.

Cabbage Concussion. An excellent name for a band, or perhaps just a 10-minute documentary.

Gee, we never have these kinds of melees in Chicago, except for an occasional Democratic convention. But living near Wrigley Field does entitle me to receive frequent presents of pee and vomit in the yard. Those Cards fans are freaking savages.

Cabbage Concussion.

Indeed. The authorities made 'em stop throwing canned corned beef.

'You'll put your eye out!"

Whether Kevin is here or not is not materiel to the argument.

But it is material to pointing out your ignorance, you sill drive-by parody troll.

Actually that article shows the low expectations we now have of the New York Times. Kevin didn't even blink over a juvenile hit piece appearing in what used to be a great newspaper.

Does Kurlansky explain why bacalao was invented?

The recipes are all about how one goes about converting salt cod into something edible. Bacalao is one such method. Not so bad as lutefisk, which involved lye.

One of the central theme of the book is the role cod played in the slave trade. It's interesting that even today, the places that got the lowest quality salt cod prefer it today.

And did you know that when Cartier delivered the French flag to the new world, he had to thread his way through Basque fishermen?

President Bush's head is already so full of facts and information of his choosing that if he reads something interesting like the article about Cheney's expected testimony and it permanently enters his synapses, something else has to leave.

What's worrisome is thinking about what got pushed out of Bush's brain to make room for the information in the Cheney article.

The nicer class of employers would let you go home at lunchtime.

I had an office at 89th and 2nd (the parade turns right on 86th and spreads through the neighborhood). There was a bar diagonally across the street that set up a little tent apparatus.

The workday indeed ended at noon. I don't guarantee that the 20 something guys who were working for me actually went home.

Kevin didn't even blink over a juvenile hit piece appearing in what used to be a great newspaper.

Read byline. Must read byline.

As for the content here, after 6 years of juvenile sycophancy, we can get some balance in here with some juvenile hit pieces.

I'd prefer real journalism from reporters on the DC beat, but that doesn't seem to be one of the options. (There has been plenty of fine reporting from Iraq and other places. Jon Stewart, referring to Obama, once remarked that the oath of office for the Senate seemed to also include taking a stupid pill. The same seems to be true of getting assigned to the White House or the Hill.)

jayackroyd - Have you read Raymond Sokolov's 'Why We Eat What We Eat' or Rhea Tannahill's 'The History of Food'? Sounds like just your cup of Darjeeling. Or possibly 'Earl Grey'.

Waverly Root's incredible "Food' too.

jayackroyd: As for the content here, after 6 years of juvenile sycophancy, we can get some balance in here with some juvenile hit pieces.

Thanks for correcting my error on the poster.

You have a good point about Katherine Seelye. She can be just as mediocre a reporter when she's being kind to Bush.

However, the kind of tripe in the cited column has been standard fare for years in columns by Maureen Dowd. Frank Rich, Paul Krugman, and Bob Herbert, as well as many editorials. I grew up reading that great newspaper and am sad to see its decline.

I note that W. misuses "skim" and "scan." He says he "scans" the page till he finds an article he wants to read, then "skims" it. Actually, "scan" means to meticulously examine something*, which, in this case, would mean reading every word. "Skim" means to check out the headlines and maybe a sentence or two to see what should be scanned more closely.

So his understanding of something comes from "skimming" the report (newspaper, PDB, whatever). That explains a lot, right there.

Ed

* You wouldn't want a CAT skim, would you?

A true story: In July 04 I took a high-school class I was teaching to visit the local Bush-Cheney HQ. During the Q and A at the end of our visit I asked how I could stress the importance of reading to the students when the President didn't even read the newspaper. The PR flack that was leading our tour became very snooty, and assured my class that I was wrong, and that Bush did indeed read the newspaper, and that he was a very intelligent and well-read man. (Methinks the lady doth protest too much.) Unfortunately for her, nowadays we have something called 'the internets'. When we returned to campus I asked the class to find out which of the two of us was right about GWB's reading habits...google is indeed a wonderful tool.
In a way, a very revealing little anecdote about the cognitive dissonance necessary to support Bush, even 2 years ago.

However, the kind of tripe in the cited column has been standard fare for years in columns by Maureen Dowd. Frank Rich, Paul Krugman, and Bob Herbert, as well as many editorials. I grew up reading that great newspaper and am sad to see its decline.

Dowd, sure. The others, not so much. And I'll see your Dowd and raise you Brooks. I don't much like Herbert, unless the column is about a law enforcement story that belongs in the news pages, but he isn't snarky. The other two are just saying things you don't like, which is not the same thing at all.

But iac those are opinion pieces. My problem has been with the straight news feeding the official narrative. A snarky news piece directed at Bush is an indication that the official narrative is shifting. I'd prefer they practice journalism, but if it's gonna be snark, then they owe us six years of snark against the republicans to get us back into balance.

I note that W. misuses "skim" and "scan."

Everyone except you and me misuses scan--to the degree that in W3, definition 3b is to study closely and 3c is to skim through. (1 is to scan as a poem and 2 is archaic--to test thoroughly.)

I just finshed the second in a line of books I am reading about the men who fought for independence and created this government. As true children of the Enlightenment, most of these idividuals devoted focused energy on self-education and the acquisition of knowledge.

What a shame that at such a critical time in our history we are now led by such a monumental dullard.

jayackroyd - Have you read Raymond Sokolov's 'Why We Eat What We Eat' or Rhea Tannahill's 'The History of Food'? Sounds like just your cup of Darjeeling. Or possibly 'Earl Grey'.

Cod: The Story of a Fish that Changed the World is not a food book. It's a history book, and also a book that uses cod to illustrate the destruction of the world's fisheries. Salt cod was as important to the triangle trade as were rum and slaves.

The recipes are included are rather tongue in cheek, as are the references to the Icelandic taste for rotted shark head.

The full title is 'Why We Eat What We Eat - How the Encounter Between the New World and the Old Changed the Way Everyone on the Planet Eats'.

It's not a cookbook, honey.

I didn't think it was a cookbook, dear.

So it's about the big five--potato, tomato, tobacco, maize and chocolate? It's always a different fifth one.

Sounds interesting. Have you read any of Michael Pollan's work? Botany of Desire or An Omnivore's dilemma

Sorry, that didn't make any sense. Let's try again.

So it's about potato, tomato, tobacco, maize and chocolate?

And chile peppers, vanilla, guavas, squashes, avocados, and beans (the old world had pulses like lentils). It's a fairly long list.

Botany of Desire is sitting in my to-be-read basket. It's currently sifted down to a spot just under Hiaasen's Nature Girl but I swear I'll get to it soon.

He has literally boasted about not reading, about not being intellectual, instead simply going by his gut. It is pitiful to watch him so ill-prepared, bumbling and inarticulate... and it doesn't appear that on-the-job experience has helped this president either...
look how his staff had to burn a cd so he could become cognizant that New Orleans was completely destroyed. Obviously he had not watched the news or read a newspaper, he just partied and vacationed.
He is such a smart alec with the press, acting like the world's oldest frat boy. How about the time he got all fussed up when a US reporter posed a question to Jacques Chirac in French--George clearly seemed annoyed,then called the reporter "intercontinental" in a most derisive, condescending tone of voice.
How about the time he asked the president of Brazil Cardoso--"Do you have blacks too?"
And that time he said "Whether they be called Christian, Jew or Muslim or Hindu, people have heard the universal call to love a neighbor just like they'd liked to be called themselves." What? The end of that sentence is illogical. One gaff after another.
It is just absurd. And people voted for him twice?
When he talked about having a contest with Karl Rove on who was going to read the most books for the year, I got all Shakespearean --Me thinks thou dost protest too much. Like I'm sure. You don't even read your daily presidential briefs.
The newspapers document his failures--if he didn't seem so arrogant, I'd give him that for not reading them. We know too much to respect him. The Bush era is over.
Bill Clinton is eulogizing James Brown on CNN as I type this. Golly, I miss Bill--now there was an articulate guy, the Rhoades Scholar.
I lose sleep thinking about this kind of stuff...

ex-lib: Kevin didn't even blink over a juvenile hit piece appearing in what used to be a great newspaper.

heh..

if there is an expert on not blinking..

here at p.a.

it would be ex-liberal

ex-liberal really likes making excuses for his main man.
He likes to tie us up with our rebuttals to him when instead we could be hacking through the propaganda, lies and manipulation out there and posting it

Botany of Desire is sitting in my to-be-read basket. It's currently sifted down to a spot just under Hiaasen's Nature Girl but I swear I'll get to it soon.

Nature Girl is disappointing. More of the same, but muted.

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