Was Bush ever articulate?

[SemiCharmedQuark]

I have been reading lately that he was as a young man. Is this true?

[punpirate]

1. No. Trust me...

... on any subject that did not include drugs, the death and/or destruction of others or drinking, Bush was not articulate.

If you look up inarticulate in the dictionary, it says, "see George W. Bush."

[Carla in Ca]

28. Some say he did OK until his 40's and that has

been attributed to presenile dementia.

[Southsideirish]

2. His people don't want him to be articulate or intelligent.

Intelligent and articulate folks make his kind of people feel inferior.

[ever_green]

29. lol! Yes, it's quite true

I think you're right on. They like him because he's "one of us". Blech.

[whistle]

3. Which Bush are we talking about....

- pre-adolescence Bush
- teenage Bush
- alcohol consuming Bush
- DWI Bush
- cocaine using Bush
- cheerleader Bush
- Yale Bush
- Nat'l Guard Reserve Bush
- AWOL Bush
- Harvard B School Bush
- Born again Bush
- gov candidate Bush
- Texas Gov Bush
- pres candidate Bush
- pResident Bush

None of these that I've read about or seen video clips on suggest that George W Bush had good communication skills. He was just a punk and a bully.

[lil-petunia]

4. WRONG. It should read: "Were Bush ever articulated?"

But the answers are all correct.

[bain_sidhe]

5. No. I was calling him "Jar-Jar Bush" in early 2000

during the primaries.

[JimmyJazz]

6. I have no idea but he does seem to babble more these

days. It kind of reminds me of Lady Macbeth when she goes nuts because of all the blood on her hands.

For a laugh, check out http://www.dubyaspeak.com

[usurper4]

7. It would be pronounced "arcitulate"

[Eye and Monkey]

23. it would be pronounced "Kin he tawk good?"

Maybe "kin he tawk purty?"

[AIJ Alom]

8. of course it's true...

and according to W (for Wrong) his life as a young man has lasted the majority of his life when at the age of 40 he stopped drinking.

Then again it may have lasted until age 46, as this 1992 clip from the smoking gun seems to indicate....
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/graphics/packageart/bush/bush_tsg.mov

For more info go here.
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/bush/bush.html

[napi21]

9. NO! But neither was his father!

Several speeches his father gave have been aired on TV in the last few weeks. He was almost as bad as shrub! People tend to forget how good or bad a speaker was after several years.

[nodehopper]

10. apparently yes

a coworker was telling me about a man who runs a progressive website (I wish I could remember the name but it's something media-related as we all work in independent media), alan something, who has made interesting points that it was Rove's "spin" to make Bush a bumbling nincompoop so that people could relate to him, and he has clips of Bush as governor where he is perfectly lucid and makes sense. I've read this elsewhere and have seen some clips that demonstrate the validity of that theory. Try to look up old appearances of Bush while he was governor of Texas.

[drscm]

11. I also heard that the answer is yes from a debate scholar

who said he demonstrated it in his debates with Ann Richards.

He understood state politics and was able to defend his position with full articulate sentences.

He does not know if Bush's "radical change" occured because he feels out of the water when it comes to the federal government (his take) or if it is all an "old boy" affect he adopted.

[QC]

12. Check out that clip in F 9/11 where Chimpy is talking about

how his father's name does give him access to the powerful. He doesn't sound like L'il Abner after a lobotomy in it.

[peacetalksforall]

13. Yes he was articulate in the language of parties and telling stories

and talking about his free ride in life and wild nights in May-hi-ko.

[Crunchy Frog]

14. In F 9/11

when they had footage of him from a couple of decades ago, he seemed vastly more articulate than he is today. Still as much of an asshole, but more articulate. It wouldn't surprise me if it turned out that he has a degenerative neurological condition of some sort.

[William Seger]

21. Yep, even the clips from the 2000 campaign...

... while "articulate" would be a stretch, he was at least able to make it through complete sentences at a normal cadence. These days, it doesn't seem that he can do that unless he's reading a speech. Jon Stewart did a really funny bit about Bush announcing Tenet's resignation -- with Bush pausing several times in the middle of each sentence and Jon guessing what he was going to say to complete the thought.

[AlCzervik]

15. When i lived in Texas under the Bush regime..ie governer

we never used to see or hear from him much, it all makes sense now.

[grace0418]

16. Actually...

I read an article recently that suggested Bush is a sociopath and he uses this inarticulate language to make himself appear harmless.

Here's a snip from the article:

"Mark Crispin Miller, author of The Bush Dyslexicon and professor of media studies at New York University, who also sees the darkerBush, said in a Nov. 28 interview with the Toronto Star, "Bush is not an imbecile. He's not a puppet. I think that Bush is a sociopathic personality. I think he's incapable of empathy. He has an inordinate sense of his own entitlement, and he's a very skilled manipulator. And in all the snickering about his alleged idiocy, this is what a lot of people miss...."

"...He has no trouble speaking off the cuff when he's speaking punitively, when he's talking about violence, when he's talking about revenge," Miller told Whyte. "When he struts and thumps his chest, his syntax and grammar are fine. It's only when he leaps into the wild blue yonder of compassion, or idealism, or altruism, that he makes these hilarious mistakes."

In a speech last Sept. in Nashville, trying to strengthen his case against Saddam, Bush's script called for him to say, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." But the words that came out of his mouth were, ""Fool me once, shame . . . shame on . . . you," followed by a long pause, then, "Fool me?can't get fooled again!"

Said Miller, "What's revealing about this is that Bush could not say, 'Shame on me' to save his life. That's a completely alien idea to him. This is a guy who is absolutely proud of his own inflexibility and rectitude."

I can't find my link to the original article, but here's a link that has similar information, including some of the above quotes:

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/1128-02.htm

[AlCzervik]

17. Sounds about right

Noun: antisocial personality disorder

1. A personality disorder characterized by amorality and lack of affect; capable of violent acts without guilt feelings ('psychopathic personality' was once widely used but was superseded by 'sociopathic personality' to indicate the social aspects of the disorder, but now 'antisocial personality disorder' is the preferred term)
- sociopathic personality , psychopathic personality

[drunkdriver-in-chief]

18. I read that in college he was a fine speaker

A few months back i read a book called "the Bushes" that said that. I really think those twenty years of being a falling-down-drunk fried his brain. Booze will do that to you.

[Eye and Monkey]

24. in college, he HAD fine speakers - probably Bose

and he HEARD fine speakers in his classes.

But leading cheers - I don't believe that qualifies as demonstrating oratory skill.

[spanone]

19. Maybe he got more focused when he was coked out of his head.

[Generic Other]

20. If you ever saw the video of a drunken Bush at his friend's wedding

you wouldn't ask. He was rating all of his friends on a some kind of a social scale: "So and so...boring...that guy...boring...oh, him, he's boring too..."

Besides the fact that only stupid people are bored, if that's the best you can say for your choice of friends...well then you are the biggest bore of all.

He might as well be wearing a lampshade on his head.

[kayell]

22. According to Mark Crispin Miller

"Bush can often be quite lucid when he speaks on subjects that really matter to him, and when he's talking from the heart. For example, when, during his second debate with Al Gore, he spoke about how James Byrd's murderers are going to be put to death down in Texas, he spoke with a sudden clarity that had to startle anyone who expected everything he said to be unclear. Bush usually tends to be clear when speaking from the heart like that.

It is, on the other hand, when he tries to sound a note of compassion, that he tends to speak most nonsensically. There are many good examples in my book, but the remark he made in New Hampshire is a perfect example. I argue that his inability to say "I know how hard it is for you to put food on your family table" betrays the fact that he does not know how hard it is to have to struggle economically, and furthermore, that he does not really care. All of us, regardless of our educations, tend not to speak coherently when we speak insincerely. George W. Bush is no exception. "
http://www.cnn.com/2001/COMMUNITY/08/06/miller/

If you have not yet read The Bush Dyslexicon, by Miller, I highly recommend it.

Another interview with Miller
http://www.alternet.org/story/10989

DH: What's the biggest misperception the public has of Dubya?

MCM: That he's a moron -- and a benign moron at that. Although Bush is indeed illiterate, bone-ignorant and generally illogical, he's not a cretin. At the nastier kind of politics, he is extraordinarily shrewd. In this he is a lot like Richard Nixon, who, as I argue, is his spiritual father. Bush only benefits from his wide comic reputation as a genial idiot (he's neither genial nor an idiot). So we "misunderestimate" him at our peril.

DH: How does Bush's style work for him?

MCM: He is adept at the sort of "self-effacing humor" that lets people see him as a regular guy. Through this pose, first of all, he turns his major weakness -- his enormous ignorance -- into a seeming strength. Anyone who calls him on his lack of education can be dismissed as stuck-up and elitist, like the Stevenson supporters who would jeer at Ike's weak syntax. (That confusing syntax was deliberate on Ike's part. He was incomparably more literate, and better-educated, than this Bush.)

[Disturbed]

25. Brain Damage.

This topic has been brought of many times here at DU.

Most of the Mass Media do not discuss this.

GW Bush is not a moron. He is arrogant, spoiled, shallow but clever. He fits the description of a Sociapath. His speaking ability is deteriorating and the brain damage widens.

He may soon be unfit on the basis of this damage to carry out his duties.

George Bush Medical Bombshell: Brain Damage Drama
by CONSPIRACY PLANET

Reports by a White House insider, published on TBRNews.org reveal that George W. Bush is suffering from unspecified medical problems, characterized by "seizures" or "ministrokes," possibly due to so-called cocaine stroke.

A former cocaine addict, Bush has exhibited increasingly bizarre behavior in recent years, indicative of brain damage (See: http://www.drugabuse.gov/NIDA_Notes/NNVol13N3/Cocaine.html)

Bush's mental impairment is held in check by his handler Karl Rove and Dick Cheney has become the defacto president of the United States, according to the insider's report.

Bush's performance at his latest press conference was questioned due to his anomie, characteristic of his being under heavy medication.

Also Bush's unexplained "pretzel" dive and the resulting bruise on his face several years ago are indicative of brain damage.

Medical experts suggest that mental impairment may also be a sign of HIV infection, measurable even from the earliest stages of the disease. Usually referred to as 'AIDS Dementia' it is recognized as fogetfulness and confusion.

http://www.thebody.com/Forums/AIDS/Mental/Archive/Reactions/Q8505.html

[knowbody0]

26. brain drain

i am sooooo looking forward to the debates. i predict that he will drool and have white foam on the corners of his mouth and that he will stutter and spit his love all over the audience. these speeches of his lately you can see his mental confusion glitches all the time-little prick

[Disturbed]

27. The Debates

Mass Media that is owned mainly by Right Wingers will slant the debates as W winning unless he totaly starts babbeling in an unknown language or faints. No matter what the issues are W will be boosted. It'a a setup. Pinning hopes for Kerry on the debates is a long shot bet.

[orpupilofnature57]

30. WHILST PUKING THE PRETZEL.MAYBE?

He has the verbal flow of the little man on twin peaks.Lets check deeper into his years at yale.

[progressivebydesign]

31. Yes.. he was...

I've seen some video of him, and he speaks clearly... he has a distinct style.. but he never sounds so clueless as he does now. Oh, and he doesn't have a texas accent on the video that makes him seem drunk at a friends wedding.

[priller]

32. In Atlantic Monthly a few months ago

there was an article about the upcoming debates. The author reviewed past debates by both and was struck by how different Dubya was in the past, how he seemed to have little trouble speaking, and how far his speech has deteriorated in the last few years.