.“Imagined February 2009 Interview with Former President George Bush, Junior”
© Copyright 2007 by Douglas Perron
Betsy Ross (BR): Thank you for agreeing to this interview, your first since leaving office.
George Bush (GB): Your welcome, Little Lady.
BR: How does it feel to be an ordinary citizen after so many years in office?
GB: I'm not ordinary. Never been.
BR: Yes, Sir, I agree. What I meant was that you were governor of Texas for eight years, then President for eight years. And now your an average citizen.
GB: Not average. Sub-average. Sounds like I'm in the navy. Ha, ha. What? [He turns to look at Laura Bush, sitting nearby.] Super? Sup-ra? Okee, dokee, thanks, Hun. [Turns back to face Betsy Ross.] I'm a sup-ra-average fella. Not just plain average.
BR: Okay. Moving on. What do you think your legacy as President will be?
GB: Pardon?
BR: Your legacy?
GB: Is that a French word? Like “French fries”? You know we changed that to “freedom fries”? Sounds more patriotic-ore.
BR: That word “freedom” is important to you, isn't it?
GB: Very much. Freedom is what America is all about.
BR: And yet, American freedoms, civil liberties, have diminished under your leadership.
GB: What do you mean?
BR: You issued executive orders and your Republican-Party-Controlled Congress passed laws allowing wire-tapping, internal spying, required patriotic oaths, travel restrictions and restricted funding for non-faith-based programs.
GB: Listen, Missy, those 9-1-1 terroristas blew up aeroplanes into our American buildings and they was going to do it, again! Tough times call for tough measures. We had to circle the wagons and fight off them injuns...I mean terroristises.
BR: Perhaps if you had acted on the Homeland-Security suggestions of the Hart-Rudman Commission, 9/11 may not have happened.
GB: We were new to the White House and so we were studying the recommendations.
BR: You had the necessary bi-partisan information and recommendations for months. Your people did nothing because they perceived the recommendations were coming from the Democrats and you didn't want to appear to be taking orders from the outgoing Clinton Administration. And you, Mr. Bush took more vacation during your first several months in office than any other President in history.
GB: Transitions are tough. We didn't want to go off half-cocked. We acted in our good time, after studying things carefully.
BR: So why was it necessary to restrict American freedoms?
GB: We was protecting American freedoms the same way you put yer chickens in the hen house when you know there's a coyote outside. Don't make much sense to leave 'em out ta get killed, does it?
BR: In that analogy, no it wouldn't.
GB: I wish you'd stop using French words. I don't speak that lingo. I habille Espaniola, if you know what I mean?
BR: Sé lo que usted piensa que usted significa. Pero Vicente Fox dijo que usted sólo habla español en un nivel de primaria.
GB: ¿Qué? What?
BR: I said “I know what you think you mean. But Vicente Fox said that you speak Spanish at a grade-school level.
GB: Vincentee is an old amigo. We go way back. “My Amigo Over the Border.” Ha, ha. He's just joshin'. Or in Mexicanize, that's “bravado.”
BR: You mean “bromeando.”
GB: Of course. Heh, heh.
BR: Getting back to the topic, you were protecting American freedoms by restricting them?
GB: Protecting American freedom is what I'm about.
BR: You like that word “freedom.” In fact, you've used it in both of the wars you started.
GB: Now wait, Missy! I didn't start no wars! Them terroristist guys did. We just gave 'em paybacks.
BR: “Operation Enduring Freedom” and “Operation Iraqi Freedom” were your calls – I mean you and Dick Cheney and your Republican Party – to go to war with Afghanistan and Iraq. Were they not, in fact, declarations of war?
GB: That's where the terroristees were, that's where we got to drop bombs. You don't bomb Canada to destroy terroristists camps in Iraq, Do ya?
BR: Yet there are terrorists in Canada, the United States and at least a dozen other countries. Why didn't you bomb the other countries?
GB: No one told me that! How do you know?!
BR: The CIA makes public information on locations of suspected terrorists. Surely you were briefed on all the information, or was it just selected information, like the rumor of weapons of mass destruction?
GB: I was a very busy man – signing papers, appointing people and giving speeches. Lordie, Laura would make me practice them speeches over and over and over, agin! It was exhaustin'. I re-lied on my advisers to tell me what's goin' on, the “Dickster” to tell me what to do and the speech writers to tell me how to explain what I've dun. I had no time to know any of that.
BR: So former Vice-President Dick Cheney told you what needed to be done?
GB: Dick was my chief staff person. He was my vice-CEO. I mention that 'cuz underlings mostly don't get the credit they deserve. So I'd like to state in a pubic...oops, public manner that Dick took control and got the job done. Why Mister Cheney is the very model of a CEO, just like Rockerfella, Carney-gee and that Dick fella, the one with Enron. And other Dicks, or course. I call Mister Cheney the “Dickster.” Jus' like I call Mister Putin, Ivan. Yes, Ma'am, from Ivan Putin to the Dicks, I've known 'em all. You know that's one of those coinciden-cees. CEO and Dick are like see-non-o-mus. That means sort of like the same thing, with two different names.
BR: Yes. And I'll agree with your examples. Many CEOs are Dicks.
GB: Thank you. Yes, good ole Dick, a real patriot. Not the missile. Though he'd often go firing off like one. Heh, heh. He was a guy who knew who to talk about and who to keep an eye on. He kept the country running like he kept his Halliburton Corporation running, at a very good profit.
BR: But America is not a corporation and it certainly didn't make a profit. The U.S. currently has a ten-trillion-dollar debt and a five-hundred-billion-dollar federal deficit!
GB: The deficit ain't that much.
BR: It is that much if everything is included on-the-books and not offset with borrowed money from the Social Security Trust Fund.
GB: We don't never include everything. Some expenses don't need to be on-the-books.
BR: And if America was a corporation, your administration and Congress would have put us into bankruptcy.
GB: That's not so! We've been borrowin' money and we'll pay it back. I mean the average citizens will pay for it, pay it back. That's how you do your business, Missy.
BR: It will take decades for America to pay off the enormous National Debt the Republicans have created!
GB: Hooey! Look, Missy, you don't know business finan-see-els like I do. There's debetentures, liquid-teas, capital this and that. With growth, we can do it in some small amount of years. We had a mission to protect America and, God bless us, get rid of them Moslem fantastical terroristas. War costs money. You don't think the bomb makers are going to give us free bombs, Do ya?
BR: Let's talk about military expenditures....
GB: Sorry, but I don't have notes on defense numbers, so's I jus' as soon not.
BR: Well, then let me give you some numbers. First of all, I'm using the term “military” not “defense” because most of your administration's so-called “defense-budget” spending was for “offensive military actions” such as starting and continuing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, to the estimated long-term cost of over one trillion dollars. And another one-trillion-dollar impact on America's economy. Your administration has more than doubled the so-called “defense-budget” spending from the previous administration and doubled the National Debt. It stood at over five trillion dollars at the end of Bill Clinton's administration and was over ten trillion dollars at the end of yours!
GB: So what? He spent five trillion and I spent five trillion. That's the same amount. Five plus five equals ten, Right?
BR: Mister Bush, before Ronald Reagan took office the National Debt was only around one trillion dollars. Reagan and your father ran the National Debt to over four trillion dollars by the end of your father's administration. During Bill Clinton's eight years, the National Debt rose just over one trillion dollars versus your five-trillion-dollar increase. The Republicans refer to the Democrats as the excessive spenders, and yet, it was the Republicans that have spent America further and further into debt!
GB: You must be addin' wrong. I told you that you don't know business finan-cee-els like I do. I used to own and manage the Texas Rangers, which is just the same as a corporation.
BR: Moving on. Studies have estimated that perhaps over one million Iraqis and over 4000 Americans have died as a result of the Iraqi war.
GB: I don't believe those numbers.
BR: Either?
GB: Neither, either, nor. None of the above.
BR: The U.S. Defense Department provided the number of deaths of U.S. military.
GB: Look, Missy, they were patriots, who went and died for their country. I'm very proud.
BR: Of death?! Does that include the Iraqis?
GB: Does what?
BR: Do you consider the Iraqis as patriots who died for their country?
GB: There ya go, twistin' my words, agin. I meant the fine American soldiers who proudly gave their lives for their econ...country, for their country. It's them that I'm proud of. And...well...yeah, I suppose them Iraqi soldiers were patriotical for their country, too. But not the Muslimy terroristas. I'm proud they're dead...so as they can't harm America no more.
BR: And what about the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi women and children who died as a result of the war you started?
GB: American soldiers didn't kill no Iraqi women or children! That was the terroristas.
BR: And the American bombs, shells, mortars, mines and missiles?
GB: We have “smart bombs” and smart military commanders. They aimed away from the schools and homes. Hell, they didn't even blow up their masks...mooskes...temples. The generals didn't report any women and children as dying there.
BR: Is that because they were under orders not to release numbers on civilian deaths or not to count them?
GB: Both. They don't release them and they don't count them, in keeping with the “Don't Ask/Don't Tell” policy.
BR: Just dig big holes and bulldoze them in?
GB: That's not true! There were no dead civilians to bury, only dead terroristas.
BR: And no dead Iraqi soldiers either? As a result of the combat and the devastated infrastructure – hospitals blown-up or looted and water, sewer and electricity services destroyed – injuries, poor sanitary conditions, little food and clean water, and lack of medical care causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands, perhaps a million civilians. Plus the millions of homeless, disabled and traumatized Iraqi and Afghani men, women and children, who will live with the terror and horrors of the wars for the rest of their lives!
GB: War is heck.
BR: And yet you, like so many government officials who have never been in a war, glorify war as noble, patriotic and worth sacrificing human beings, as long as the war is not in your neighborhood. Any remorse, Mister Bush?
GB: There ya go using French, agin.
BR: Any sorrow, any regrets, any sad feelings about the death and suffering you have caused, like McNamara after Vietnam?
GB: Look, Missy, I was the commandant and the chief protecting America! I had to make tough decisions and I'd do the same, agin!
BR: So, let's review. A dozen terrorists killed three thousand people in America, and instead of only targeting terrorist-training camps with missiles and Delta teams, you and the Republicans spend one trillion dollars on the military, impact the American economy another one trillion dollars, cause the deaths of an estimate one million or more Iraqis and Afghanis, and over 4000 American military, including National Guard soldiers, who had no reason to be in a foreign war; you double military spending, set record federal-budget deficits, lowered America's reputation and credit rating, made record profits for the oil companies – your favorite industry – while raising the price of oil, which America so heavily depends upon – impacting the American consumer and the economy, and you reduced spending on education, the environment and other social programs, while producing significant profits for stock holders – the wealthy – including enormous profits for Halliburton – the former Vice-President's corporation, and benefit numerous other corporations through government contracts, tax-breaks and other forms of corporate welfare, while reducing social welfare, contrary to the tenets of the U.S. Constitution, which is based upon the health, welfare and defense, not offense, of the citizens – meaning all of the citizens, not just the wealthy, and you supported faith-based initiatives, contrary to the separation of church and state, as declared in the Constitution...and you would do it all, again?! Is it any wonder why the Republican Party is now known as the “Greed and Death Party”?
GB: We Republicans are for capitolism and a strong America. You liberals call that those other names 'cuz ya don't understand how to make it happen. You're not satisfied with yer lot-in-life. Few of people were meant to be leaders and wealthy, the rest not. I'm one of them.
BR: Will you take time to read about what you've done to the world?
GB: Heck no! Laura is the reader in the family. She can give me sin-op-sehees. You know, like the Cliff Notes. I jus' want to ranch and be available to make decisions for my think tank. That's a place where you think and then tell the media 'bout yer decisions.
BR: Yes, biased and illogical though they may be.
GB: How's that? Oh, and I think there's a swimmin' pool, 'cuz it is a tank, but not the army kind.
BR: Can the public expect new insights or the same old traditional Bush-thinking?
GB: Well, the tank will have new insides and outsides, too. People have relied on Bush-thinking for many years. Don't see why people would want something different.
BR: But they do want new thinking. That is why they elected a completely different person to be the current President.
GB: That's temporary. I could come back. And there's Jeb, he hasn't run, yet. And when Laura wins, then I'll be back, fer sure. Hell, the American people could continue in Bush-thinking for many years to come.
BR: Or they could wise up, become enlightened and concerned for their fellow human beings around the world, and less selfish, and dump the Republican “Greed and Death” Party, forevermore.
GB: That's not the American people I know! They're concerned about getting money, not world peace.
BR: You may be right.
GB: Yes, Ma'am. Bush-thinking.
BR: Some claim that you became President only because your father was a previous President and he helped you raise hundreds of millions of dollars for your campaign and he provided covert knowledge from his previous days and connections as the former CIA director.
GB: I won't deny that Daddy helped, but I'm presidential material. I've always had a destiny to rule the world, I mean, this great country, and keep the world in check for God-fearing religiously peoples everywhere. Why, I might even be President, again.
BR: You can't. There's a Constitutional Amendment against a third term.
GB: The Constitution can be amending, agin. It's a hysterical paper and it didn't much deter us while I was the President. I don't see why it could keep me from another term. And we gonna change it for school prayer and against abortion.
BR: Who is “we”?
GB: That's jus some people Daddy and I know. I'm not naming names. It's none of your business.
BR: You mean the “Insidious Power Elite” – the super-wealthy who covertly run this supposed democracy – America – as a capitalistic oligarchy, instead?
GB: Once again, that damn French!
BR: Do you deny...?
GB: Sorry, Laura is signaling that it's time to go. Thank ya fer this talk, Missy. You be sure to tell folks I'll still be giving speeches. And come see us at our new think tank. The admission price is reasonable and I think there's refreshments.
BR: And a good sewer system, I hope. Thank you, Mister Bush.
This document: “douglasperron.com/ImaginedInterviewBush.html,” updated December 20, 2007.
© Copyright 2007 Douglas Perron.