The Madness of King George

The Bush administration consistently paints a rosy picture of Iraq as a wellspring of democracy. Despite the endless violence and car bomb attacks by insurgents which have claimed the lives of 12,000 Iraqi civilians in the past 18 months, President Bush continues to assert that freedom is on the march. Sunday's WaPo debates Bush's optimism:

While Bush and Vice President Cheney offer optimistic assessments of the situation, a fresh wave of car bombings and other attacks killed 80 U.S. soldiers and more than 700 Iraqis last month alone and prompted Iraqi leaders to appeal to the administration for greater help. Privately, some administration officials have concluded the violence will not subside through this year.

The disconnect between Rose Garden optimism and Baghdad pessimism, according to government officials and independent analysts, stems not only from Bush's focus on tentative signs of long-term progress but also from the shrinking range of policy options available to him if he is wrong. Having set out on a course of trying to stand up a new constitutional, elected government with the security firepower to defend itself, Bush finds himself locked into a strategy that, even if it proves successful, foreshadows many more deadly months to come first, analysts said.

Military commanders in Iraq privately told a visiting congressional delegation last week that the United States is at least two years away from adequately training a viable Iraqi military but that it is no longer reasonable to consider augmenting U.S. troops already strained by the two-year operation, said Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.). "The idea that the insurgents are on the run and we are about to turn the corner, I did not hear that from anybody," Biden said in an interview.

Is the "turning the corner" rhetoric merely positive spin from the White House or is it a symptom of a delusional neurosis on the part of President Bush? The President clearly has a problematic and vaporous relationship with reality. The facts (evolutionary science, global warming, intelligence estimates) don't seem to phase him. When he lies does he even realize he is lying or is he so clueless that he believes he is speaking the truth? 

Last year, Dr. Justin Frank, a psychoanalyst at George Washington University Medical Center, wrote a 219-page clinical diagnosis of the President's mental condition. He concluded that Bush suffers from a range of serious, albeit curable conditions:

Poking around in the presidential psyche, Frank uncovers a man suffering from megalomania, paranoia, a false sense of omnipotence, an inability to manage his emotions, a lifelong need to defy authority, an unresolved love-hate relationship with his father, and the repercussions of a history of untreated alcohol abuse.

So much for rose-tinted glasses, I think Bush might be insane in the brain.

More on the Madness of King George:

William Thomas asks Is Bush Nuts? Patricia at Blondesense looks at the clueless nature of the boy-king and wonders what he would do without the aid of his handlers/puppetmasters. Karena postulates that Bush's penchant for crying in public may be indicative of a mental disorder.

Comments

[PoliShifter]

It was one thing when the Bush Administration would hand out the kool-aid to their radical winger rethuglican counterparts and they would all drink it.

Now it seems not only is the Bush Administration handing out the kool aid but they are drinking it themselves.

Bush has been so successful at catapulting his propaganda that even his own administration seems to be buying into. Self-delusions of gradeur....very scarey indeed.

[karena]

This Kool-aid drinking has got to stop. Last night the news ran story after story about the missing white girl in Aruba. Her friends smiled in the camera and said things like, "We want to tell her that we think she's smart and responsible and still a lot of fun!" "We are optimistic!!!!" Not once has any family member or friend pled with her captors for her release. I turned to hubby and said, "I want some of what they're drinking." Then the news showed the handcuffed black guys, but no photos of the three white guys being questioned. Mandingo ate my baby! Anyway, what I am trying to say in a long drawn out way is that the Kool-aid drinking is now a badge of honor. Cheerieness in the face of death and destruction is what many have allowed themselves to become. Tennessee Williams couldn't dream up this much denial, and it will ruin us. I am willing to cry alone.

[PoliShifter]

You wont be cying alone...there are puddles of tears below my desk chair as I type...

[Commandante Agi T. Prop]

We're making progress - CAR-BOMB! TWELVE CIVILIANS DEAD - Freedom is on the march - INSURGENTS ATTACK A SCHOOL - The world is safer - NORTH KOREA HAS SEVEN NUKES . . .

Reality, R.I.P.

[pissed off patricia]

Thanks for linking to my post.
The only ones nuttier than bush are those who voted for him and continue to say he is a great president and other such shit.

[Joe]

YA THINK? He's fuckin nuts! THAT'S how simple it is!

[scout prime]

I think he is predisposed to lunacy but also is incredibly insulated. I think he should have to deliver the State of the Union alone (no SS or handlers) in a mall in someplace like Gary, Ind.

[karena]

Thanks, Polishifter,
Alone is a lonely place to be. We are all brothers in arms against this crazy world ruled by a cokehead alcoholic that does not have the grace to do his shit with the betterment of the world he shits on, keep his shit together, and make it cool for the rest of us. We will get past all of this, and I will drink to that!!!!!!

[The Blaghdad Café]

Man, Blaghdaddy hates crackers, and King George is "King Kracker" of them all... :-)

[The Alchemist]

I've said it before, I don't beleive W can bare all of the blame for his nebulous conection to Planet Earth. I doubt his advisers give him much, if any real information (would you?) simply as a damage limitation excersise. The crittical problem is that the man won't stick to what his speech writers give him (they used to call prompts 'idiot boards' but evidently there's one idiot who won't use them, tee hee).

Whoever is actualy making the desisions has to be more clued up, so we ought ask 'why does he make the wrong desions'?

Damned if I know...

[The Blaghdad Café]

'Prop, the first Composition of the Unholy Alliance awaits you and your cohorts in this blasphemous allegiance...

As Member of the Unholy Alliance, "The Blaghdad Café" gives you "Blogging is A Mortal Sin..."

Judgement Day is Upon Us, and All Bloggers Shall Be Judged...