All I know about his reading habits is what aides have reported about his need for... brevity, and what one might conclude about whether he even reads the paper from interviews like this one by Gail Sheehy:
In late June of this year, Sheehy asked Bush if he had any reaction to the new "civil union" law upheld by the Vermont Supreme Court allowing gays the rights and responsibilities of married couples.
"I missed that," he says. "Is that like gay marriage?" He wrinkles his nose.
Told it is a new alternative, he says, "I haven't heard anything about it. I'd only be interested if it were an issue in Texas."
The man was a national candidate at the time. For the presidency of the United States. And Vermont's civil union law was discussed in every paper in the country, not to mention on prime time news.
You might be surprised by the Sheehy article in Vanity Fair, penni. It made me more sympathetic, and less concerned, in a way, about the implications of having a president with what appear to be dyslexia and ADD (the reasons for this conjecture, which I think is a correct one, are given). For example, it explains that a person with these disabilities can be very intelligent, appearances notwithstanding. (How you can be very intelligent and get not just words, but simple concepts so confused isn't clear to me, but experts say it's possible.) I'd rather not have a president like Bush, but then there are a lot of things I'd rather.
Like I'd rather Cheney hadn't regularly voted for the tightest restrictions on abortion, voting against abortion rights on all the roll calls for which he was present, including proposals to ban Medicaid coverage of abortions for poor women whose lives could be endangered by continued pregnancy; and that he hadn't voted against regulating "cop-killer" bullets that were supported by all but a handful of lawmakers from both parties (including by those who, like me, believe gun ownership is a Constitutional right) and even voted (one of only four who did) against a proposal to ban firearms that did not contain enough metal to be picked up by a metal detector; and that he hadn't voted in 1986 against a nonbinding resolution calling for the release of Nelson Mandela from prison.
These seem like extremist positions to me. I think I'd actually rather have Bush as president than Cheney. |
