Of course, I don't think W's a bigot either. He's just got some problems with the handlers.
The president told his guests he was amazed that George W. Bush had gone to Bob Jones University. He thought Mr. Bush had been very badly served by his advisers on that.
On politics, Bill Clinton is still a smart cookie.
To paraphrase Letterman, some are amazed, others amused. And it's not like Dowd is giving McCain a free ride here:
It was a thrill akin to watching Wile E. Coyote push the plunger on a load of Acme dynamite to hear Mr. McCain tag Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Louis Farrakhan and Al Sharpton, all in the same breath, as "agents of intolerance."
Comparing McCain to Wile E. Coyote has to be about as backhanded a compliment as you can have. It's unfortunate for the Republican party that the candidates are stuck playing these games, but the party sort of made its own bed there. But to promote my man W, I got to repeat one of those bits from a kinder, gentler time.
George Walker Bush was visiting his parents in the White House one day when the talk turned to religion, which is precisely the subject that some powerful factions in the Republican Party want their Presdential standard bearer to talk about, forcefully, in 2000. But Bush, sitting one day recently on a sofa in the Governor's office at the Texas State Capitol, says he is cautious about wearing my religion on my sleeve in the political process." And he offers this particular story to explain why.
"Mother and I were arguing not arguing, having a discussion - and discussing who goes to Heaven," recalls the Governor, who at the time had religion very much on his mind. Having dealt with a gathering drinking problem by abruptly swearing off alcohol, he had vowed a renewed commitment to his family and his faith. Bush pointed to the Bible: only Christians had a place in heaven. "I said, Mom, look, all I can tell you is what the New Testament says. And she said, well, surely, God will accept others. And I said, Mom, here's what the New Testament says. And she said, O.K., and she picks up the phone and calls Billy Graham. She says to the White House operator, Get me Billy Graham.
"I said, Mother, what are you doing?" Bush continues, chuckling at the memory, "Seriously, And about two minutes later, the phone rings, and it's Billy Graham, and Mother and I are on the phone with Billy. And Mother explains the circumstances, and Billy says, From a personal perspective, I agree with what George is saying, the New Testament has been my guide. But I want to caution you both. Don't play God. Who are you two to be God?"
For George W Bush, a man who, in large part because of his famous name, shows up in most polls these days as the very early front-runner for a Republican Presidential nomination battle that is still more than a year away, it is an interesting story to choose to relate. Bush says it explains in part why he urged an end to "name calling" this summer when a fracas broke out over his party's decision to bar a gay Republican group from setting up a booth at the G.O.P state convention.
"There are some great admonitions in the Bible, talking about, you know; don't try to take the speck out of your neighbor's eye when you've got a log in your own," Bush says. "I'm mindful of that."
Sounds like a decent guy fallen in with the wrong crowd to me. The local preacher men would probably say he was with the wrong crowd then, not now, so who can say?
Cheers, Dan. |
