Bush's Banned Interview: An Insight Into Insanity

While surfing the net on 'Stumble', I came across an interview with President Bush on Irish television that caused a bit of a storm in 2004. The interview conducted by the tenacious Carol Coleman of Radio Television Ireland was not aired on American television, and Bush's press officers apparently complained vociferously about the rigorous questioning.

The video shows Bush at the absolute peak of his arrogance -- convinced of his own rhetoric about Iraq, flooded with confidence from international subservience to American power, and high off a crushing military victory that reinforced his childish fantasies of American power and preeminence.

The problem was, Coleman was having none of it, and what transpired was a unique insight into the warped brain of the least respected and most hated president in the history of the United States.

"Mr. President," asked the stone faced Coleman. "You're going to arrive in Ireland in about 24 hours' time, and no doubt you will be welcomed by our political leaders. Unfortunately, the majority of our public do not welcome your visit because they're angry over Iraq, they're angry over Abu Ghraib. Are you bothered by what Irish people think?"

Other than stutter, the president managed only to answer in vacant homilies about 'the great values of our country.'

"We are a compassionate country," he asserted. "We're a strong country, and we'll defend ourselves -- but we help people."

And that was about the depth of his explanation for the invasion of Iraq. Supremely satisfied with his own answers, Bush expected Coleman to be bowled over with his 'good ol' plain speakin' English', but Coleman, not infected with the American media's insatiable appetite to service power, had other ideas.

She continued to grill Bush about the rising violence in Iraq, increased world wide threat of terrorism, and failure to find the weapons of mass destruction. Flustered and unaccustomed to serious challenges to his power, Bush displayed flashes of anger, and an increased reliance on catch phrases to argue the unarguable.

"These people are willing to kill innocent people," he answered testily in response to questioning about the Iraqi death toll. "They're willing to slaughter innocent people to stop the advance of freedom. And so the free world has to make a choice: Do we cower in the face of terror, or do we lead in the face of terror?"

Coleman cut through the simplistic slogans about evil doers and freedom loving Americans and continued to ask Bush serious questions about the illegal war he had just launched. It fast became evident that this was a man who really had no idea what he was doing -- someone so removed from reality that he failed to even understand what he was being asked.

The world in Bush's mind exists of good and evil, right and wrong, and America and everyone else. He could not fathom anyone disagreeing with his nobility, and simply refused to acknowledge that a different account of reality existed.

The interview took place almost four years ago, but is the perfect illustration of a man elected purely on name recognition, dirty money, and no discernible talent. Four years ago, there were still enough Americans who believed Bush's infantile bluster was charming and direct. Now, even Republicans do not waste their time with him, quietly wishing he would disappear and stop embarrassing their party.

The interview with Coleman should go down on record as definitive proof of Bush's utter incompetence, a priceless picture of a madman who had no business occupying the highest office of the land.

Watch below:

Ben Cohen is the editor of www.thedailybanter.com and a contributing writer to www.espn.com and Boxing Monthly Magazine. He can be reached at [e-mail]

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Comments

[Vinca]

I agree with : BLAST: I don,t CARE HOW SHORT THE TIME HE HAS LEFT< START IMPEACMMENT> IT'S A MATTER PRINCIPLE< REMOVE LAWBREAKERS FROM OFFICE< WE TOOK DOWN CUNNINGHAM FOR A WHOLE LOT LESS

[ginnypoo]

If Presidents get impeached for blowjobs.....what do you do with a guy that gets hundereds of thousands of people killed in his private illegal war? Apparently the answer is joke around while he tapdances on the porch and waits to fill in the new guy he wants to keep screwing us over. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knhErtMjC8k

[whatsthatsound]

From the blog, I was expecting something more along the lines of Bogey in "Treasure of the Sierra Madre". I don't think he looked all that bad, or all that unhappy about facing off against an interviewer who had no tolerance for bullshit. Everybody here who is calling him an "idiot", etc.; I wonder how much better they would have fared under such conditions.

What I get down about is that he doesn't receive such kind of grilling from U.S. interviewers. It's all loaded questions and cheerleading. And we'll get more of the same if McCain wins. We have a LOT to learn from the other side of the pond.

[ultrabop]

Exactly. People like Tim Russert(bless his soul) gave the President a legitimacy that he didn't deserve.

[debrouillard]

He was going to say that.The God I know is not the one The Irish know.

[squander123]

Over here, Carole Coleman's interview was only noteworthy because of the fuss the White House made about it. By European standards, her interview-style was not especially assertive or tough. That would count as an ordinary day on television for one of our politicians.

Now, a really tough interview was the BBC's Jeremy Paxman interviewing then British Home Secretary Michael Howard (in about 1996) over a current scandal in the prison-service. The key part of the interview starts at about 3.40 minutes in, when Howard refuses to give a straight answer to a straight question, so Paxman keeps asking it...and ends up asking it 17 times in succession, as Howard squirms. Howard's career never recovered from this, and Paxman, already one of the BBC's most senior reporters, became a folk-hero! See link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uwlsd8RAoqI

I wonder how different the US political landscape would be if American reporters understood that it was their job to do this?

[Shayrae]

Thanks for that link. Paxton is worth 20 of our reporters. If we had just one even remotely like him...Bush and his cronies would have long ago be run out of office. Fascinating interview. Thanks, again.

[NTO08]

The BBC does have some tough reporters...Blair was none too pleased with how they constantly called him out on the war and his poodle position to Bush.

[ProfessorVP]

Hate to say it, but would any American on TV, including the canonized
Tim Russert, have dared lobbed real questions at Bush? Ms.
Coleman puts us to shame. And we've paid the price, over and over.

[Mediocrates]

I gotta wonder how many people who posted here actually watched this interview?

Don't get me wrong, I'm no fan of W, but he doesn't come off as Mr. Arrogance or Captain Insano here. I disagree with most of all of his points, but he was sadly amicable here... but then again, maybe I'm just numb to it all after 8 years?

To be sure, we should have more probing journalists in American media, but W kept rather calm, collected, and on point. It was after all an election year.

[grn1]

No please please let them finish their posts then you can finish up after a genocide has occurred and the world is a safer place.

[lylo]

I think you are just going numb...

[OhCanada]

Couldn't agree more.

[instagladiator]

I agree. Notice how D umbya commenced to boil as the questions kept coming? And this isn't even pressure? It was evident at the end of the interview that he was one PO'd trailer trash twit.

[TAC]

"Hate to say it, but would any American on TV, including the canonized Tim Russert, have dared lobbed real questions at Bush?"

Olberman would. Steven Colbert would. Maybe Jon Stewart. The handlers would NEVER allow Bush to be interviewed by the likes of them...

[gintheb]

What a dodo!

[flydoghead]

Terrorism killed 3300 Americans on 9/11

Stupidity has killed many many more thousands

I think that our next president, Barack Obama, should declare a war on STUPIDITY

Just replace the word terror with stupidity

[speedingpullet]

While I agree with you on many points, flydoghead, I just want to point out that 2973 people died on 9/11 (not 3300) and that 327 of them came from other countries (over 8% of them non-american).

While I'm not disagreeing about the severity of the attack, it grates on me to hear people (including Sen 0-bama) reduce it down to a convenient soundbite of '3000 Americans'. There's 67 families in the UK that would beg to differ, as that was the number of UK citizens who lost thier lives that day.

Yeah, I know, its nitpicking, but it makes as good a soundbite to say 'almost 3000 PEOPLE', and has the added advantage of being true.

[Julie24]

"lemmee finish" and "my friends" words that make me wonder what the h*** people are thinking when they vote.

[ObamAtomic]

Only on America,,,­,,,Insane!
How we ended with a president with minimal education,­direction,­purposes .
Democracy is flourishing on Irak,diminishing on our soil.

[Shayrae]

How Bush became leader of the free world is beyond me. I guess he must have injured his brain while rolling across the campus of Harvard and /Yale drunk as a skunk. The man made C's in college, for gosh sakes. what does that say about his intelligence, or lack thereof.

[isisdawnra]

he is tipsy ............as in

feeling good before becoming intoxicated!

Anyone else notice?

[StephenJK]

Drunk with unbridled power is more like it.

[Vinca]

I once heard a talk show host comment on GW BUSH'S news conference < DID YOU NOTICE HIS DEAMNOR, THERE'S SOOO MANY REASONS THAT GW BUSH SHOULD LEAVE OFFICE

[rosal]

If only the corporate owned MSM would have the integrity of this lady. As long as its bottom line is controled by Corporate America, spin and bias will rule.

[tc399]

People who elect a chimp as their President deserve what they get. The first time he simply stole the election, No intelligent person argues that. But the second time? Simple. He was reelected by a nation of cowards As soon as Rove realized that, he simply made the President a dictator; and no one raised a finger.

So now millions of people are losing their homes, jobs, insurance, ability to obtain food and soon, there won't be any more gasoline or heating oil. When we start dying by the tens of thousands, we will rise up.

There is no other choice.

[Blast]

I am ready now.

[darker]

All quite true.

But HOW will we "rise up"?
Will a nation of APATHETIC, COWARDLY WUSSES who put up with Bush-Cheney's cruel and dangerous NANNY STATE FOR THE RICH do anything at all to change things and save themselves?

Likely, they will be scared into worrying about being "patriotic" enough, they will continue being
BULLIED BY CORRUPT REPUBLICANS, and just sit there passively being BRAINWASHED by the REPUBLICAN-OWNED MEDIA.

Good luck America. You will need it.

[FloaterBall]

Wow, good one, darker. Sadly, I must agree with your analysis. Being a (relatively) old fart living in Denver, I'm counting on rowdy youngsters to get something going at the DNC next month. I've been getting my bicycle ready, I plan on witnessing if not participating. Does it make me a COWARDLY WUSS that I don't want to be cracked in the head, tear gassed, and/or arrested? Perhaps. But I do plan on doing my part to show the public how brutal I fully expect Denver's finest to be. The word has gotten around here that public demonstration, our constitutional right (and obligation), will be very strictly controlled if allowed at all. The Amerikan police state will not be easily overturned and I feel confrontation in the warm Denver air. Good luck, kids!

[StephenJK]

It's going to take a lot more than what is going on right now and today. Right now we are able to get our necessities even as those are stripped down to bare minimums. We don't have to fight for anything yet. And until then, we won't "rise up". There just isn't enough reason to do it yet and we don't have the means. Something like that takes a lot of planning and no one is even thinking about it right now.

[lisak2008]

I cannot recall Bush EVER treating ANY of America's female journalists so disrespectfully! Whenever MmmmBuuush gave a natural pause to his speech, indicating tht he was done with whatever point he was trying to make (can someone explain Bush's point on ANYthing that he said), he falsely and verbally jumped on the reporter for asking a follow up question. Could you imagine Bush pulling this stuff on Rachel? LOL, She would tottally own him and preferably someone affiliated with the GoP. Did McCain ever respond to the reporter's last statement or did he give her half an eye roll and continue on with whatever it is he was saying? He is most definitely the worst president ever. Embarassing us overseas; wohwhooo! Way to go Mr.Bush!

[lovethesinner]

G.W. Bush: "I will not allow terrorists to determine the fate of people who want to be free."

"What we say of others is usually best applied to ourselves." -Cal Ripkin (from "How Life Imitates the World Series" by Thomas Boswell

[jazzpotato]

UGH...I couldn't finish it. A big hand should have come down and twisted his wooden head off. "Ignore that Dick behind the curtain!!"