Murdering the English language

With only a week to go before George W Bush is sworn in for a second term as president of the United States of America, aka the land of colour-coded terror alerts (yellow alerts, orange alerts, red alerts, etc.), it would be instructive to recall some of the things he said during the initial months of his first term in office.

I say instructive because whatever else may have changed in the four years since then, one thing that has not changed is Bush’s proclivity for murdering the English language whenever he is trapped into making off-the-cuff remarks (as opposed to speaking from cue cards or teleprompter text written by his staff). Consider.

Referring to how far the United States would be willing to go to defend Taiwan, Bush said on the Good Morning America television show on April 25, 2001: "Whatever it took to help Taiwan defend their self."

Talking about trade between the United States and Canada, at the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City on April 21, 2001, Bush said, "It’s very important for folks to understand that when there’s more trade, there’s more commerce." If he hadn’t said so, we would never have known.

Declining to answer reporters’ questions at that same summit meeting, he said he wouldn’t do so in any language, "neither in French nor in English nor in Mexican." It didn’t seem to matter to him that there is no such language as "Mexican."

People in Mexico speak Spanish, of course, as even Bush should have known given the fact that he speaks Spanish himself, or Spanish of sorts at any rate, having learned to speak it at school in Texas, a state that shares a long border with Mexico and has a large Spanish-speaking population.

Addressing students at Concord Middle School in Concord, North Carolina on April 11, 2001, Bush said, "I think we’re making progress. We understand where the power of this country lay. It lays in the hearts and souls of Americans. It must lie in our pocketbooks. It lays in the willingness for people to work hard. But as importantly, it lays in the fact that we’ve got citizens from all walks of life, all political parties, that are willing to say, I want to love my neighbour." So if you’ve been wondering about the source of America’s power, now you know.

Speaking about tax cuts in Washington on April 10, 2001, Bush said, "The Senate needs to leave enough money in the proposed budget to not only reduce all marginal rates, but to eliminate the death tax, so that people who build up assets are able to transfer them from one generation to the next, regardless of a person’s race." Just what a person’s race has to do with taxes or assets, Bush did not say.

Speaking at the Radio-Television Correspondents Association dinner in Washington on March 29, 2001, Bush said, "I’ve coined new words, like, misunderstanding and Hispanically." He may have coined the word "Hispanically," but somebody really ought to tell him that the word misunderstanding has been around for a very long time.

Addressing a press conference in Washington on March 29, 2001, Bush said, "And we need a full affront on an energy crisis that is real in California and looms for other parts of our country if we don’t move quickly." A "full affront" on the energy crisis! The mind boggles.

At a photo opportunity with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Washington on March 20, 2001, Bush said, "I assured the prime minister, my administration will work hard to lay the foundation of peace in the Middle (sic) - to work with our nations in the Middle East, to give peace a chance. Secondly, I told him that our nation would not try to force peace, that we’ll facilitate peace and that we’ll work with those responsible for a peace." That’s very reassuring, indeed, and "peace in the Middle" (sic) can now only be a question of time.

Bush went one better than this on the subject of peace at a media roundtable conference in Washington on March 13, 2001 when he said, "But the true threats to stability and peace are these nations that are not very transparent, that hide behind the - that don’t let people in to take a look and see what they’re up to. They’re very kind of authoritarian regimes. The true threat is whether or not one of these people decide, peak of anger, try to hold us hostage, ourselves; the Israelis, for example, to whom we’ll defend, offer our defences; the South Koreans." You can make of that what you like. Personally, I think its gibberish. Make that Grade-A gibberish.

Under the American constitution, the president is also commander-in-chief of US military forces. For all his macho tough talk, however, Bush evidently doesn’t know that a soldier is a trooper, not a troop. Addressing military personnel at Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida on March 12, 2001, he said, "I do think we need for a troop to be able to house his family."

After the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, Bush said, "This terrorism will not stand." In saying this, Bush was echoing his father’s words. Following Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, Bush Senior had said, "This aggression will not stand."

In an interview with the Washington Post on March 9, 2001, Bush Junior said, "I suspect that had my dad not been president, he’d be asking the same question. How’d your meeting go with so-and-so?...How did you feel when you stood up in front of the people for the State of Union Address - state of the budget address, whatever you call it." State of the Union Shunion...Budget Shudget - evidently, it’s all one and the same thing as far as Dubya is concerned.

There are many conflicting views about the death penalty in America. But Bush seems to think that it is somehow connected in some way to (wait for it) agriculture, of all things. Speaking at a rally in Omaha, Nebraska, on February 28, 2001 (the same Omaha to which he fled on September 11, 2001, after the attacks on New York and Washington) Bush said, "Those of us who spent time in the agricultural sector and in the heartland, we understand how unfair the death penalty is."

And if that leaves you baffled, consider this: Addressing Congress on February 27, 2001, Bush said, "My pan (sic) plays down an unprecedented amount of our national debt." His "pan"! Again, the mind boggles. Make that, BOGGLES.

Talking to reporters about the federal budget in Washington on February 5, 2001, Bush said, "The budget caps were busted, mightily so. And we are reviewing with people like Judd Gregg from New Hampshire and some other budgetary reform measures that will reinstate - you know, possibly reinstate budgetary discipline. But the caps no longer - the caps, I guess they’re there. But they didn’t mean much." Maybe they didn’t mean much, but, then, neither did Bush.

Following Islamabad’s pledge to cooperate with the United States in the Bush administration’s "war on terrorism," President Bush waived the Glenn, Symington and Pressler sanctions against Pakistan.

The move came as no surprise given Bush’s views on sanctions in general. Speaking at a press conference at the White House on February 22, 2001, he said, "I have said that the sanctions regime is like Swiss cheese - that meant that they weren’t very effective." Ineffective Swiss cheese! Whatever will Bush think of next?

Speaking at a school in Townsend, Texas on February 21, 2001, Bush came out with a truly amazing pronouncement. "You teach a child how to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test," he said.

Speaking at the Nalle Elementary School in Washington on February 9, 2001, he said, "One reason I like to highlight reading is, reading is the beginnings of the ability to be a good student. And if you can’t read, it’s going to be hard to realise dreams; it’s going to be hard to go to college." It most certainly is!

A pet expression of Bush’s is: "Make no mistake about it..." He has used it on numerous occasions since the 9/11 attacks. But this was a favourite phrase of his even before the attacks. Speaking to reporters in Washington on February 7, 2001, he said, "We’re concerned about AIDS inside our White House...make no mistake about it."

Then, there was what he said in Washington on January 11, 2001, nine days before he was sworn in as president: "I want it to be said that the Bush administration was a result-oriented administration, because I believe the results of focusing our attention and energy on teaching children to read and having an education system that’s responsive to the child and to parents, as opposed to mired in a system that refuses to change, will make America what we want it to be - a literate country and a hopefuller country."

A "hopefuller" country? Ye gods! Perhaps the White House should arrange a special screening for Bush of the 1960 movie "My Fair Lady," in which Professor Henry Higgins bemoans "the cold-blooded murder of the English tongue."

End.

more...not exactly murdering the english language...but still note worthyness

"I wish you'd have given me this written question ahead of time so I could plan for it...I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with answer, but it hadn't yet...I don't want to sound like I have made no mistakes. I'm confident I have. I just haven't – you just put me under the spot here, and maybe I'm not as quick on my feet as I should be in coming up with one." -President Bush, after being asked in a news conference to name the biggest mistake he had made

"Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere!" -President Bush, joking about his administration's failure to find WMDs in Iraq as he narrated a comic slideshow during the Radio & TV Correspondents' Association dinner

"So anyway I'd be rubbing your big boobs and getting your nipples really hard, kinda' kissing your neck from behind...and then I would take the other hand with the falafel thing and I'd just put it on your p – -y but you'd have to do it really light, just kind of a tease business..." ˜-Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly, as quoted in a sexual harassment suit filed against him by a Fox News producer

"As I was telling my husb-" -National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, overheard making a slip of the tongue at a Washington dinner party. Rice, who is unmarried, stopping herself abruptly, before saying, "As I was telling President Bush."

"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." -President Bush

"Sometimes I think war is God's way of teaching us geography."

-Paul Rodriguez

i found one on cnn I liked so much i made it my signature. Not so much fucking up the language but just such a conflict from the beging to the end.

The clips on Letterman of Bush are the best.

The last one I saw was George W. Bush Economic Mastermind.

Originally posted by hobo knife@Jan 20 2005, 11:32 AM

""As I was telling my husb-" -National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, overheard making a slip of the tongue at a Washington dinner party. Rice, who is unmarried, stopping herself abruptly, before saying, "As I was telling President Bush."

Quoted post

:haha:

:haha:

what's a husb?

OMG OMG JK!

I think its really amusing how Bush speaks without actually saying anything. his words usually have nothing to do with reality or the subject matter... to increase the effect of this tragical comedy, just observe normal people listening his speeches and see how they react.

when the speech is over no one knows what to think. the absurdity is overwhelming! :lol: