PLEASE CREDIT ANY EXCERPTS TO GWBıS ³BEAT THE PRESS²
Beat The Press: And we are in the Oval Office this morning
with the President of the United States. Mr. President,
welcome back to ³Beat The Press.²
President Boob: Thank you, sir.
Beat The Press: On Friday, you announced the formation of a
commission to look into intelligence failures. You have been
reluctant to do that for some time. Why?
President Boob: Well, itıs an election year (laughs). The
fact that we ordered our intelligence officials to back off of
investigations of the Bin Laden family started by President Clinton
might give people the wrong impression of my familyıs long-standing
business relationship with the Bin Ladens and Saudi Arabia in
general. So, you know, this kind of PR commission has to be
handled right so voters arenıt misled into casting their votes for
the evildoers, that is, the Democrats.
Also, let me kind of step back and talk about whether intelligence
in general is all that intelligent, if I might. See,
intelligence is often flawed. Which is why Vice President
Cheney took it upon himself to go out to Langley and make sure they
were coming up with facts that would lead to regime change in Iraq.
He knew that people have a tendency to be misled by logic and
reason and he made sure they weren't in this case. Iım
very grateful to him.
Beat The Press: Your commission is not scheduled to report
conclusions until March of 2005, five months AFTER the presidential
election.
President Boob: Yeah. I didn't want to play politics
with national security.
Beat The Press: Shouldn't the American people have the benefit
of the commission
BEFORE the election?
President Boob: There is going to be ample time for the
American people to assess whether or not I made good calls, and I
look forward to that debate once it no longer matters.
Beat The Press: Some would call that cynicism.
President Boob: Remember, I'm a war president. Without
war, there's not much for me to run for election on, not to mention
my poll ratings would sink like a stone. I can't be expected
to focus attention on millions of lost jobs and a sea of red ink,
can I?
Beat The Press: Will you testify before the commission?
President Boob: Iıd be glad to, but like Condi I'll have to
insist on testifying in secret and not under oath. Neither she
nor I will testify under oath. I'm not going to make Clinton's
mistake (laughs).
Beat The Press: Senator Charles Grassley, a Republican, said
he is absolutely convinced we will capture Osama bin Laden before
the election.
President Boob: Well, I appreciate his optimism. Osama
bin Laden is a cold-blooded killer, and he and John Kerry represent
the nature of the enemy that we face. These are people that
will kill on a moment's notice, and theyıll kill innocent women and
children and the frightening part about that is they're no longer
doing it for the United States. They've gone into business for
themselves. We can't tolerate that. Competition is not
allowed in the security field. We own the patent on it.
Beat The Press: Do we have a pretty good idea where Osama is?
President Boob: I suspect he's working with the Democrats.
Their whole line about the war in Iraq being a mistake was
probably written by Bin Laden.
Beat The Press: Let's then turn to Iraq. How do you
respond to critics who say that you brought the nation to war under
false pretenses?
President Boob: I tell them to get over it. Sitting
behind this desk I made a very difficult decision of war and peace.
I based my decision on the best intelligence possible,
intelligence that had been manufactured, intelligence that told us
what we wanted to hear. Remember, we were attacked on 9-11,
and that gave us a great opportunity to concoct new threats and
unleash unfunded wars throughout the world. But it took a lot
of hard intelligence work to make the right threats seem real.
But we have a fabulous team, and they pulled it off.
Beat The Press: What about the fact that no WMD have been
found in Iraq?
President Boob: Saddam had the capacity to make weapons.
Saddam Hussein was dangerous with weapons. Saddam Hussein was
dangerous with the ability to make weapons. He was a dangerous
man in the dangerous part of the world among dangerous people with
dangerous customs, dangerous ideas, and dangerous clothing
styles. Danger was everywhere and it still is. That's
why the American people support me, because they're scared shitless.
They understand that I am helping reduce threats to their
security by militarizing the Middle East, imposing a bloody
occupation of Iraq, and blocking all investigation of Israeli war
crimes.
Beat The Press: Mr. President, when you spoke to the country,
you said "there is no doubt." When Vice President
Cheney spoke to the country, he said "there is no doubt."
Secretary Powell, "no doubt." Secretary Rumsfeld,
"no doubt, we know where the weapons are." You said,
quote, "The Iraqi regime is a threat of unique urgency.² ³Saddam
Hussein is a threat that we must deal with as quickly as
possible." You gave the clear message that this was an
immediate threat that must be dealt with.
President Boob: I don't want to get into word contests. If
what I say today contradicts what I said yesterday, get used to it.
The important thing is that I be obeyed. There was
no doubt in my mind that Saddam Hussein was a danger to America. No
doubt. The people with the evidence hang-up will just have to
learn to trust the president more.
Beat The Press: In what way?
President Boob: Well, by helping us run off to war whether it makes
sense or not. If I start talking about shadowy terrorist
networks that should be enough for everyone to get behind a series
of unfunded wars, no questions asked. I mean, doesn't that
sound creepy? Shadowy terrorist networks, shadowy terrorist
networks, shadowy terrorist networks. (Shuddering) Jeez, I
feel like launching another war just thinking about it.
Beat The Press: You don't need a justification for war because
you're the President?
President Boob: Right. Remember, I'm dealing with a
world in which we have gotten struck by terrorists with airplanes
and I did nothing to prevent it. And the worst nightmare
scenario for any president is to realize that the people have power.
We run the world and we're the ones who are supposed to
make the decisions unimpeded by public opinion. So when people
start questioning our motives and conduct and pour into the streets
in record numbers to protest, it's terrifying.
So people should stop questioning authority and just cower in
the corner remembering that Saddam gassed his own people. We
have the receipts for the weapons he used, so we know it's true.
Beat The Press: But can you launch a preventive war without
iron-clad, absolute
intelligence that he still had weapons of mass destruction?
President Boob: You can if you make it up. That's the
course we decided on back at Crawford well before the 2000
elections. I told my staff: "We can't rely on the
evidence to support an invasion of Iraq, so let's use the latest PR
techniques to get the American people to support war no matter what
the facts are." That's my record and I stand behind it.
Beat The Press: So what you told the American people was
wrong?
President Boob: Well, wrong in the technical sense that it was
untrue. But it was right in the higher moral sense of
achieving our objective of taking over Iraq, which is leading us to
a Golden Future as we speak.
Beat The Press: This is an important point. You said he
had biological and chemical weapons too.
President Boob: He did. We have the receipts for those
too. Absolutely diabolical, he was.
Beat The Press: But there are lots of such people in power
around the world. What about North Korea, which has nuclear
capability and has threatened to turn America into a "sea of
fire?" And yet you call it a diplomatic issue. Isn't
this inconsistent?
President Boob: Look, you have to put things in context.
North Korea has a big army and deadly weapons and they're sure
to inflict a lot of damage on us if we get hostile. So we've
got to pick on the weak nations, the helpless nations. That's
why we forced Iraq to disarm and then invaded, to punish the
helpless at minimal cost.
Anyway, I don't deal with logic and
comparisons. You think I'm some brainiac kind of guy like Al
Gore? All I know is you can't rely upon a madman, and Saddam
Hussein was a madman the moment he stopped following U.S. orders in
1990. You couldn't rely upon him making rational decisions
about whom to torture and kill anymore. So peace-loving people
had to make war in order to preserve the peace. Which is what
my father did and what I did.
Beat The Press: Now the vice president said, ³we would be
greeted as liberators² in Iraq.
President Boob: Truck bombings are the way liberators are
greeted in that part of the world. The insurgents don't think
like us, they're pure evil. They know that we are advancing on
the path of freedom and they want to defeat that. The fact
that Americans are dying every day is actually good news. It
means that the freedom we are bringing to Iraq is threatening the
position of the evildoers, so they lash out. But sooner or
later we'll put the whole country down a spider hole and then Iraq
will be free.
Beat The Press: Are you surprised by the level and intensity
of resistance?
President Boob: No, I'm not. The greater the good you
represent, the greater the evil will be against you. So
the more they attack us, the more it strengthens our resolve,
because our cause is righteous. The more of our boys they kill, the
more certain that victory is right around the corner. If not,
there's always Armageddon, which all good Christians look forward
to.
Beat The Press: If the Iraqis choose an Islamic extremist
regime, would you accept that, and would that be better for the
United States than Saddam Hussein?
President Boob: They're not going to develop that. And
the reason I can say that is because I'm directing the basic law
they're writing, which is how liberation works. Rest assured
that right here in the Oval Office I sat down with Mr. Pachachi and
Chalabi and al-Hakim, to tell them to write a constitution that
recognizes minority rights and freedom of religion. Since
these principles will be forever associated with our invasion, which
killed 10,000 Iraqis and wrecked the country, they're sure to be
popular.
Beat The Press: Are you now willing to allow the United
Nations to play a central role in the reconstruction?
President Boob: They can share in the dying, sure. But
the oil is ours and the construction contracts go to Dick Cheney and
my friends. We can't allow these Ba'athist fanatics to
socialize it again. That's why Halliburton and other oil
companies are taking charge of oil production. They're the
experts on oil, they'll do the right thing.
Beat The Press: Now looking back, in your mind, is it worth
the loss of 530 American lives and 3,000 injuries and woundings
simply to remove Saddam Hussein, even though there were no weapons
of mass destruction?
President Boob: Every squandered life is precious - or was.
Every person that is willing to
fight and die for Halliburton and Bechtel deserves our praise, and
yes it was worth it. Oil is a vital national interest. Our
whole economy is based on it. Can there be a more sacred cause
than blood for transnational oil companies? I don't think so.
America can shed its blood proudly in Iraq.
Beat The Press: In light of not finding the weapons of mass
destruction, do you
believe the war in Iraq is a war of choice or a war of necessity?
President Boob: War is always a choice. You think people
at the top don't have options? Of course we do. Peace is
always an option, but war is a better one. You can't sell
obedience if peace is allowed to reign. The rule is: war
to induce fear, fear to justify more wars. That keeps the
resources flowing into the right hands and prevents the people from
seeing why their lives are going down the drain.
Beat The Press: On to the elections. Mr. President, this
campaign is fully engaged. The chairman of the Democratic
National Committee, Terence McAuliffe, said this last week:
"I look forward to that debate when John Kerry, a war hero with
a chest full of medals, is standing next to George Bush, a man who
was AWOL in the Alabama National Guard. He didn't show up when
he should have showed up" How do you respond?
President Boob: Political season is here. I served in
the National Guard in a unit that had zero chance of going to
Vietnam. I flew F-102 aircraft. I snorted a lot of coke
and therefore had to avoid the annual physical with drug test.
The honorable discharge I got came out of my nose! (laughs)
Anyway, I dropped out of my service early so I could go
to Harvard Business School. The Democrats can politicize it
however they want, but this is the way the system works for rich
kids.
Beat The Press: Were you in favor of the war in Vietnam?
President Boob: Sure, what's not to like? We killed
millions of Commies and destroyed the basis of independent
nationalism in Southeast Asia forever. I never understood what
all the controversy was about.
Beat The Press: Let me turn to the economy. The
Bush-Cheney first three years, the unemployment rate has gone up 33
percent, there has been a loss of 2.2 million jobs. We've gone
from a $281 billion surplus to a $521 billion deficit. The
debt has gone from $5.7 trillion, to $7 trillion - up 23 percent.
Based on that record, why should the American people rehire
you as CEO?
President Boob: Because I have plotted a course that will make
the original Great Depression look like a picnic. After my tax
cuts become permanent 1929 will be a footnote in the history books.
They'll probably end up calling it the "moderate
downturn."
Beat The Press: You're taking responsibility for this?
President Boob: Actually, it's Clinton's fault. His
immoral sex life caused the 9-11 attacks, which hurt the economy.
Then I gave billions of dollars in free money to
downsizing corporations like Ford, GE, and the airlines, while
letting the workers enjoy the genius of Wall Street success stories
like Kenny Boy Lay. But for some reason a lot of people lost
confidence in the economy, some pessimists say because of wholesale
looting by well-meaning officials dependent on unscrupulous
bookkeepers. But accounting is not all black and white and I'm
glad to see no one has been punished.
Beat The Press: But when you proposed your first tax cut in
2001, you said this was going to generate 800,000 new jobs.
Your tax cut of 2003, create a million new jobs. That has not
happened.
President Boob: Well, it's happening. There is good
momentum when it comes to the creation of new jobs. Just look
at China. Plenty of new jobs.
Beat The Press: The General Accounting Office did a computer
simulation on your fiscal policy and the computer blew up. The
last computation before the explosion showed that balancing the
budget in 2040 would require increasing taxes by 50,000%. The
auditors say your legacy to the next generation will be as the
Father of a national network of shanty towns.
President Boob: I'm not a mathematician, but I don't share the
pessimism, which is not good for America.
Beat The Press: Why as a fiscal conservative as you like to
call yourself, would you allow a $500 billion deficit and this kind
of deficit disaster?
President Boob: Why not? Look, the debt is owed to the
people I've eliminated taxes on and they're good friends of mine.
They're making a fortune and contributing heavily to the GOP.
If the entire country is totally in debt to us forever, that
means we're in charge forever. I can't see anything wrong in
that.
Anyway, the budget I just proposed to the Congress, worked out
by my friends at Andersen Accounting, shows a balanced budget
starting in 2006, unless the tax and spend Democrats get in.
Beat The Press: How about Medicare?
President Boob: Privatize it. I'm strongly opposed to
this idea that geezers deserve health care. There
are too many of them. Look, if after six and a half decades on
earth you still haven't saved enough to cover your own medical
needs, you're a loser and should do without.
Beat The Press: What is your view of entitlements in general?
President Boob: These entitlement programs need to be done
away with. They cut way into corporate profit margins and for
what? To give people a false sense of security. The
market is dog-eat-dog and it always will be. Why pretend
otherwise?
Beat The Press: Mr. President, last time you were on this show
you said that you wanted to
change the tone in the nation.
President Bush: I think I've delivered on that one - secret
military tribunals authorized to execute people without due process
of law. That has improved the tone considerably. And the
belligerence level we've established is enough to make Teddy
Roosevelt cringe. No, I don't think we can be criticized at
all on this score.
Beat The Press: Why do you think you are perceived as such a
divider?
President Bush: Gosh, I don't know, maybe because I said,
"You're either with us or with the terrorists?"
Beat The Press: Your unfavorable ratings around the world are
through the roof. Any comment?
President Boob: People are so hung up on jobs, universal
health care, and saving the environment that they forget about the
war against evil. You can't do that. God runs the world
and the secular folks are just aiding the Devil. I won't be a
party to it.
Beat The Press: Biggest issues in the presidential campaign?
President Boob: Gay marriage. I got that non-procreative
sex thing out of my system bed-hopping for years with all those West
Texas bimbos. Now I'm committed to Christian marriage. Incidentally,
I agree with Governor Schwarzenegger that gay marriage is fine as
long as it's between a man and a woman.
Beat The Press: Mr. President, we thank you for sharing your
views. I hope there is still a country left when we visit you
again.
