George Likes to Read
Thursday, August 24th, 2006Bush has entered a book-reading competition with Karl Rove, his political adviser. White House aides say the president has read 60 books so far this year (while the brainy Rove, to Bush’s competitive delight, has racked up only 50).
So, now we’re supposed to believe that George W. Bush reads 60 books in 8 months? I call bullshit (and so does The Carpetbagger):
C’mon. We’re talking about a guy who’s supposed to be folksy and simple. It’s an image the White House has worked hard to cultivate over the years. The president seems to enjoy it — otherwise he wouldn’t openly mock people with PhDs.
The fact that the White House gang is experimenting with a new persona — Bush, the reader — is embarrassing. He’s not supposed to be about book learnin’; he’s about governing by instinct and relying on the advice of educated people who tell him what he wants to hear. Switching gears now is not only literally unbelievable, it’s pointless. The die is already cast.
I deal with books for a living. I have giant stacks of them sitting on my desk, on carts, on shelves all over my office. I am surrounded by books and read quite a few in my spare time, too. Some might call me bookish, but then I’m a librarian and it comes with the territory. And there’s no way I could read 60 books in 8 months. Last year, I was trying to match my friend Jenny. We were each trying to read 50 books in a year. I think she made it, but she was counting books on CD that she “read” in the car to work. I don’t listen to books on CD and was unemployed for five months and I still only got to about 30.
And you’re trying to tell me that an incurious mental featherweight, who openly disdains education and mocks intellectuals who also happens to be the ostensible leader of the free world, conducting a multi front war has the time to read twice as many books in 3/4 the time? No fucking way.
Hat tip to Noz.
