Bush As Sociopath
I’ve never actually read Mark Crispin Miller’s The Bush Dyslexicon; I guess I just assumed it was another one of those “Bushisms” books that pokes fun at our adorable C-student-in-chief’s struggles with expressing himself verbally. But it turns out that Miller goes beyond that. In cataloging Bush’s funny misstatements, he discovered something remarkable: Bush has no problem expressing himself when he’s using the language of anger, and retribution, and hostility. It’s only when he tries to express things like compassion, contrition, and self-effacement that he starts tripping over his tongue. Miller’s conclusion? Bush is a Very Bad Man. In fact, a sociopath, akin to Richard Nixon.
Anyway, here are a couple of interviews with Miller that go into that: one from the Toronto Star, and one from Hustler (yeah, I know).
Thanks to Glen & Pilar for the link suggestion.
Update: Some excellent commentary from Miller on the anti-intellectual online reaction to his book: Brain drain. And some more on the book: Alternet interview, BuzzFlash interview, and stopsleeping’s Mark Crispin Miller page.
August 8th, 2003 at 2:25 pm
“Bush Dyslexicon” is a great, great book. I’ve written about it on my site before:
http://www.lucky8ball.com/wordsmeanthings/index.cfm?postID=1236
September 17th, 2003 at 11:19 pm
George Bush the son is a typical liar like his own father George Bush the father. Like father like son. In fact, without the constant lies, distortions, and propaganda which the US government and media perpetuate day and night, the American people would not be easily brainwashed and controlled.
October 23rd, 2003 at 4:43 pm
screw you, you towel head a-hole
October 23rd, 2003 at 4:43 pm
screw you, you towel head a-hole
November 18th, 2003 at 1:08 pm
Allah is crap? You are ignorant, stupid, and vulgar.
December 23rd, 2003 at 5:35 pm
I am voting for Bush again in 2004. I think he is a great man. I don’t understand why some people think he is a sociopath. I think it is great he liberated Iraq from that Evil Saddam! If you can’t support the President then there is something wrong with you. He helped liberate people that were suffering. What? you people think that the people in Iraq shouldn’t be helped? You probably never lived there!!! If you did you wouldnt have the attitude that you have NOW! Think THE TRUE GOD that Pres. Bush is in office. Gore would of done NOTHING! He would of let us get atacked and then he would of ran for cover cuz he is a coward and a BIG Lier!!! I know a lot of people will not agree with me but I don’t care.
January 22nd, 2004 at 11:51 pm
Judging by the grammatical and spelling mistakes in the post above, we see what highly educated and informed supporters Bush has.
March 12th, 2004 at 7:14 am
I can’t beleive the level to which some of you americans are brainwashed. The above ‘allah is crap’ posted exactly the kind of message that shows what is causing these wars and terrorism today- it’s blatant, old-fashioned racism. Evil forces in power in America are set on world domination and unfortunately they can do so due to the high level of ignorance in the people.WAKE UP BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE!
April 17th, 2004 at 1:15 pm
“1984” will soon read like a fairy tale.
May 17th, 2004 at 4:11 am
What a load of rubbish? Do you really believe “Evil forces in power in America are set on world domination” oh for Christ’s sake get real. Wake up, drop this Anti-American crap and smell the coffee. OK, so the yanks like to pock their nose’s into other peoples business. Without a world police force (America and Allies) the world would be in a lot more of a mess than it is. Any how, what on earth do you think the evil forces in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Iran etc, etc, etc, are set on. The answer in case you’re not bright enough to work it out is “World domination through religion”. If it comes to a choice I would rather have a President in charge than an Ayatollah.
May 21st, 2004 at 3:19 am
the same people are running american policy that are governing israli policy.-Sharon will be declaring he will not stand terrorism as he helicopter gunship’s the crap out of the last palestinian family. Shi’ite islam is centered around the fight against injustice so as long as occupation and greed exploit the middle east there will be retalliation. By the way cris i follow no religion and i don’t think you can blame Islam any more for terrorism than Christianity- i see muslim extremist’s in a similar to the klu klux klan in america- if you bombed america killing innocent civilians, installed a puppet regime, and wiped out their traditions and culture, groups such as the klu klux klan would become a lot more popular. Try and look at things from a more rounded perspective.
May 24th, 2004 at 7:23 pm
I use to be a Republican, then I woke up!
May 24th, 2004 at 8:12 pm
I just found this by putting the words sociopath and bushisms into google, but, having done so, I might as well chime in on the discussion…
I do believe that Bush is a sociopath, but more to the point, I think he is just a silly unconvincing puppet for a global corporate oligarchy. Yes, they are bent on “global domination” but not in the Dr. Evil comic-book sense. The gist of the last four years can be boiled down to a battle for diminishing resources. Do a Google search on the Project for a New American Century. Then another for the Council on Foriegn Relations and yet another on the Bilderberg group and it will start to flesh out a loose knit (or sometimes tight knit) organization that has a shared agenda of economic control of planetary resources, and, through that, a certain level of control of the forces at work on the planet.
Am I a frothing conspiracy theorist to be easily dismissed as a crank? Perhaps, but just because I am does not mean that the agendas of these organizations have not set the tone for the planet in the years since WW II. And, sure, one could trace the groups back to before that time, but 1947, following WW II, was when the National Security Act was passed and intelligence organizations which were not outlined in the US Constitution began to consolidate power and create an extra-constitutional influence on the constitutional US government. In the years since, we’ve seen the rise and ultimate triumph of this National Security State, to the point now where what could loosely be called the Shadow Government has more power than the constitutionally structured US government.
Beyond that… Bush is a fraud, the CIA are drug smuggling crooks, and the WTO is starving babies and making people drink water laced with Dioxin. In conditions like that, who needs to make up conspiracies to prove that something drastic and dangerous is amiss?
May 26th, 2004 at 1:49 am
i totally agree ‘shady’- u know your stuff. it’s all economics. Bush is just an actor and democracy is a debateable name for it all. But i guess your gonna get this when one nation is so much more advanced than the rest- and i’ve got nothing against American people or American culture- It’s American foreign policy that kills innocent people and destroys other cultures that is the problem. u got any suggestions how to put it right?
May 26th, 2004 at 12:29 pm
Is it rue that as a child Bush used to put lit firecrackers in frog gullets and blew them up?
August 20th, 2004 at 12:38 pm
It appears that Mr. Miller’s book is just another example of a useless intellectual dissecting how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. The real evil in the world lies not in the U.S. White House but in the pathology of those ultra liberal intellectuals who can always justify using force against individuals in their own country (usually in politically correct speech control or utopian income redistribution schemes) but condemn a President for liberating a population from a buthering tyrant. Using that kind of logic, I could justify not going to war against Hitler in the 1940s; after all, we could have rationalized a way to live with him.
August 30th, 2004 at 1:23 pm
Bush did what had to be done, He is a good man doing a good job and all i can say is God bless him and our country,And we all say God bless America , well He has and it show’s Now let America bless our God and we will see his blessings all around us
September 15th, 2004 at 3:10 pm
What had to be done?
More Iraqi civilian died during the war so far – which is far from over – than Americans in 9/11 – which Saddam had nothing to do with. Almost half of these people were children. That’s not counting the maimed, orphaned and damage to infrastructure that will cause suffering and poverty, disease for years to come.
Nobody is sorry to see Saddam gone, but the way GWB went at it is nothing short of criminal.
September 20th, 2004 at 11:17 am
It is terrifying to see that some of the citizens in this country still see Bush as a well-adjusted good guy!
September 30th, 2004 at 11:30 am
For all the Bush supporters out there, if you have so much faith in this administration and its policies why not sign up for the military? Surely if you love Bush so much you are willing to die for him. No rush though, if he’s re-elected (please if there is a God it won’t happen) but if he is then you’ll have another four years of wars to participate in. Quit getting all your information from FOX news and realize you and many in this country have been manipulated.
November 22nd, 2004 at 8:55 am
You americans deserve Bush, he`s a reflection of what average american stands for today… What you guys need is a nice little civil war so you can freely kill each other and leave rest of the world to live peacefully.
January 25th, 2005 at 12:34 pm
Bush is a bona fide sociopath. Anyone with an ounce of instinct and intuition can figure that out. However, in America, intuition, or reading beneath the surface, is discouraged. Perception and penetration are discouraged. Everything must be on the surface, otherwise you are accused of speculation. Why does no one comment on the jaw grinding that Bush does? In the presidential debates, he was constantly grinding his jaws. He was grinding his jaws like crazy during his inaugural speech. This is often a side effect of drug use. Why does no one comment on this habit of his, especially since it has appeared relatively recently? It is because in America we do not talk about such things, we talk about the content of his speech, not the fact that he grinds his jaws like a madman. My final assessment on Bush: a sociopath on tranquilizers who is aroused by violence, and is hellbent on destroying the world – yes, destroying the world. This is the only thing that will satisfy him. Even his use of the word “spread” when he talks about democracy is troubling. It makes me think of those little boys who spread feces all over their bedrooms.