Bush Derangement Syndrome strikes again in new bio of 43rd president

[Machiavelli]

Seth Mandel
New York Post
August 18, 2016

Bush Derangement Syndrome claims another victim.

The malady, identified and defined by Charles Krauthammer as “the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency — nay — the very existence of George W. Bush,” has struck eminent historian Jean Edward Smith.

Though I think after this we can safely part ways with the “eminent” part of that title.

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[Machiavelli]

It’s Impossible to Count the Things Wrong With the Negligent, Spurious, Distorted New Biography of George W. Bush

Will Inboden
Foreign Policy
August 15, 2016

When I first heard that acclaimed historian and presidential biographer Jean Edward Smith was writing a biography of former President George W. Bush, I recall telling a fellow historian that I was cautiously optimistic it would be a well-crafted, insightful book and that I looked forward to its publication. I had read some of Smith’s earlier works, including biographies of former presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and of Dwight D. Eisenhower, and found the books to be elegantly written, carefully researched, and deeply insightful. But my optimism was tempered by the fact that the materials and perspectives of history are not yet available to Smith, or to any other would-be biographer of Bush.

How wrong I was to be optimistic at all.

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[EasyAce]

To paraphrase (of all people) the former maximum president of the Hell's Angels, Sonny Barger: All that
bullsh@t, hell, ain't the truth bad enough for 'em?

[TomSea]

Off topic from the central topic but this sounds like a good book, I barely caught Rowe on the radio, he was talking about another candidate who got giant crowds, 75,000 way back when but still lost. Maybe that candidate was McKinley's opponent, William Jennings Bryant, sounds like a good book. I haven't found that much on it yet.  I'm certainly not plugging for Karl Rove.

No one ever talks about Presidents like McKinley or Garfield, really, we don't talk about most of them but a few.

[TomSea]

To paraphrase (of all people) the former maximum president of the Hell's Angels, Sonny Barger: All that
bullsh@t, hell, ain't the truth bad enough for 'em?

Looks like a real good book, yes, I think "we" (as a nation saying) turned away from the great Reagan legacy during those years.

This book might be important because even if you take away talking about foreign policy under Bush, there is room for criticism on domestic issues as there is with all presidents.