BUSH: (Opening statement) Thank you. I wanted to apprise you of the situation in Iraq. The military leaders I haven't fired assured me that my plan to surge 20,000 troops was well-considered and is proceeding without difficulty. Things are a little grim, as you may have seen on television, but failure is not an option. Although we can't stop the suiciders, we can secure the capital, which as you know was why we entered this war in the first place. To secure Baghdad. Don't listen to the chumps in the House when they vote against this plan; I know I won't. Okay, I'll take your questions now.
First Qestion: Is the Vladimir Putin who said the United States is undermining global security and provoking a new arms race the same Vladimir Putin whose soul you looked into and found to be trustworthy?*
Bush: Yes.Questions 2-4, 6: Are you going to recklessly invade Iran?
Bush: (winking) No.
Question 5: Even Bolten thinks you bungled the North Korea deal. Did you?
Bush: First of all, guards, will you remove that man and have him beaten? Secondly, no. Sure, this was a deal we could have made six years ago, before they made the Korean penninshoola nukular, but hey, better late than never.
Q 7: Are you cooking the intelligence on Iran like you did on Iraq?
Bush: (winking) No.
Q 8-9: Is Iraq in the middle of a civil war?
Bush: We're striving for "relative peace" there. It's hard for me, living in this beautiful White House, to give you an assessment, firsthand assessment.* I haven't been there.* (Coyly) You tell me.
Qs 9 and 10 were boring.
Q 11: Does the House vote against your surge embolden the enemy?
Bush: I could beat around the bush here and equivocate and mince my words, but the short answer is yes.
Q 12-15 about the Libby trial; Bush won't comment.
Q 16: The press is losing its interest, asks two pro forma questions about, respectively, our allies and the effect of Iraq on the '08 elections. As if Bush cares.
Bush: (yawning) That's an interesting question.
Q 17: Can a regular American oppose your plan and still support the troops.
Bush: I don't care what a regular American does, as long as Congress funds my war.
Following Q 17, Bush pauses for a moment to mock the press. Then onto...
Q 18: You aren't really going forward with this bipartisan nonsense, are you?
Bush: You know, the Dems may actually work with me on immigration, and that'd be cool. But no, not really.
Final question: Past presidents sat down to face-to-face talks their enemies. Will you sit down with the leaders of Iran?
Bush: Those nuts? Are you crazy?
You've been a great audience--good night, everyone!
____________
*Actual question/quote
2 comments:
I heard the press conference. Ironic how the actual quote you included is the hardest to believe that he actually stated.
(sigh)
Is it just me or does it seem bizarre that the bribe, pay-off, capitulation to extorsion and terror or whatever you want to call the deal with North Korea has been reported in "tons of oil"? Why not gallons? Does that make it too easy to figure out how much we're paying them?
According to what I've read, the U.S. and a couple other countries are going to give North Korea 1,000,000 "tons" of oil--most of which will go to keep their oppressive military police state able to keep functioning. But whatis a ton of oil and how much does it cost?
Here's some data from:
http://www.opm.state.ct.us/pdpd2/energy/flows94.htm
* 1 BARREL = 42 GALLONS
* 1 BARREL OF CRUDE OIL = 0.150 SHORT TONS = 0.136 METRIC TONS
* 1 SHORT TON = 2,000 POUNDS = 6.65 BARRELS OF CRUDE OIL
* 1 METRIC TON = 2,204.62 POUNDS = 7.33 BARRELS OF CRUDE OIL
* 1 METRIC TON OF GASOLINE = 345 GALLONS
* 1 METRIC TON OF HEATING OIL = 312 GALLONS
* 1 METRIC TON OF RESIDUAL OIL = 6.5 BARRELS
* 1 CCF = 100 CUBIC FEET
* 1 MCF = 1,000 CUBIC FEET
* 1 THERM = 100,000 BTU = APPROX. 100 CUBIC FEET OF NATURAL GAS
So are we paying them off in short tons, metric tons, or what? And how much is that exactly?
1,000,000 / .15 (short tons) = 666,666 barrels of oil. Oil is running about $56 (rounding down) a barrel today. 666,666 times $56 = $373,333,333!
According to the CIA Factbook, all of North Korea's imports altogether for 2005 only added up to $2.6 billion--so we've rewarded their blackmail by augmenting their total imports by more than 10%.
Be sure to mention that next time someone credits the Prez with hanging tough and never bargaining with terrorists. It's cheaper in lives and treasure than other options, and without more details I can't say for sure it's not a good deal. But it shows the rank hypocracy of W. as clearly as anything he's yet done.
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