Who's the Decider?

Bush’s “I’m the Decider” tirade has been stuck in my mind, and for a while I couldn’t figure out why it was so bothersome. Then I realized it was because Dubya in his shrill declaration reminded me of my two-year-old daughter, throwing a fit if she can’t have more grapes, or doesn’t want to go to bed.

"I hear the voices, and I read the front page, and I know the speculation. But I'm the decider, and I decide what is best. And what's best is for Don Rumsfeld to remain as the secretary of defense."

Bush was being a crybaby because the press was abuzz over the sweeping power handed to Josh Bolton, the new chief of staff. Check out David Gergen, presidential advisor and talking head, on Anderson Cooper’s CNN broadcast on the 17th of April:

COOPER: So, David, what do you make of this, Josh Bolten saying there are -- there are probably going to be changes to -- to refresh the Bush administration?

DAVID GERGEN, FORMER PRESIDENTIAL ADVISER: I find the story that has emerged from the White House today absolutely extraordinary, even bizarre.

The -- Scott McClellan, the press secretary, has come in front of the press today to say that Josh Bolten, at a senior staff meeting, said that he was going to refresh and reenergize the White House. That's entirely understandable.

But Scott McClellan is quoted by "The New York Times" as going beyond that, to say that the president has given his new chief of staff wide latitude to not only shake up the White House staff, but to even choose new Cabinet members.

The last time I looked, Josh Bolten was not President Bolten. Now, if the -- the -- under our system, it's the president who chooses his Cabinet, sends the names up to Congress, up to the Senate, and they're confirmed. So, to have a situation -- Scott McClellan went on to say that Josh -- Josh Bolten might start by naming his own successor at OMB. That's a Cabinet-level position.

Is the president really surrendering his appointment capacity to his chief of staff? That would be the first time in my memory...

COOPER: Do you think it's -- it's a...

GERGEN: ... it has ever happened.

Indeed, I think Bolton does have “decider” power, since the new rumor is that they’re looking to dump Harriet “You’re the best governor ever” Miers, longtime confidant/suck up to King George 43.

Bush is not the Decider. He’s the Strawman for the Deciders – Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Wolfowitz, Rove and the rest of the military industrial complex. Look for yourself! Here the “Decider” asks Condi Rice if he can go potty at the United Nations ….




Furthermore, was it not Cheney who decided to name himself the Vice President?

Some see Cheney as perfect choice

By Kathy Kiely, USA TODAY, 7/24/00

WASHINGTON — He's said to be unassuming and quietly humorous, with a tendency to low-ball his own abilities. So could Dick Cheney's effort to find a Republican vice-presidential candidate lead to none other than...himself?

With GOP presidential candidate George W. Bush preparing to announce his running mate this week, Cheney's name suddenly surged to the fore of the speculation game Friday. The former congressman, who served as secretary of Defense for Bush's father, made a quick trip to Wyoming to switch his voter registration back to the state he represented for more than a decade.

The change of voting address, made just a few hours before Wyoming election officials closed their books before next month's primary, would avoid an Electoral College snafu if Cheney, who heads the Halliburton Co. in Dallas, were on the same ticket with Bush, the Texas governor.

Of course, it could all be an elaborate ruse: The Cheney rumors surfaced just in time to take a late-breaking veep boomlet for Bush's former rival, John McCain, out of the headlines. And Cheney, who has been heading Bush's vice-presidential search since April, assured Halliburton shareholders at their annual meeting in May that he had no intention of leaving to join another Bush administration.

Was it not Cheney who gave the shoot down orders on 9/11? Here’s Sec. of Transportation Norm Minetta’s testimony to the 9/11 Commission:

Mineta: “During the time that the airplane was coming into the Pentagon, there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President…the plane is 50 miles out…the plane is 30 miles out….and when it got down to the plane is 10 miles out, the young man also said to the vice president “do the orders still stand?” And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said “Of course the orders still stand, have you heard anything to the contrary!??”

See what I mean? Here’s Bush “deciding” to go forward in a Segway ….


I just don’t believe he’s really the day-to-day decider, the cool man of judgment in a crisis, except in the sense that that’s his job description in the Constitution. Really, he’s the face man, the puppet, the guy with the famous last name, the monkey, the boy king, the … oh, you know what I mean.