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Bush quotes in context? (last updated August 8, 2004)
Fahrenheit 9/11 quotes President George W. Bush several times, sometimes without providing full and arguably important context for the quotes. Perhaps the best example of this is when Bush is shown saying: "This is an impressive crowd of the haves and have mores. Some people call you the elite, I call you my base."
Bush is not saying this to a secret gathering of Republican donors, but to attendees at a non-partisan fund-raiser for charities run by the Archdiocese of New York. Both Bush and Al Gore gave remarks at the 2000 Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation dinner on October 19, 2000, and both mocked themselves and their own images.
At that dinner, Gore claimed to invent the tradition of the Al Smith dinner, referencing the claim that he exaggerated and that he "invented the Internet" (he never quite said that, by the way). He also reportedly said that if he was elected, he would not only Social Security in a "lockbox," as he said in the first presidential debate, but would also put "Medicare in a walk-in closet" and NASA funding in a "hermetically sealed Ziploc bag."
Bush's comments were meant and should be taken in the same light. He mocked the image of him as catering to wealthy donors and also made self-deprecating jokes about his time at Yale, especially when compared to William F. Buckley, Jr., a conservative author also in attendance. "We have a lot in common. Bill wrote a book at Yale, I read one. He started the Conservative Party, I started a few parties myself."
Similarly, Bush's "dictatorship would be a heck of a lot easier" quote was made in jest on December 18, 2000, after Bush had been declared the winner of the 2000 election and as he prepared to take office. Bush made the statement in regards to his first meeting that day on Capitol Hill with the majority and minority leaders of the Senate and House, when he told the four that he would continue with proposals such as his tax-cut proposal.
Bush's "shame on you" quote, which Moore uses to end his movie, is not necessarily taken out of context though is arguably a cheap shot (one that many, many people made at the time). Bush was at the time making a speech about Saddam Hussein's alleged efforts to hide weapons of mass destruction, and Bush obviously flubbed the line: "There's an old saying in Tennessee -- I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee -- that says, fool me once, shame on -- shame on you. Fool me -- you can't get fooled again."
Sources: CNN has an article on the Al Smith dinner speech on-line here, and Catholic New York has an article on-line here. CNN has a transcript containing the December 18, 2000 "dictatorship" quote on-line here. A transcript of Bush's September 17, 2002 speech ("shame on you") is on-line here.
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