Bush in Belfast, so what? Frankly, America couldn’t give a damn

IT’S CERTAINLY without precedent. Indeed, it’s hard to believe. But it’s a fact. As far as American media is concerned, the valedictory tour of Europe by President George W Bush is of little or no interest compared with Ireland’s rejection of the Lisbon Treaty.

They may dutifully, on an inside page, record his optimism about Iraq, but what they find intriguing is Ireland derailing European progress. That such a small member state can halt the agreed onward progress of a 500 million-strong union fascinates Americans, who liken it to the possibility of low population Delaware deciding it’s going to change the way the United States operates.

Nobody is talking about America’s president. It’s as if he has ceased to exist. And, while all presidents become less potent and present when the race is on to elect their successors, it’s doubtful that the US has ever before developed such deliberate amnesia about a serving Chief of Staff.

Ordinary Americans don’t know that he’s in Europe, and don’t care. Addicts of politics, on the other hand, know he’s in Europe, but find the exercise ludicrous. One plastics supplier was simultaneously amused and concerned to hear that security was being stepped up in Belfast in advance of the President’s arrival there. Amused because he couldn’t figure out why anybody would want to have a pop at someone so demonstrably irrelevant. Concerned lest it put the idea into an unstable head. The last thing America needs, he suggested, is to see the worst president in living memory made more interesting and memorable by assassination.

“This guy is a lot worse than Nixon,” was his comment. “Nixon had a brain.”

Of course, the people who voted George W into power knew from the start that he didn’t have a brain. They knew his academic non-record. They knew that his commercial experience was negligible and handed to him on a parental plate.

They knew he had never had a significant thought or insight. They knew he had not fought for his country. They knew he had a history of alcohol abuse and suspected he had a history of substance abuse.

But — in an eerie parallel with the referendum result — they found the other guy too difficult to understand. Al Gore was an upper-class nerd who baffled them with talk about complex propositions and policy possibilities. George W, in contrast, was a guy they could relate to, a nudge and wink guy who was good for a laugh. He passed the “pint” test: “Which of the two candidates would you prefer to go and have a pint with?” Bush, of course.

So they elected him — twice. And they forgave him countless times. For example, when 9/11 happened, he disappeared. But then he came out of hiding and did what he’s good at doing: the photo opportunity. He stood, teary-eyed, on the wreckage of the World Trade Centre towers, hugged firefighters, and promised he’d get the guy who’d done the deed. He didn’t get the guy. He just committed the United States to an invasion cloaked in idiocy.

Under the high-flown nonsense of a war against terror, he took America’s young underclass and sent them out to die. When the body bags came back, he was never around to be photographed with them or to grieve with their destroyed families. He was too busy doing photo opportunities in happier surroundings, wearing a combat jacket on a ship, claiming victory and talking tough.

He’s now apologised for some of the language he used when talking tough. It might not have been appropriate, he admits, to use phrases like “Bring ’em on”. Which is a bit like a surgeon apologising for the language used to tell a patient the surgeon removed the wrong leg by mistake: the language used is not the central issue.

As he progresses through Europe on his lap of dishonour, the president continues to use junk language, telling the Pope he’s “lookin’ good”, and the French that their president is “quite a guy”.

With his valedictory tour going down like a lead balloon, Bush must have been pleased to hear that the image of his country has improved in the past year. That’s according to a new worldwide study by the Pew Global Attitudes Project of the Pew Research Center in Washington.

The project found a widespread belief that America is to blame for poisoning economies throughout the world. It also found that many countries held the United States culpable for global warming. European nations, according to the research, are somewhat more negative in their attitude to the US than they were 10 years ago. Muslim nations, understandably, are much more negative.

“But there are some indications that the world sees the possibility of change,” observed Andrew Kohut, the man who runs Pew Research Center, “with the prospect of a new president.”

In other words, hearts begin to lift at the prospect of anyone, Republican or Democrat, replacing Dubya in the White House. Europe, Australia and Japan tend to believe that Barack Obama would be more likely to “do the right thing regarding foreign affairs” than John McCain, but the central consensus is that either of them will be better for America and the world than Bush.

Bluntly, the odds are that nobody could be worse. By opting for the “regular guy” Bush has always — despite his privileged background — presented himself as,

America made a dumbed-down choice. The man chosen outsourced his thinking, because his attention span was so scant.

He surrounded himself with embattled old men who played to his comic-book notions of aggression. When in doubt, he dressed up in redneck clothes and cleared brush on his ranch while the cameras watched.

America gave this deeply shallow man the benefit of the doubt for a long, long time. Now, there is no doubt left to donate, and the latest research indicates 70% of his own people are dissatisfied with the way things are going. Understandably.

The economy is ropy, fuel prices are sky-rocketing and the threat to American jobs posed by China and India is ever present. The war is not only not being won, but in the view of a majority never will be. The last point is new. Two years ago, a majority believed success in Iraq was likely.

Whether a Republican or a Democrat succeeds Bush, either man will present a stark and welcome contrast to the current President. John McCain is a war hero who has survived isolation and torture, whereas Bush never submitted himself to military service.

Barack Obama is a lucid intellectual whose challenging books have been on the New York Times bestseller lists for years, whereas Bush couldn’t articulate a coherent thought unless it was scripted for him, and the prospect of him writing a memoir evokes headshaking laughter.

He could, of course, have cut short his pointless European tour to offer support to devastated Iowa, where Cedar Rapids is under water. He didn’t.

And when he does get home this week, guess where he’s headed? Florida. For a fundraiser.

As he’d say himself: what a guy…