A destiny linked to Iraq is the only thing they share (Bush* & Blair)

[kskiska]

Bush and Blair could not be further apart on all aspects of social reform

The spectacle over the next few days of Tony Blair and George Bush beaming and backslapping remains as puzzling as ever. Is this just realpolitik business-as-usual, putting out more flags in the Mall for another necessary but unsavoury foreign leader? If so, Blair plays his part well, his energetically sincere smile never faltering.

Even in private he hotly protests that the Bush he knows is nothing like the one of caricature. No, no, the president is intelligent, thoughtful, well-informed, a good listener and a lot of other entirely incredible adjectives. Look into Blair's face and you see not one flicker: he's a good bluffer. He knows no one believes a word of it, but he will pretend it is so until the last. He has made his fateful bed of nails and now he has to lie on it - and lie through his teeth about it, too. If he has regrets, if ever in the still of night he doubts whether he took the right path, he will never let on. You can bet there will be nothing to suggest doubt about his tragic error in his autobiography. We have yet to see if he is eventually broken by it, as Lyndon Johnson was by Vietnam: it is not impossible.

But it is intellectually impossible to believe Blair and Bush share more than the same brand of toothpaste - as Bush once joked. Only Colgate explains the artificial grin between this most ultra rightwing president and Britain's social democrat prime minister.

(snip)

So what do Bush and Blair talk about over their fireside bottle of mineral water? Where is this fabled meeting of minds? Once they have done whatever is to be done - or not done - on Iraq, Guantanamo and trade tariffs, once they have small-talked wives and children, what then? Here is the leader with the greatest wealth and power on Earth at his command, squandering it, abusing it, misusing it with every step he takes. The two men can hardly compare notes on pet projects and policies. It is astonishingly difficult to talk for long or with any closeness to someone whose politics are obnoxious.

In truth, whatever appearances suggest over the next two days, there is precious little shared between them beyond political destinies so fatefully linked in Iraq.

more…
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/columnist/story/0,9321,1088220,00.html

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. I have to wonder too

What the heck do they talk about?

[Marlie]

2. Somehow

I don't think Bush has ever mastered the art of conversation nor
particularly cares. I can see him making a few jokes, which he
laughs at himself, while his little head bobs up and down and expect
that's about it. Can he really discuss current events, the latest
best-sellers, art, what's really going on in the world? He's in
a bubble after all. All he knows is what his advisors tell him..
Tony Blair or anyone having to be around him for any length of time
must be ready to pull their hair out or go to sleep really early.
I expect he's a real bore, unlike Clinton who could talk about
interesting things for hours on end.

[Manix]

3. The only subject Bush knows anything about is baseball!!!..I'm sure the

Brits are excited about that.