What is this Bush* business?

[leyton]

Can someone explain to me why some people keep typing a star after or in place of Bush's name? Is this a DU tradition I'm not aware of, or what?

Thanks.

[patdem]

1. First of all I noticed you spelled bush* with a capital b..which shows

your true colors...and the * is the indication that bush* will forever be an astrick in American history because he was installed by the Supine Court, rather than voted into office!!!

[leyton]

4. Thanks for the explanation

but as for the capitalization... it's a convention of the English language, not an endorsement.

[hlthe2b]

5. Whoah, Patdem... I capitalized bush* as well in my explanation...

Let's don't place suspicion which it is not likely warranted...

[BDawg]

12. I've always understood the *...

but why do some people call him "whistle-ass?"

[PunkinPi]

13. see link below :)

http://www.whistleass.com/

Welcome to the DU! :hi:

[hlthe2b]

2. It signifies that Bush, selected and not elected...

will always have an asterick after his name throughout history... If you do a search, there frequently are posts explaining the history of this and I think I saw one the past few days.

[RandomKoolzip]

3. The asterisk is a footnote denoting illegitemacy.

'Cuz he is not reall the president. Also, Doonesbury always depicts the current president as a small floating asterisk-like star-thing.

[littlejoe]

6. The truth of the matter

is that he is such an abhorrent person, I cannot bring myself to say his name, let alone spell it. My preference is the "presidick".

[RandomKoolzip]

7. I prefer the "resident."

Less inflammatory, but still gets the point across. And just for the record, although he's not my favorite person in the world, * really is more of a figurehead than the real seat of evil in Washington. Pearle, Cheney, Wolfowitz, the board of directors of Bechtel, Halliburton, etc. are the true evildoers here. I don't want to get carried away in Bushhate, cuz it's not the man himself I hate, it's his policies and his advisors.

[DUreader]

8. It is a Quote from a dissenting opinion in the Supremes 2000 decision

I don't have a link for you

but check out the bush* vs Gore decision

[LearnedHand]

9. Am I misrememberating something, here?

Didn't Gary Trudeau also show bush 1 and bush* 2 with asterisks?

[RandomKoolzip]

10. read post #3, please.

EOM

[proud patriot]

11. Yes Gary Trudeau used an astrisk under a big cowboy hat

:D

[stinkeefresh]

15. not quite - but here's the full history

Bush I was shown as not actually there- like the speech text was coming from an invisible man. To illustrate this better, Gary drew a few short lines in a circle about where a head should be to give the reader a better sense of this. This was the first abstraction of a president at podium in Doonesbury. Reagan was abstracted as the character "Ron Headrest" (a play on Max Headroom and a comment on the Reagan team's mastery of television images, but I don't quite consider this the first of what has now become Trudeau's entrenched method, because Ron was never shown at podium, only on a tv. Like he existed only in the tv.)

Quayle was drawn around the same time as a feather floating in mid air, and Gingrich was a lit bomb (I love that one).

Today, chimpy is an asterix (for reasons noted in other posts here), and Ahnold is a giant groping hand.

I meant to include links to illustrative examples form the archives, but I guess you now need an account to access them. Too bad.

[Timefortruth]

16. I thought only Chimp's was an asterisk.

under a cowboy hat, and Chimp was an asterisk under a cowboy hat was used to show he is nothing, vacuous, empty…you get the drift.

People here started using it instead of his name to signify that Chimp was unworthy of even haven his name used. I prefer to call him Chimp because of the obvious physical similarities and identical intellectual capabilities, not to mention it is disrespectful.

[leyton]

17. Clinton

I think Clinton was an asterisk.

Wasn't Bush also portrayed under one of those Roman war helmets at one point? Perhaps during the weeks leading up to the war in Iraq?

[Lizz612]

18. I could swear that Clinton

was a waffle. I was 7 in '92, so I grew up with a lit bomb and a waffle in charge of the free (Doonsebury) world. Yeah, Bush is under those Roman helmets whenever he's being a war monger, otherwise its the cowboy hat.

[MoonRiver]

14. I also remember reading something about how one should never

write or say the name of the beast.