Friday, June 11, 2004

Are you sick of the nauseating, fawning media tributes to the late Saint Ronald Raygun? You should read The Clothes Have No Emperor, a book written in 1989 by Paul Slansky. A quote from the introduction by the author:

"... [I was] an observer whose very sanity was threatened by the ease with which illusion - an actor is playing the President! was embraced as reality. I did not find the President's ignorance charming. I was unwarmed by his genial head-waggling, unreassured by his stern frowns of manly purpose, uncheered by his hearty waves as he stolled to and from his limos and choppers and jets. His smooth purr did not soothe me. His nostalgic fables about an American that never was did not inspire me. And his canned one-liners, perversely celebrated as "wit" (If I'd gotten a hand like that in Hollywood, I never would have left") definitely did not amuse me."

The final paragraph of the introduction discussed the possibility of then-Vice President Dan Quayle being a future president. It applies to Dubya, for sure:

"... Do not assume that this lightweight can never be elected to the White House. Back in the '60s, we knew the very notion of "President Reagan" was preposterous."

(click on image below to read more about this book)