Bush to graduates: "choose your friends carefully."

[DaveSZ]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/05/22/MNG6G6Q30E1.DTL


Bush gives new college graduates advice on friendship

Dana Milbank, Washington Post
Saturday, May 22, 2004



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Baton Rouge, La. -- As he readies a prime-time speech Monday to try to repair public support for his Iraq policies, President Bush took a philosophical turn Friday, advising college graduates to "choose your friends carefully."

It was a timely message from the commander in chief, whose administration is publicly feuding with a former ally in Iraq, Ahmed Chalabi, who provided the United States dubious intelligence about weapons of mass destruction. But aides said that was not the president's meaning as he addressed Louisiana State University's Class of 2004. They said it was a heartfelt message.

"On the job and elsewhere in life, choose your friends carefully," the president advised after receiving an honorary doctor of science degree. "The company you keep has a way of rubbing off on you, and that can be a good thing, or a bad thing. In my job, I got to pick just about everybody I work with. I've been happy with my choices -- although I wish someone had warned me about all of Dick Cheney's wild partying."

The advice about friends was one of five suggestions, part whimsical and part reflective, that Bush offered. The others: Be on time, be generous, don't practice moral relativism and, above all, "listen to your mother."

[SayitAintSo]

1. So.... he won't go to his own daughters graduation b/c of security

imposed on everyone else ... BUT he WILL do a commencement speech .... with all the same security requirements ....


What am I missing ?

[mhr]

3. They Would Not Be Able To Party If He Was In Town!

So Bush ruins other people's parties instead.

Kind of like he is doing in Iraq and here in the United States!

[PaDUer]

11. First there was an article that said...

they were not going to attend....then one saying they were going to attend....then the latest was they were NOT going to attend...What's the truth??

[ikojo]

15. I may be wrong but I think people are PAID to speak at

commencement exercises. So, if people ARE paid to speak then here is yet another example of Republican family values at work.

Can anyone verify whether people are paid to speak at commencement exercises?

I can only imagine the hue and cry the right-wing would have made had Clinton opted out of attending Chelsea's graduation from Stanford. They would have called him a bad father and accused him of being more concerned with politics, blah, blah, blah.

So many things the Dems could be using against Bush when it comes to family values but yet they remain ignored.

[GCP]

29. Well, making him a Doctor of Science is payment enough IMHO

For the most anti-science moron we have ever had in charge of this country.
Ben franklin must be spinning in his grave.

[SayitAintSo]

32. Actually, Ben Franklin was no model of fatherhood either... n/t

[TahitiNut]

25. I'm betting they asked him NOT to attend.

Probably nobody knows better how DimSon has to be the center of attention wherever he is. (Remember the Olympics?) The DimDaughters (TwinEnablers) have spent their lives enabling his NPD and no doubt remember high school graduation where their own accomplishments were ignored as DimSon scurried to the center of every spotlight.

[muriel_volestrangler]

35. This is free air time and campaigning for him

he gets to go there free (I'm sure the Republicans won't have paid a penny towards the day; it'll either be the university of the taxpayer), have his speech reported, and gets an audience of whom many will applaud and cheer. If he went to his daughters' graduations, he'd have to pay, shut up and listen to someone else, and the media photos would mainly be of his daughters rather than him.

Nothing he does this year isn't connected with trying to get him elected. Nothing, literally, matters more to him in the world.

[gottaB]

2. makes me want to holler

yeargh

oy weh

[lumpy]

4. Bush dons new PR costume.

Academic robes. He now holds a Doctorate of Science honorary bestowed on him by the Louisiana State U. You can see The Smirk smirking at Yahoo's picture gallery. He is so proud. I'm sure we are all proud of him, he has earned it, yes indeedy, sure, mmhuh..

[pacifictiger]

39. I couldn't believe it

when I saw him all robed up. Maybe the costume is a feeble attempt by his handlers to rebut Nancy Pelosi's 'he's stupid' image.
So is this science degree the biblical kind - you know the kind that ignores evolution? With that science doctorate he must be now qualified to justify his 'global warming, what global warming' stance.

[maddezmom]

5. maybe he was thinking about his and Dick's good friend, Chalabi

;)

[gottaB]

6. Surely, and Rummy too

and everybody's friend, Ken Lay.

[saigon68]

13. YOU MEAN THIS SWEETHEART ??

[Paradise]

24. yeah, bush just l o v e s iraqis! ;) n/t

[Paradise]

21. by george, i think you've got it! :) n/t

[ILeft]

7. "...warned me about all of Dick Cheney's wild partying"???

Maybe the Dickster's two (that we know about) DWIs should have been a clue, Junior???

Or maybe he means the neo-cons version of wild partying: death and destruction on a global scale. Apparently it turns them on.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

18. Why would Bush think 2 DUI's was anything other than normal?

[4dsc]

8. House Of Saud, House of Bush

Now there's a friendship for ya!!

[Atman]

9. Once again..."Do as I say, not as I do"

Choose friends wisely...and pay them handsomely

[woofless]

10. Well it's true enough.

If you pick your friends carefully you can fuck up all your life long in the sure belief that they will cover your ass. He's the proof of the pudding, I'd say.

[SpiralHawk]

12. "Don't practice Moral Relativism"

That's right, kOmmander cHimPee -- Torture is wrong. Torture is evil. You are the "captain" of the ship of state, and the "head" of the armed services.

YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE. So puhlease -- you and all your apologists -- stop with your "morally relative" excuses, and accept responsibility like an honorable human being.

[FlaGranny]

14. That's weird - I have never "chosen" a friend.

That's like choosing an employee. First you check out their qualifications, interview them, and then compare them to the other applicants, and then you choose the one with the best qualifications. Very clinical. Friends to me are like lovers. You are attracted to one another because of compatibility. Maybe you get ahead in the world by choosing your friends according to how much they can help you, but I was always more interested in the friendship itself than I was in what the friend could do for me.

[ikojo]

16. In the world in which Bush (and Kerry) grew up

friends are not there for hanging with but for what they can DO for you. It's all about networking, which is why private schools, fraternities and sororities are so popular among the upper crust. They ensure that the progeny of the upper crust will associate primarily with others of their same class. It's not only about the education because if it was then Bush would not have skated by as a C student.

[teryang]

17. Choose your leaders carefully n/t

[Paradise]

19. "choose your friends carefully",

a prelude to "CHALABI DID IT!" :think:

[Tellurian]

20. His address is geared to children graduating from Kindergarten to Gr.1 nt

[Cocoa]

22. Bush: "you can pick your friends..."

[Tellurian]

23. good one!

[Morning Dew]

34. ah, but...

you can't wipe your friends on the couch.

[NashVegas]

26. Silly President, Doesn't He Know You Don't Choose Your Friends?

Associates, on the other hand …

[trof]

27. So much irony there it makes my fillings hurt.

"Birds of a feather..."
jeez

[i_c_a_White_Ghost]

28. Choose your presidents carefully

[no_hypocrisy]

30. You are known by the company you keep. Credit to my Mom.

[truthisfreedom]

31. was "support US freedom, democracy and free elections" in there?

or was it all about your frat buddies?

[SayitAintSo]

33. no shit .... n/t

[Jade Fox]

36. "I've been happy with my choices...." Interesting statement in light of..

something I read the other day which indicated that die-hard Bush
lovers are adopting the rationalization of blaming Bush's
staff members when asked to defend his disasterous Presidency.

[dawn]

37. don't practice moral relativism? I can't believe he said that.

that's all he does.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

38. Bath.

[Wind Dancer]

40. My response -

:puke:

[PaDUer]

41. He's finally admitting it

that he's not a good friend to have.

[truthisfreedom]

42. i thought you were going to say "work with your cronies to get ahead."

choose your mafia carefully.

[VolcanoJen]

43. "Department of Unintended Chalabi Ironies"

That's what Josh Marshall called that most unfortunate Presidential quote.

:D

[Piperay]

44. Uh huh

the way he choose his and America's 'friends', hmmmmmmmmm....not a good recommendation. :-(