Bush's Ranch Serves Down-Home Diplomacy

[SillyGoose]

CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - President Bush has turned his remote ranch into a stage for down-home diplomacy, where a barbecue grill and a pickup truck have become his favorite tools for dealing with world leaders.

The 1,600-acre property in central Texas is a place where aides say the president feels most comfortable and can spend more get-to-know-you time with his guests than in hurried Washington. On Thursday, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe will be the 14th foreign leader to visit the ranch.

Bush's dog once wandered through a press conference with the Australian prime minister. The president led the Saudi crown prince by the hand through blooming bluebonnets. And Russia's president was treated to a hoedown with cowboy cooks and a swing band.

"You only invite your friends into your house," Bush said when Russian President Vladimir Putin became the first head of state to visit in November 2001. "Occasionally, you let a salesman in, or two."

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050804/D8BP1IUO0.html
(more at link)

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

1. He's like a cross between Jesus and Mark Twain, isn't he?

"You only invite your friends into your house," Bush said when Russian President Vladimir Putin became the first head of state to visit in November 2001. "Occasionally, you let a salesman in, or two."

IS IT 2008 YET?

[Maddy McCall]

3. OMG! HAHAHAHAHAHA!

This has to be the funniest post subject line I have ever read.

:rofl: !!

[SillyGoose]

8. This statement is priceless...

Bush made it clear that those who were against him wouldn't get the honor of coming to Crawford. Angered at French President Jacques Chirac's opposition to the war, Bush said, "I doubt he'll be coming to the ranch any time soon."


:eyes:

[Booster]

10. Only fools go to Crawford Texas in August. Bush acts like the

White House is just a place to go every once in awhile. I'm almost positive any visitor from any country would rather go to Washington than to Crawford. This man is just so embarrassing; I think inviting people to Crawford is just his way of demeaning everybody because the heat is unbearable - not that it isn't hot in Washington in August. Hell, it's hot here in CA.

[booksenkatz]

12. The heat AND the chiggers.

Believe me, my dad's farm is not far from Crawford. I try to make my summer visit as early in June as possible! It's a nightmarish heat hole in my opinion. Just heat, chiggers 'n scrub. When I left at the age of 27, I yelled to the skies, "As God is my witness, I'll never be hot (and itchy) again!"

So I'm glad to live in the snowbelt now. I miss my family in Texas, and the food, but that ungodly heat, I can do without.

[Booster]

14. I'm originally from Texas also and you're right about the chiggers

but the thing I remember most are the mosquitos. Since moving to CA in 1966, every time I go to visit my Mom in Texas I am amazed at the mosquitos, not to mention the humidity. Like you, I said then and still say now, I will NEVER move back to Texas for anything. It still is amazing that Texans can brag about their state - I always say if they ever visited another state, ANY other state, they would keep their mouths shut about how great Texas is - just ain't true. Texans had to have invented brainwashing for them to believe that their state is the best. Flame away.

[booksenkatz]

17. No flames here

I was born/raised in Ft. Worth. You grow up with a certain propaganda about it, that's for sure. The same type of propaganda that calls itself "American History" in our classrooms. Just a bunch of lies designed to make us all feel good.

I graduated from TCU, got married, lived in other places and realized that when I call myself a "homesick Texan" that I'm really just missing my family! And I do miss certain places that evoke happy memories. I truly do love our family farm, but it's because of the memories created there, not because of the place/location itself. Don't know what I'll do when my dad dies. Everyone thinks I should have the farm, but I'm not sure I want it! But yeah, when I do go down there to visit, I'm so physically miserable, I get cross with myself for believing the propaganda while I was growing up. After what we Texans have given to the world, I think we probably should just shut the hell up and quietly go rub some Chiggerex on all of those red welts and pop open another ice cold Big Red.

Back to Bush: why in the heck do they get away with calling his place a ranch when he has no livestock there? In Texas, you have to run maybe 10,000 head of cattle to allow yourself to be called a ranch. And he doesn't farm anything down there, does he? Am not sure what to call a place like that. I've never seen a place of that size in Texas with no activity on it other than clearing brush. Unless it's a brush farm?;)

[Booster]

21. LOL Brush farm. Let's call it what it is - a photo-op, nothing more.

[CottonBear]

29. Q: Why does * clear brush when there's no livestock or crops?

If there are no fencelines, waterholes or pastures to maintain then WHY does he need to clear brush?
:wtf:
I'm asking this as a horseowner who does maintain fences, mow pastures, cut back kudzu and chop down privet bushes.

[thereismore]

23. Yes, the mosquitoes. Can you imagine being a foreign leader and

knowing that one of the thousand bites you got may have actually come from a mosquito that had just bit bushturd? I would not be surprised if after such a stately visit a rogue missile landed 18 miles south of Waco.

[Triana]

27. How long has he been out of the First Grade?

My god, he sounds like a petty schoolyard bully.

[Hobarticus]

2. Huyk-hyuk, ain't my fake Texan schtick cute? n/t

[BeyondGeography]

4. weeze jes plain folks heeyuh

C'mon in and ah'll show ya mah war masheen.

[thereismore]

5. Barbecue. That's all he learned while he still had a brain. nt

[notadmblnd]

11. c'mon.. it's not like they actually let him handle matches

and charcoal. all he has to do it push the ignitor button on the gas grill.... George, when you turn on the gas.. put your face up real close to the burner and press that little red button in the middle.

[ironman202]

13. oh please...

to paraphrase Barry Goldwater...say it ain't so...a Texan doesn't know barbeque from the leavings in a coral.

[thereismore]

22. Haha, the bushturd is no Texan. n/t

[Missy M]

6. My, my isn't bush just the cutest.....

I thought we had the White House to meet with foreign leaders not some forsaken ranch in the middle of nowhere with not one ounce of charm or class. He is just such a down home kinda guy. bush has got to go because he is such an embarrassment to the American people.

[DrDan]

7. there's nothing like a pig farm

to break down cultural barriers and promote an environment for serious diplomacy

[KeepItReal]

9. He doesn't have *ONE* horse on the whole ranch??

WTF??

He really is "all hat, no cattle (nor equines)."

[tanyev]

15. "If'n ya don't agree with me,

we're gonna skewer you and fire up the grill. Got it?"

[Buns_of_Fire]

16. Bush's Ranch Also Serves A Mean Texas Margarita

Oops, scratch that from the menu. We're also out of our specialty "Jack Daniels Punch," too. I think we've still got a few Lone Stars hidden away.

Gee, if you'd only shown up before the pResident arrived... :beer:

[saigon68]

18. Maybe a Few 40s of Colt 45 High Gravity Malt Liquor for the deportees

That's mighty fine beer--- 8 1/2 % Alcohol

[gratuitous]

19. Gee, I hope nobody wears flip-flops there

You KNOW how that upsets some people.

[Dulcinea]

20. Please.

Anyone who only wants to associate with people they like has no business being in public life!

[xxqqqzme]

24. this 'ranch' ruse is such a joke

I wonder where he & pickles plan 2 retire? He will have no need for a photo op 'ranch' after '08.

[MN ChimpH8R]

26. Chimpy and Pickles will retire somewhere

(1) where he's immune from extradition; and (2) can hide the money he stole. Assuming that justice does not prevail. If it does, the folks at the Hague can probably find some appropriate long-term living quarters for His Chimperial Majesty.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

25. Diplunacy takes over

after diplomacy dies.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

28. Like Reagan, Nixon and Poppy, Bush wants his own feifdom

away from the Versailles palace in Washington, where he can summer and winter with his court around him. He's in competition with the practice of having regal estates that Nixon had (the Western White House on the ocean in San Clemente, California), Reagan (the Malibu Ranch), and Poppy (Kennebunkport). But Bush definied himself with a ranch that's more like a fake movie set, in a place that has virtually nothing, which matches the inner substance of the man.