WHY the photos of bush with a shovel on the ranch?

[mopaul]

i realize they think we are stupid children, who need to have our brains directed in certain thought channels, but what impressions are supposed to be relayed to us with the photo ops of him pretending to be doing hard physical labor? on a dirt road, with secret service agents and human props, photos of him digging up a shovel full of dirt, and placing it over there. this man, who has never developed a callous on his hands, takes orders from his handlers, who tell him, go over there, say these words, pick up that thing called a shovel and do what those others are doing. you know, shovel up a chunk of dirt and put it over there.

i know having him speak at mt. rushmore positioned in such a way as to force your brain to imagine his mug up there with the other faces, thereby burning into your soft brain the idea that he is that great of a president. i understand having him speak on a battleship is supposed to have a certain subliminal if not outright blatant effect on your brain. or having him in a national forest to promote forest management. even though the hypocrisy meter needle is off the scale.

but what oh what is the point of him clearing brush, and shoving dirt around, FOR ONLY HALF AN HOUR? jimmy carter would actually help build houses for the poor, and put in a days work. but bush did not stay there all day shoveling dirt like a regular worker might. he just had his photo taken, using a shovel more as a graphic aid than a tool, as if to show.....what? that he is a common, working class man like his voting base? that he is not a pol and slave of d.c., that he is a regular joe sixpack dirt shoveling' man of the earth? does anyone really swallow any of this bullshit?

i'm trying really hard not to be insulted, but when they use howdy doody in these silly photo op propaganda brain washing sessions, i get sick thinking about how stupid they think WE ALL ARE.

[NJCher]

1. LOLOLOLOL

I've been out shoveling dirt all morning and let me tell you, the garb one wears to shovel dirt does not include a blue oxford shirt. Nor big bulky gloves. One needs flexibility to handle the shovel. Those trousers don't look like anything to shovel in, either.

Furthermore, that dirt doesn't even look like it can be shovelled. Hardpan. Looks like an auger job to me.

Morans!


Cher

[bearfartinthewoods]

19. he wasn't at the ranch.....poor baby

this was a planned photo op at some national conservation/recreation area and was supposed to showcase volunteerism.

big bad blackout blew his talking points for the day.

[FlaGranny]

22. The shovels all look brand new.

They probably sent someone out to buy them just for the photo.

[Octafish]

27. Good eye, Granny!

And like the shovel, the Little Turd from Crawford hasn't worked a day in his life. Oh well, maybe the next tool he'll learn to use will be the pick. Once a jury hears about Bush's complacency or complicity regarding 9-11, he'll be lucky to get off having to make little rocks out of big ones at Leavenworth for the rest of his natural days.

[gardenista]

39. Brand new EXPENSIVE gloves, too

Those gloves are about $17 a pair. Not a mark on 'em, either. Karl Rove, you're loosing your touch, dude. Time for a new propmaster.

[donco6]

2. Digging pits for the mass graves

For gays, lesbians, transv, transg, liberals, not-conservative-enoughs, non-Christians, etc.

[finecraft]

15. Maybe he realized the blackout

was one more "nail in his political coffin" and he is preparing?

[efhmc]

21. Feminists. Why are we always left out of the good stuff?

eom Needed a capital.

[Jacobin]

3. Subliminally

It is probably designed to make it appear that Smirk is not an "effete Dem white wine sipper" but a macho man who is actually "working" (even while on vacation?) after which we all want to go have a beer with him......NOT.

Or should I say: "subliminably"

[Divernan]

8. Subliminaninaninainableinanainan - -somebody stop me!

You can get trapped in one of those Bushisms!

Another dead giveaway that it's a photo-op --no hat to protect the presidential face. You have to wonder if he was even there or his picture was superimposed.

[meow2u3]

4. He's showing us what he's really shoveling

100% pure BUSHIT!!!

Does this answer your question?

[RC]

5. His sleeves are down and buttoned.

And those gloves are so new they must still have the price tag on them.
Yeah, that looks real.

Any photoshopers wanna add some chains to the road gang?

[cosmicdot]

18. ya mean these gloves

photo op from August 2001 visit to Rocky Mtn Nat'l Park while the team plotted how to deal with plummeting polls in a newly stolen maladministration only months old

[Imalittleteapot]

24. He forgot to put on his "rancher" jeans.

He may be wearing Dickies work pants, but no self respecting Texas rancher goes to work in anything but jeans.

[LizW]

6. It was an obvious photo op

I think those other people were national park workers and volunteers. It wasn't on the "ranch", but somewhere else.

The funny thing was when the reporters started asking some questions and Bush* stopped, and leaned on his shovel, chatting away, while behind him the women and men kept on with the work, sweating and shoveling away. It made Bush* look like the biggest lazy-ass ever!

[tboullett]

9. The temp was in the mid 90's

Look at the clothing of the "other" workers.

[teryang]

7. Its facist "roots in the soil" propaganda to go

...with "homeland security" for the white trash electorate.

"Shee mah, heess jess lik us en." These are the same people who think they are "native americans." They are the same people who lap up apparently limitless advertising and tv programming which show the untramelled vistas of a rustic America which no longer exists and isn't even accessible to most Americans when they get a few days off work.

PR agencies call it unbranded advertising.

[nedlogg]

10. Hard at work . . .

looking for those WMDs!

[Divernan]

11. Notice the only Park Service person is a white woman

and the two ununiformed guys appear hispanic - perhaps privatized labor brought in from Mexico? You all know Bush has ordered a multimillion dollar "study", i.e., justification to completely privatize the National Park Service. Then we'll see just what we see with privatized electric services. All profit, and next to no maintenance, repair or necessary expansion of capacity.

[cosmicdot]

20. ... and, she doesn't look like she's lifted anything heavier than a pencil

... no offense to her, natch ... but, come on ...


... and, for a "fit" jogger of a pResident, W looks like he's breaking sweat just holding the shovel ...

[sandnsea]

48. Yes, the Park Service

Working hard clearing the brush. This is a whole lot more than just George being a 'working man'. First, he's doing the thing that every farmer and rancher knows he has to do, keeping his property cleaned up. That helps lock in all those midwest farming votes. Second, with the Park Service person there, he's promoting the notion that cleaning underbrush is the way to keep land healthy. It all works in there together, this is to reinforce the idea that the forest program is a 'thinning program' and anybody who has ever owned a piece of land, or gardened even, knows you have to weed and clear brush. Even the Park Service knows that. Why can't the stupid environmentalists figure that out?

Farmers and ranchers also know you burn. Why can't environmentalists figure out how to get THAT message out? We've got to start talking to real working people, that's all I can figure out.

[Rex]

12. Why? Because people eat that shit up by the shovel full!

"Oh, look at him - he really is a man of the soil."

"See, those dam LIEbruls act like he ain't one of us, but that picture shows that he is!"

"Wow, what a visionary...I mean just look at him survey his surroundings, he really is a renaissance man."

"What a ham! I love that George Bush - always ready to clown around with the pissant class - Jeeves, bring me another scotch."

I could go on...but you get the point.

[kentuck]

13. Look busy...

Jesus is coming.

[PaDUer]

14. Opportunist....

comes to mind, along with Parasite, leech, etc..

[cosmicdot]

16. he needed a prop to hold him up

actually, mopaul, I think the photo-op with clean gloves was taken at Rancho Sierra Vista, Ventura County, in the Santa Monica Mountains in between his fund-raisers, etc., in S. California

The nation's park system is "the crown jewel of America's recreation system," Bush said, standing among the jagged peaks of the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/politics/20030815-1143-ca-bush.html


Gale Norton and Bush walk to a press conference

more of this coming our way



W: I can't tell you the memories this brings back - especially when Poppy, Jeb and me did runs for the United Fruit Company and stuff while fronting for the CIA as "oilmen" ...

http://web.insidevc.com/special/bush/index.cfm?PhotoCount=1

[Mari333]

17. He like shovels....

[kerouac]

23. Caption should read:

Something Dubya's actually good at: shuvlin' shit..

[realFedUp]

25. lol,

shuvlin' shit from one spot to another....also.

I don't think his handlers trust him with power tools

[Warren Stuart]

26. The shovel still has the label on it

Maybe it's the some one he used two two years ago during a similar stunt. At the time there was a young child who was part of the stunt he got one whiff of Bush and exclaimed "he smells just like brand new clothes". Out of the mouth of babes.

[Q]

28. Hitler's propagandists used the same methodology....

....to make him seem a 'man of the people'.

[Malva Zebrina]

29. in Hitler's fascism

the people that were the salt of the earth were the sturdy farmers, the people of country who worked with their hands were the backbone of the country--such was the propaganda.

[gulliver]

30. Guess they finally released his Harken SEC file

Captions:

1. Man, this would look so much better if there was some sweat under my armpits!
2. Phew! I'm glad I don't actually have to do this.
3. What? Dig? You're kidding right? Just take the damned photo!

[maggrwaggr]

31. burying the 28 pages

nt

[Mari333]

32. Photo Op to make people forget his Past , thats all

[no_hypocrisy]

33. Because he's burying democracy literally and metaphorically.

.

[opihimoimoi]

34. That fool woman don even know how to HOLD the damn shovel

much less use it.

all part of the pysops thingy the pubs foisting on the people

[Johnyawl]

35. It's the Reagan image he's trying to grab on to

While he was President, Reagan would vacation on his ranch (outside Santa Barbara?), where he was often photographed clearing brush and doing other manual labor around his ranch. Of course the photo opps were designed to show that Ron was just a normal working class guy like the rest of us. The difference between Reagan and W, is that Reagan would put on jeans, denim shirt, work gloves, and actually do things like chop wood, and clear brush, because he knew how to do it, and actually enjoyed doing that kind of shit around his hobby ranch. Reagan cleared brush to make more riding trails on his ranch, because that's what he really liked, riding his horses. Why does W pretend to chop brush? So that he can pretend to ride a horse? He's just trying to invoke the Reagan legacy, but he's just such a complete phony that he looks like a dork when he tries it.

[The Night Owl]

40. Exactly right...

A lot of what Bush says and does are attempts to appear Reaganesque. The ranch. The white cowboy hat. The frequent references to good and evil. The attempts to portray himself as a military man. I could go on.

Alongside of this attempt to portray Bush as "the new Reagan", The Bushies are often trying to portray Bush as "a regular working guy". This illusion requires constant maintenance by The Bushies because the reality is so vastly different from the illusion, at least to everyone but Freepers and Faux News watchers.

[MisterP]

49. remember the price tag on Reagan's shovel?

here we go again...

[qanda]

36. Caption: "If Saddam could make mass graves,

by golly so can I!"

[Clete]

37. It was in my state of California.

He was posing as an environmentalist. It's too bad the Sierra Club wasn't there to upstage him.

[DemLikr]

38. I love the lost, miserable look on his stupid face.

"uncle Karl, whyyyyyyyyyyyy?"

Also love the creased jeans and button-down shirt to shovel dirt in 95 degree heat...oh my god, how bogus and stupid is that and this country?

Yeah, why does one move dirt around on a dirt field in the middle of hell?

Mopaul, you rock as usual.

[MasonJar]

41. Bush and the shovel

Hey, I like to think he is digging his own grave for November 2004 (metaphorically speaking.)

[aquart]

42. No dirt on his pants.

Shouldn't the leader of the free world be wearing a hat? Doesn't his family get skin cancer?

[Buns_of_Fire]

43. Tell him there's a case of Lone Star buried in the area...

...and just WATCH that dirt fly! :evilgrin:

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

44. He mistook it for his coke spoon?

Or, it looks better than the silver one that was in his mouth when he was born.

[ScreamingMeemie]

45. and in dress pants nonetheless.. I don't know about you, but often I scrub

the floors in my wedding dress... And what the hell is it that he always seems to be looking off into the distance at these days???

[sandnsea]

50. rotfl - I missed that altogether

That is sooo funny. Now why haven't our Democratic candidates picked up on that and just buried him with his phony rancher routine?

My husband is convinced he's wearing special hearing devices so somebody can talk into his ear while he's speaking. When he looks away, he's trying to move his head just right so he can pick up the transmission. I don't know, but I wouldn't doubt it.

[Catshrink]

51. That would explain his delivery

the strange pauses and phrasing. Wouldn't surprise me a bit. He's such a phony through and through.

Although digging is a good metaphor for his residency, isn't it? Keeps digging himself a bigger and bigger hole.

[PATRICK]

46. Cool Hand Bush

"What we have here is a failure to communericate."

The bomb shelters have to be deeper. Dig, you maggots!"

[maveric]

47. He was shoveling away all the bullshit he had spewed in the previous

30 minutes.

[skip fox]

52. Well, then, come give us a CAPTION!!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=105&topic_id=101479

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=105&topic_id=101418

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=105&topic_id=101494

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=105&topic_id=101395

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=105&topic_id=101382

or three, or five . . .

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

53. "Somebody read me the directions for this thing."

"Karl, is this really necessary?"
"Why don't we move to Maine so I can drive a boat like my daddy."
"Clinton got Monica, and I all I got is this lousy shovel."


Gotta stop, this target is too easy.