Table Of ContentTable of Contents
Title Page
Preface to the Paperback Edition
Preface to the First Edition
Introduction
Economics Lesson
Trouble in the Middle East
God Bless
Saving Time
Let’s Not Forget the Lobbyists
Which God Is Your God?
Yesterday’s Enemy
Dinner at the Darbys’
Book Flogging
Shadow Government
Safe Deposit for Sale
The Young Audience
It’s Cherry Blossom Time
Malice on Purpose
Red Alert
The FBI Changes Its Ways
Declaration
Things in My Attic
Another Icon
Ashes to Ashes
I Spy-You Spy
Between Iraq and a Hard Place
Will the Real Saddam Stand Up?
I Hate Saddam
To Lose One’s Center
Games Children Play
Come Fly With Me
Foreign Affairs for Dummies
The Last Pill
Losing Your Identity
Whose Reality Is It?
The Fight for Duct Tape
Yelling at the TV
The Tip of the Iceberg
The War Over Abstinence
Bumper Stickers
Weapons of Mass Destruction
I’ll Always Have Paris
Americo-Shaft Airlines
Freedom of Speech
The Political War
Spam the Greatest Generation
James Bond and WMD
The Bookies
The Iraqi Stock Market
Bless the World
I Won’t Be Home for Christmas
Who Remembers Watergate?
Three-Letter Word
Poor Rupert Murdoch
Senior Citizens Vote Too
The Ten Commandments
Power Anonymous
A Great American
The Big Leak
Unnecessary Roughness
But Seriously Speaking
Wal-Mart
Talk Show
A Sexual Revolution
Gotcha Saddam
Holiday Greetings
Saving Britney’s Marriage
The Opera Isn’t Over
Suppose They Were Wrong
War of the Steroids
Four Letter Words and More
Duck Hunting with Scalia
Just Good Friends—Bah
Who Killed Jesus?
The Good Americans
Canada, My Canada
The Blues Brothers
Soldiers of Fortune
Torture 101
The Rich are Different
Michael, Say It Isn’t So
The Trial
“Oh Darn”
How Many Wars?
Commissions for Boo-Boos
Image Control
Couch Potatoes
Meat Loaf
Husseinku
Compassionate Conservatism
Left Behind
Trial Lawyers—Who Needs Them?
Do It Our Way
The Dan Rather Factor
Our Long Nightmare Is Over Once Again
Congressional No Flu Zone
Slam Dunk
Crate and Baghdad
In God We Trust
A Vivid Inauguration
First Junk Call
Making Extra Money
Social Security Blues
Flip-Flop Diplomacy
Harvard, Dear Harvard
Well Hello, Martha
Smoking Guns
A Constitutional Solution
Oil Tasting For Snobs
The News
The Quiet Ambassador
Happy Mountain
Where Were You?
Hate in America
Bless This House
You Can’t Sue Me
Canceling Out O’Reilly
Darwin Go Home
Katrina
Once Upon a Time in New Orleans
I’ll Drink to FEMA
A Leak in the Basement
Torture Airlines
Let’s Pretend
The Truth About Global Warming
The Nine Trillion Dollar Heist
Good News
A Call from Big Brother
About the Author
Also by Art Buchwald
Copyright Page
EVERY WRITER WHO CAN’T SPELL or is never grammatically correct needs
an editor. Cathy Crary has fit this role since 1982. I therefore dedicate this book
to her. She laughs at everything, but still wields a red pencil in her left hand.
Preface to the Paperback Edition
WHEN BEATING AROUND THE BUSH was published in hardcover I had two
legs and great kidneys. Now I have one leg and wounded kidneys. The
paperback version of Beating Around the Bush had nothing to do with these
losses.
Bush is still captain of the Titanic. There are icebergs all over Washington.
Some of the White House stars have left the ship. Some of them have become
lobbyists, some have escaped indictment, and others have been writing books.
Despite all this, nothing has changed since the hardcover, except that several
columns have been added and the beating has not stopped.
The main difference is that the softcover is much cheaper.
The good thing is, although I went to a hospice, I haven’t died. It has made my
publisher very happy.
Preface to the First Edition
BEFORE I BEGIN, I would like to say that I am prepared to go to jail rather
than reveal to a grand jury the names of my sources for this book. The reason is I
had no sources—I made everything up.
The characters I mention, such as President George W. Bush, Donald
Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, former Attorney General John Ashcroft, Bill
O’Reilly, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Martha Stewart, Michael Jackson, Vladimir
Putin, Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, Jacques Chirac, Tony Blair, Prince
Charles, and the Boston Red Sox, are all fictitious and do not resemble anyone
living, dead, or in between.
It is hard to believe, but for all of us these have been the best of times and the
worst of times—depending on if you are in the top two percent of wealthiest
Americans, have health insurance, a decent pension plan, and a credit card that
doesn’t bounce on you.
These past few years have been a gold mine of material for a columnist. For
one reason, our leaders keep screwing up and refuse to admit it. As you will
read, there are no bad guys in Washington, there are only good guys doing bad
things.
The uppermost subject on our minds has been single-sex marriage. No
civilized society can have people of the same gender getting into bed together.
Then we worried about the environment. Everyone agrees global warming
should be stopped, and if it isn’t, Anchorage will soon look like Miami.
I have also dealt with creationsim versus Darwinism. Did God create the earth
in six days, or did we originate from monkeys? I discuss this because a book that
mentions God sells more copies to human beings than one that appeals to apes.
I also deal with the Iraq war. It is not my position that it was a good war or a
bad war, a just war or an unjust war, a smart war or the dumbest war we have
ever gotten into. My position is that it is the only war we’ve got, so we have to
support it.
Do you want to know how I feel about torture? Personally, I am against it, but
