I N T E R N A T I O N A L

Havana. August 5, 2004

Bush is appearing more and more like Nixon

• A sullen and depressed president in the White House retreating into a private and paranoid world is a cause for concern

BY GABRIEL MOLINA

PRESIDENT George W. Bush is steadily becoming more similar to Richard M. Nixon in the days leading up to the latter’s resignation.

“From what people who work there tell me, this White House looks more and more like Richard M. Nixon’s,” stated George Harleigh, a retired professor who worked there with Nixon.

Harleigh compared the Bush of 2004 to the Nixon of 1974, during the scandal involving Cuban-born “plumbers” who were spying on the Democratic Party leadership, which unleashed an avalanche of revelations regarding the dirty methods that characterized the Nixon administration.

President Fidel Castro’s remarks during his July 26 speech regarding the effects of alcoholism on W. Bush have caught national and international attention. An July 29 article on the web site Capitol Hill Blue (CHB) signed by Teresa Hampton and William D. McTavish refers to Bush’s bad humor and isolation, a recurrent theme among his advisors and employees, who find him “retreating into a private, paranoid world where only the ardent loyalists are welcome.”

“Bush’s erratic behavior and sharp mood swings led White House physician Colonel Richard J. Tubb to put the President on powerful anti-depressant drugs after he stormed off stage rather than answer reporters' questions about his relationship with indicted Enron executive Richard J. Lay. “Keep those motherfuckers away from me,” he screamed at an aide backstage. “If you can’t, I’ll find someone who can.” However, White House insiders are saying that the strong prescription medications seem to increase Bush’s sullen behavior towards those around him,” the article reads. At the White House, it is said that access to Bush is very controlled. Only advisors such as Karl Rove and Karen Hughes are allowed. Even the White House chief of staff has complained that he has less and less access to the President.Tom Ridge, who is Homeland Security Secretary, and heading the government’s war on terrorism, says that he has little time with the president, and “gets most of his marching orders lately from Ashcroft,” the CHB article reads. RUMSFELD HAS FALLEN FROM FAVOR

The article quotes one senior Homeland Security aide as saying, “Too many make the mistake of thinking Dick Cheney is the real power in the Bush administration. They’re wrong. It’s Ashcroft...” It continues by quoting aides who say that Bush and Ashcroft “both believe they are on a mission from God.” Cheney continues to be in Bush’s tight inner circle, but Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld “has fallen out of favor and tells his staff that ‘no matter what happens in November, I’m outta here,’ “ the article reads. Not just Justin Frank – the prominent Washington psychiatrist quoted by Fidel – attributes everything to “Bush’s paranoid and hallucinatory personality.” Dr. Frank’s colusions have been confirmed psychiatrists including Dr. James Grotstein, Professor at UCLA Medical Center, and Dr. Irvin Yalom, MD, Professor Emeritus at Stanford University Medical School.

 “It’s a double-edged sword,” the article quotes one aide as saying. “We can’t have him flying off the handle at the slightest provocation but we also need a President who is alert mentally.”

Tubb prescribed the anti-depressants after July 8, when Bush, upset, stormed off,  refusing to answer reporters' questions about his relationship with Enron executive Kenneth J. Lay, who was indicted for fraud.

Bush’s mental stability has become the topic of Washington whispers in recent months. Capitol Hill Blue first reported on June 4 about increasing concern among White House aides over the President’s wide mood swings and obscene outbursts.

At first, loyal Republicans dismissed the reports as anti-Bush propaganda, but they were later confirmed by Dr. Frank, who refers to a life sprinkled with sadism, from exploding frogs and insulting journalists to “pumping his hand gleefully before the bombing of Baghdad.”

One Republican Party consultant – who obviously didn’t want to be identified – is already advising aspiring congressmen to keep their distance from Bush, saying that the real possibility that the president’s behavior is not good for the party or the country needs to be faced.

 NANCY REAGAN DOESN’T SUPPORT HIS REELECTION

More recently, on July 30, Capitol Hill Blue revealed that Nancy Reagan, the former First Lady, told the Republican Party that she would not support the reelection of George W. Bush.

Ronald Reagan’s widow, a Republican icon, has turned down a number of invitations to appear at the party’s National Convention and she told Ed Gillespie, the party’s president, that she would not tolerate the use of the words or images of her late husband in the re-election campaign.

Ron, Nancy’s son, spoke at the recently concluded Democratic Convention, and in Esquire magazine, he wrote “George W. Bush and his administration have taken normal mendacity to a startling new level far beyond lies of convenience. They traffic in big lies.”

His sister Patty joined Ron in opposing Bush. The only member of the family who supports Bush’s reelection is Michael Reagan, the adopted conservative son of the late former president.

Whatever the reason, old experts and authorities on the White House see a strong parallel between Bush and Nixon. It is not by chance that Cuban groups associated with the CIA and former dictator Batista have taken charge of the dirty work of both presidents, notably during Watergate, and in abominable drug trafficking to finance the war against the Sandinista Revolution. The conclusions of a 1978 U.S. Congressional Committee that investigated the assassination of President Kennedy refer to the involvement of some of those Cuban terrorists.

Since the 2000 elections, they have convinced Bush that he owes them his election, and they are collecting on the debt, meddling in U.S. policy on Latin America, via Roger Noriega, today’s figurehead for sinister characters like Otto Reich, the Díaz Balarts and the Ros family.

Recently, a spokesman for the Democratic Party said that they would try to make electoral mileage in Florida out of Bush’s recent outrages against Cuban-Americans. But in order to get non-voters in that state to the polls, one has to get down to brass tacks: to break with the fascist, embezzling, murderous fundamentalism of those terrorists.