Battle of the Bush Bulge

cyberman11 writes "Get out your tinfoil hats! Salon.com is running an article about Internet speculation that Bush uses an earpiece prompter and ignores his teleprompter while making speeches. Bush exhibited peculiar pauses between sentences while speaking during the debate and a large solid object appears between his shoulder blades as he leans over the lectern. He also interrupts himself in the middle of one of his responses by interjecting "Let me finish!" while he still had time remaining to answer and no one else had spoken." If Bush was wired, the receiver would be the size of a deck of cards or smaller, not some giant thing strapped to his back. Update: 10/09 16:10 GMT by J : The NYT contacted the Bush campaign and got a few answers that rule out the innocuous explanation that I had assumed.

Comments

Nothing to see here

[Shakrai]

Let's be real people. Most of us dislike George W. as much as the other guy but do you really think they would try to cheat at the debates? And don't you think that if they did cheat Bush would have done a better job? Do you really see Karl Rove (boy genius ®) couching him to say "It's hard work" over and over again?

Even Michael doubts it's true and we all how about his political leanings. As for the big thing in his back -- may I be the first to make the obvious suggestion: bullet-proof vest?

Re:Nothing to see here

[Zutroy Of Earth]

A bullet proof vest with a wire that leads to one side of the head ? To me, that looks like an earpiece :) Of course, I'd still have to see the original video instead of pictures taken on the internet, which could have easilly be doctored. And even if it is the original unmodified image, it could be something else. But right now, IMHO *LET ME FINISH!* the evidence points to cheating.

(note: "POINTS TO" != damning evidence)

And for those who said "if he would have cheated, he would have done a better job of it, therefore he was not cheating", your logic is flawed :p

Indeed

[Yeechang Lee]

If Bush was wired, the receiver would be the size of a deck of cards or smaller, not some giant thing strapped to his back.

Indeed. Heck, there wouldn't be anything on the back at all; the earpiece would be all that's needed.

The story's veracity is also hurt by Salon running it, given its reputation for "All Bush bashing, all the time." TeeVee's terrific parody of Salon from earlier this year got that characteristic dead on.

Not real.

[Captain Rotundo]

Too bad all the source sites I've seen for this appear to be fake and its a challenge posted on RTMark . Would have been an interresting story otherwise, myself not being a Bush supporter :)

Nothing to see here, move on

[KilobyteKnight]

And Kerry took a note out of his pocket and Badnarak wasn't even allowed to show up and nothign of substance got discussed.

Please, can we stick to something that matters?

Silly

[Watcher]

This is just as silly as all of the accusations that Kerry had a cheat sheet for the debate. Frankly, after listening to the debate a couple times, I've got to say that if Bush was cheating, he did a pretty piss poor job of it.

In defense of Bush

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm no Bush fan. I think he is about as bright as the average American, probably less. This is why I am defending him. He was clearly confused by the lights. When he said "let me finish", the green light had just turned on a few seconds earlier. I think that was "who" he was talking to - the green light.

Yes, the green light means he still has a lot of time, but this is Bush. Pay close attention to his inability to pace himself with the lights. At one point he started talking very fast in response to a green light, then slowed down realising that he still had time, but slowed down too much. Then after the light turned red he speeded back up way too late and kept talking after it started flashing.

"Cheating" in a debate?

[cgenman]

I fail to see how having a better speaker make lines for you to speak during a presidential debate is cheating. I mean, they have swarms of people doing their research for them, their speeches are obviously entirely canned, what part do the presidential candidates actually play except for talking heads?

As for the earpiece in general... If I had to write speeches for that man I'd do that too. His intelligence doesn't exactly burn like a nuke-u-ler fire.

The only way this could be actual major news is if the format of the debate forbade audio prompts. Which, if true, would be the kind of trivial infraction that the American people would be able to understand and hate him for. Anyone know the rules?

Re:"Cheating" in a debate?

[brandido]

It's significant because the debuates give Americans a chance to see the candidates "one-on-one" presenting their ideas and defending their actions. If one of them is using a audio prompt, it gives a significantly unfair advantage to the one with the technological superiority, in this case the incumbent, and misrepresents the candidates ability to think on their feet, and explain themselves.

He sure sounds like it.

[Squeeze Truck]

I heard this yesterday and then rewatched the debate.

When Bush begins speaking he spends more time not talking than talking, like he's repeating dictation. Not like a normal person at all.

Good thing the ground rules say Kerry can't come near him or speak to him directly.

Let's try a more plausible explanation

[hey!]

Let's try a more plausible explanation for Bush's weird speaking cadence. Bad debate strategy.

The Republican political technique is based on repeating a small number of simple consistent messages to the electorate. It's the "talking point" thing. Get everybody top to bottom saying exactly the same thing in the same phrases over and over and over again in every venue you can put them in, and pretty soon the message starts to stick. The pauses in the President's delivery were him thinking on his feet, trying to find a way to connect the topic to one of these small number of messages they've chosen.

First of all, he's not as skilled as the usual talking heads at this game. Furthermore, this wasn't some cable news segment, this was a presidential debate. Not only is he under greater scrutiny than the the normal talking head would be, he's under it for a lot longer. It's not five minutes of blather then cut to the commercial, it's ninety minutes of white hot attention, stacked up next to a determined opponent who has managed to eliminate all of his rivals up to this point.

As a result, the dominant impression he left was that he didn't have enough material -- exactly the opposite of what you'd expect if he were wearing a wire.