Category Archives: Politics: Tinfoil

The American Street brings us this great cartoon. I laughed.

What amazes me about the Bush Bulge story is how totally ineptly the White House has dealt with this thing. It would have been so easy to kill this rumor dead: bring on the doctors to say he's healthy, the Secret Service to say there's no electronic device, etc.

Instead, the White House brings out … the White House tailor. Never mind that Georges de Paris (!) looks like he moonlights at Hogwarts, the “bulge” he points to in this picture looks like a little ridge—the sort I get on my suits when I hunch up, not a box.

Furthermore, as you can see in this nice recap of the Bush bulge issue, a somewhat similar bulge appears inside Bush's t-shirt!

When Kevin Drum does the tinfoil thing about the strange object on Bush's back, he does it elegantly. He many only have three pictures, but his pictures have circles and lines (no arrows, alas).

Want more? Try the Bush bulge photo gallery

You know if this were Clinton, Gore or Kerry, the right-wing blogs and the radio (alleged) felons/drug abusers and the cable (alleged) sex perverts would be baying for an investigation. I still can't quite shake the feeling that this is much ado about nothing, but the strange thing is that the White House is acting guilty. A super-smart Rovian trick to distract? Is he that clever?

Update: This device (via Kevin Drum) fits the pictoral and circumstantial (no doctor's report this year) evidence all too well.

Can you imagine what would happen if voters knew that both parts of the ticket had wonky (but not Wonkette-y) tickers? Who would vote GOP knowing there was a risk of getting President Dennis Hastert?

Spiegel Online prints a photo from the SECOND debate showing odd stuff under Bush's jacket.

The campaign denies Bush had any sort of help during the debate. I believe this: Bush didn't do well enough to have had help. So these strange wrinkles are either a coincidence, a medical device of some sort (why no physical this year?), or — perhaps — body armor?

Meanwhile, Jay Leno asked John Edwards last night what Edwards thought the bulge was. Edwards suggested it was Bush's battery. He also proposed the candidates be patted down before the third debate. I think he was joking.

Hey, if you can't have a Bush boom, have a Bush bulge!

Daily Kos argues there might be something to the idea that Bush had something hidden under his jacket during the first debate, relying primarily on the Bush campaign's initial reaction to a NYT query about the bulge: a false accusation that the pictures had been doctored. Cryptome, meanwhile, sees tinfoil everywhere and has the techie details, too, including 28 8×10 color glossy photos, sadly lacking, however, in circles and arrows.

Update: Digby explains the Battle of the Bulge — GW Bush's tailor is to blame! Yes it's all because, GW Bush uses a very expensive French tailor.

Is Bush Wired?, a web site dedicated to exploring the odd bulges in GW Bush's jackets…was he wearing some sort of electronic prompter during the first debate?

I'd dismiss this as pure nutso fantasy but for this Salon article (ad view req.) which includes this tidbit:

“Repeated calls to the White House and the Bush national campaign office over a period of three days, inquiring about what the president may have been wearing on his back during the debate, and whether he had used an audio device at other events, went unreturned.”

The failure to deny it may be due to the view it's beneath contempt. Or…