14 replies on “Bush is “on the Google.””

  1. This is hardly some sort of new development. President Bush is 60 years old, and does not exactly have a lot of free time to use the internet. I was talking to a 35 year old woman a week ago who was commenting on how she barely knows how to use her cell phone (as a side note, she is a former boss of mine and I am unsure of her political affiliation). My grandparents, both in their 70s, are not technophiles, and I think my grandmother has never even touched a computer, despite the ease of use of e-mail and some simpler photo programs (like iPhoto) if she chose to get a digital camera, again something neither of them have. And when my parents have difficulty with their computers, despite the fact that they are very able at using them, they come to me and my sibling (mostly my sibling as he, like them, uses a Windows machine) for help with troubleshooting, backup, and other things.

    This hardly seems like a sin on the part of President Bush, or even worth the effort of reporting. Is it supposed to convince me and other conservatives reading here to vote Democrat? I know it seems silly to you Waldo, as you have proven quite well how adept you are with technology, but it does escape some people, and that is hardly reason to point it out.

  2. I don’t think the intention here is to convince anybody that President Bush’s verbal awkwardness or lack of technical know-how has any bearing on how they ought to vote. It doesn’t even seem particularly political. But, it is amusing.

    I’m probably somewhere between CR UVa’s parents and grandparents in terms of my computer skills. I have no intuitive understanding of hardware or software. If somebody is willing to instruct me, with patience, I’ll eventually learn things.

    I admit my cluelessness and even embrace it, in a Zippy the Pinhead sort of way. I often refer to any type of internet use as “bein’ on th’ email”. I know better, but it’s a fun schtick (for me, that is – everybody else thinks I’m an idiot). That’s why I laughed, when President Bush said he’s “on the Google”. But, I don’t think he knows better.

  3. It’s not a matter of being good with technology, any more than his father being baffled by a barcode scanner at a grocery store indicated that he was bad with technology. Understanding that “internet” is not pluralized and “Google” is not preceded by “the” is both fundamental to western culture and to the English language. (Good luck thinking of product names generally preceded by “the.” There just ain’t many.) Like his father before him, this was simply another opportunity to demonstrate that he’s totally out of touch, not because he’s president, but because he was a blue-blood rich kid who was never in touch with regular people.

  4. Haha! That silly old man talks about technology like a 60-year-old!

    Old people — can’t live with ’em, can’t be born without ’em.

    And in other news, knowing whether or not Google is preceded by an article is now a fundamental part of Western culture.

  5. Not Google — any such product name. “I eat the Kraft.” “I watch the CBS.” “I drink the Coke.” “I enjoy The Seinfeld.” “I listen to the NPR.”

    It’s got nothing to do with “the poor old man doesn’t know how to use a computer” and everything to do with “holy shit our president lacks a fundamental understanding about the English language and western grammatical language constructs commonly possessed by three-year-olds.”

  6. Old people — can’t live with ‘em, can’t be born without ‘em.

    Not trying to make any points with this either way, but giving birth at 60 is not exactly wise if even possible for most women.

  7. Actually I think it’s most amusing that he uses Google Maps to look AT HIS OWN RANCH.

    He’s the “Leader of the Free World” and the only thing he’s interested in is his own backyard?

    I mean, I guess we already knew that. But JEEEEE-zus!

  8. Waldo, maybe I’ve just helped too many geezers with their computer woes to take quite as strident a position on this as you (not too mention that I’m not a politically progressive technophile). Considering “Google” hovers somewhere between being a noun, adjective and verb, it’s no surprise the technologically unlearned could get confused.

    I wonder if he was a fan of “the WB.”

  9. Let’s be fair, it’s not like ever has to do these things himself. We all know that he has plenty of staff members polish his monacle, wax his mustache, and drive his horseless carriage. I’m sure he also has somebody to use “the Google” on that weird Typewriter-with-a-Television-on-top that everyone seems to be talking about these days.

  12. It is kind of funny that both the interstate highway system and the internetworking of computers came out of massive government investment in defense by politicians who considered defense an important purpose of government… Yet while Ike is still celebrated half a century later for funding and pushing the interstate highway system (designed to easily move tanks around, btw), the public has completely forgotten that ARPA and politicians made the internet possible. No, they didn’t invent a thing, but they certainly funded it, and funded it again, and again, and again until it started taking off on it’s own.

    The whole packet based messenging system was devised because they thought packets might survive interruptions from blown up routers and electromagnetic pulses better, and that even if they didn’t the messages would still get through eventually because of packet re-transmission and re-routing.

    How many times have our politicians voted to use tax money to fund broadband to every home in America? How many times have the baby-bell telephone companies and the local cable companies accepted the money to do exactly that, and then spent it to lobby for more?

    Sigh.

  13. There is a pretty specific year (and I think it is something like 1956 – but I could be wrong) that marks different types of people. People born before that year have their secretaries read their email; people born after it read their own email. It’s true in corporate America, legal America, government service America, and even some places overseas.

    I have many, many, many problems with George W. Bush and his corrupt facist oligarchy of an administration; but his lack of computer savvy and even pop-culture terms is no surprise nor even cause for concern in my opinion. He is simply a product of his age, just like my father and yours (if they were born before the magic year).

Comments are closed.