Tony Blair: George W. Bush was no ‘dumb idiot’ - PATRICK GAVIN | POLITICO CLICK
By now, you’re well aware of the stereotype that dogged President George W. Bush during his presidency: that he wasn’t quite up to the task, intellectually speaking (see any Will Farrell “SNL” skit).
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair isn’t having it, though. In his new book, he dispels any such notion.
“One of the most ludicrous caricatures of George is that he was a dumb idiot who stumbled into the presidency,” writes Blair. “No one stumbles into that job, and the history of American presidential campaigns is littered with the corpses of those who were supposed to be brilliant but who nonetheless failed because brilliance is not enough.”
He continues: “To succeed in U.S. politics, or that of the U.K., you have to be more than clever. You have to be able to connect and you have to be able to articulate that connection in plain language. The plainness of the language then leads people to look past the brainpower involved. Reagan was clever. Thatcher was clever. And sometimes the very plainness touches something else: a simplicity that is the product of a decisive nature.”