Comparing George W. Bush to Edgar Degas
Don’t laugh. Morgan Meis knows more about art than you do. No? Well, he has founded more New York-based arts collectives than you have. And Meis sees some similarities between the paintings of W and Degas.
Comparing the paintings of George W. Bush and Edgar Degas is an absurd undertaking if we are talking about quality. We would be comparing a hobbyist with one of the great masters. But I am not suggesting that we compare in terms of quality. I am suggesting that we can learn something about the Realist mind when we look at the art of George W. Bush as well as that of Degas. The Realist is often forced to the side, to the oblique angle, to the unusual vantage point precisely in his attempt to get at the truth. The truth of a scene doesn’t always reveal itself right away. The Realist must hunt for the right spin with great confidence. The Realist believes in his or her capacity to see rightly. The Realist cares nothing for multiple points of view. The Realist cares only for the correct point of view, the view that reveals the most truth. That is to say, Realists in painting (or in anything else) have an in-built arrogance. It is an arrogance born of the idea that Realists are uniquely able to see things the right way.
Read the rest of Meis’ essay. Good stuff.
George W. Bush Gets Hot Under the Collar Watching Brittney Griner Dunk
Question: why doesn’t she just dunk every time she’s in the paint? She obviously has the athleticism to do so. And when will people stop keeping track of every dunk she’s ever made? It’s like the announcers are counting great white sharks they’ve spotted in an ocean.
Here’s a Sneak Peek at the Menu For Cafe 43, the Restaurant at the Bush Presidential Center
There will be cake. Photo: Infrogmation, via Flickr
Yesterday, news came that the restaurant at the George W. Bush Presidential Center would be named Cafe 43, in honor of Bush’s presidential lineage. The restaurant will open May 1, and will be open to the public, not just ticket-holding center-goers.
“That’s what Mrs. Bush wants,” George W. Bush Foundation president Mark Langdale told the Morning News. “She’s looking forward to being there with her friends and family and going there after church. It’s going to be a great place for people in … the greater community to come to campus, come to SMU, and experience being here.”
The cafe will serve lunch daily, and will be available for some special dinner events. Langdale added that it will likely become available to rent for community activities. One thing the Morning News piece left out was the menu. I don’t know if that’s because they chose to leave it out, or just don’t have the same connections at food-operator Culinaire that we here at D Magazine do. After the jump, a sneak peek at some of the menu items:
George W. Bush Is ‘Going to Go Down in the History Books As a Great Artist’
I’m not sure how this slipped past everyone’s radar, but Fox 5 in Atlanta had a story Tuesday about George W. Bush’s art teacher, Bonnie Flood. Apparently Bush has painted more than 50 dogs, and is “going to go down in the history books as a great artist.” I’m sure he hopes that will supplant the “After his re-election, Bush received increasingly heated criticism from across the political spectrum” line from his Wikipedia entry. “Has painted more than 50 dogs” does have a nice ring.
Now Coming to A Map Near You: Bush Avenue
Source: City of University Park
From our friends at Park Cities People:
The agenda for this evening’s University Park City Council includes a proposed name change for Airline Road/Dublin Street to Bush Avenue. The city staff is in favor of the change, which was requested by SMU, for two reasons:
1. SMU is building student housing along the road, and that likely will lead to emergency calls once the students move in. Having one name for that road will cut down on confusion on the part of callers/dispatchers.
2. The name change will affect only SMU and the George W. Bush Presidential Center. Nobody else owns property on that stretch of road, between Mockingbird Lane and SMU Boulevard.
For many reasons, I imagine these signs will be oft-stolen.
Anti-Spending West Texas Rep. Lobbies to Make George W. Bush’s Childhood Home a National Park
Back in the 80s, Mike Conaway was the CFO of Bush Exploration, George W. Bush’s failed oil company. Since then, he’s gone on to become the United States Congressman for Texas’ District 11, consistently running on an anti-spending platform.
His brand of fiscal conservatism doesn’t stretch to his friendships, apparently. According to Think Progress:
A ThinkProgress review of legislative correspondence with the U.S. Department of the Interior revealed that on September 11, 2012, Conaway wrote Secretary Ken Salazar to request a “reconnaissance Survey” of a potential new national park location. According to the log, Conaway’s letter asked that the National Park Service “look at the possibility of adding the George W. Bush childhood home as a unit of the Park Service.”
Conaway’s office did not respond to requests for comment from Think Progress.
George W. Bush Library Director Attempts to Draw Crowd by Promising Free Chicken Pot Pies
“Hey, BE COOL! There’s plenty of pot pie for everyone.” Photo: Marion Doss
This is really too good to mess with, so:
Highland Park Cafeteria will host the Director of the new George W. Bush Presidential Library, Alan C. Lowe, who will give an exciting visual presentation to all Highland Park Cafeteria diners on Sunday, January 13 at 5 p.m. in the main dining room. This event will be free and open to the public. Â All attendees will receive a free entree of chicken pot pie, one of President George W. Bush’s favorite dishes. In addition, a limited number of Presidential Library memorabilia will be given away to attendees.
The emphasis was included in the email. For more information, visit Highland Park Cafeteria’s website.
Now YOU Can Own George W. Bush’s Pickup
tp://frontburner.dmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/george-bush-ford-f150-300×179.jpeg” alt=”" width=”300″ height=”179″ /> George, strikin’ a pose. Source: Barrett-Jackson, “the World’s Greatest Collector Car Auctions”
A pickup former President George W. Bush used on his Crawford ranch will be auctioned off to benefit Fisher House Foundation, a program dedicated to assisting U.S. military families.
Let’s go straight to the announcement:
“President Bush has used this stunning white F-150 at his Prairie Chapel Ranch in Crawford, Texas, since shortly after he left the White House in 2009. With a 5.4-Liter V8 engine commanding 310 horsepower, this impressive truck has a luxurious adobe King Ranch premium leather interior and 11,200lbs towing capacity. President Bush and former First Lady Laura Bush have since used the truck to work around their ranch; entertain friends, family, and dignitaries and to give tours of their Crawford property.”
The most interesting thing to me: he used the truck to “entertain friends.” Donuts, presumably, or maybe some sort of demolition derby. Also, why’d he stop at the 150 model? Seems like a man who’d at least go F250, with all that ranching.
The auction is January 19, in Scottsdale, Ariz. Get more info and tickets (tickets?) here.
Jenna Bush Hager Is Pregnant
I was going to say something snarky about Grandpa George, but you know what? He’ll probably make a pretty fantastic grandfather. Throw a kid on the knee, have a nice afternoon.
Still:
“I just have a cat, to my parents’ dismay,” Bush Hager told People magazine last year. “My dad saw my husband’s boss at a conference, and he said to stop paying my husband until we produce children.”
George W. Bush Is About to Address a Conference at the Dallas Fed, and You Can Watch it Live
Former President George W. Bush is scheduled to speak at a George W. Bush Presidential Center-hosted symposium on immigration and economic growth at the Federal Reserve of Dallas in about 10 minutes. You can watch it here. If anything of note pops up, I’ll update this post.
UPDATE:Â Bush spoke for about five minutes. My takeaway: immigrants, they ain’t that bad.
“They come with new skills and new ideas,” Bush said. “Immigrants fill a critical gap in our labor market, and they work hard for a chance at a better life.” He went on to say that “America can be a lawful society and a welcoming society at the same time,” and that immigration needs to be handled with “a benevolent spirit.”
The conference continues throughout the day, and you can watch the whole thing through the link above.
Texas Tech Student Gets Life Sentence For Plot to Bomb George W. Bush’s Preston Hollow Home
Khalid Ali-M Aldawsari was sentenced to life in prison today in Amarillo, for the attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction, the Associated Press reports.
Prosecutors say Aldawsari had collected bomb-making materials and researched possible targets, including former President George W. Bush’s Preston Hollow home. He was convicted of the crime in June.
Best line:
Investigators say Aldawsari’s goal was to carry out jihad, though his attorneys claimed he was a harmless failure who never came close to attacking anyone.
When your own attorneys are sonning you, it’s probably time to find a new calling.
George W. Bush Is Already One of the Most-Fictionalized Presidents, so Deal With it, Franklin Pierce and Chester A. Arthur
Source: NConDC, via Flickr
In coordination with the release of Hyde Park on the Hudson and Lincoln this fall, Slate broke down the history of presidents in movies, starting with Washington (70 appearances) up to Obama (21 appearances).
Top Five:
1. Lincoln (the Clint Howard of presidents, with 130 appearances)
2. Washington (70)
3. Grant (47, mostly in Westerns)
4. Jefferson (46)
5 (tie). Nixon and George W. Bush (36)
And that doesn’t even include Bush’s decapitated appearance in Game of Thrones.
Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes: “We’re Always Looking for Somebody Who’s Getting Screwed”
60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft says he’ll have a piece on Sunday’s show about the U.S. Senate, and how it isn’t working because there’s no compromising “middle” there anymore. He’s also preparing a story for later about a hospital chain (he wouldn’t name it) that’s somehow using jacked-up Medicare payments as a money-making strategy.
Appearing in Dallas today at a luncheon put on by the National Center for Policy Analysis, the veteran journalist for the top-rated CBS news program submitted to a grilling by Dennis McCuistion, a local TV host and professor at the University of Texas at Dallas.
During the interview Kroft disagreed that there’s overt liberal bias in the mainstream media; asserted that Dan Rather rushed his controversial 60 Minutes story about George W. Bush’s service in the Air National Guard; and said he doesn’t believe the explosion of Web-based New Media is good for the country.