According to Treasury Secretary Brady, Bush had been urged to skip the state dinner
altogether by his personal physician, Dr. Burton Lee, but Bush had rejected this advice
out of hand, saying that his absence would "disrupt" the proceedings. [fn 76] After the
vomiting and fainting scene was over, Bush was asked if he intended to slow down.
"Nope," Bush retorted. It's just a 24-hour flu." [fn 77] The truth about Bush's collapse in
Tokyo has yet to be told; but it was clear that Bush had learned nothing, and was still
determined to impose his will on the universe. Bush's first efforts at campaign oratory
after his return from Japan indicated that rage was once again winning the upper hand,
which was not a good sign for Bush's ability to function on the campaign trail.
In the light of the evidence reviewed here, it is evident that Bush's marked tendency
towards rage episodes, public fits of anger, and obsessive fixations has not subsided.
Indeed, Bush's uncontrollable temper tantrums have been if anything more severe during
October and November, 1991, as his presidency began to buckle under the strain of the
economic depression Bush was unable and unwilling to overcome. We must therefore
conclude that the treatment received by Bush for his thyroid condition during May, 1991
and the successive months has not remedied the mental and cognitive disturbances which
were at the root of Bush's psychosomatic affliction, Basedow's disease. This means that
Bush's health, and most especially his mental health, must be considered a decisive issue
for the 1992 presidential campaign. Citizens must accordingly set aside White House
propaganda statements and carefully consider the advisability of returning to the White
House an individual who has demonstrably experienced psychotic episodes during his
tenure in the White House, and who has presented no convincing evidence of remission.
NOTES:
- "Tough and Tender Talk," People Weekly, December 17, 1990, p. 52.
- Anton Chaitkin, Treason in America, (New York, 1985), p. 476 ff.
- Cited in Chaitkin, p. 478.
- Elizabeth Drew, Portrait of an Election, (New York, 1981), p. 106.
- J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye, (New York: Bantam, 1986), p. 1.
- F. Scott Fitzgerald, This Side of Paradise, New York: Scribners, 1960), p. 128.
- Mary McGrory, "The Babbling Bush," Washington Post, September 29, 1988.
- Mary McGrory, loc. cit.
- Maureen Dowd, "The Language Thing," The New York Times Magazine, July 29, 1990.
- Maureen Dowd, loc. cit.