The Blind and the Deaf
Much has been made of Paul O'Neill's comment about Bush at cabinet meetings (Suskind The Price of Loyalty, 149):
The only way I can describe it is that, well, the President is like a blind man in a roomful of deaf people.
Many share Michael Kinsley’s complaint: “It’s vivid, and it certainly sounds insulting. But what on earth does it mean?” And I have yet to see the comment explained.
But its meaning is quite clear in the book. The context is O’Neill’s discussion of a cabinet level meeting on energy policy. He has already emphasized throughout the book his puzzlement over meetings with the President. O’Neill’s comments never seemed to make their intended impact. Bush never asked questions and always seemed disinterested.
Here is a longer quotation that gives the context:
O’Neill was watching Bush closely. He threw out a few general phrases, a few nods, but there was virtually no engagement. These cabinet secretaries had worked for over a month on detailed reports. O’Neill had been made to understand by various colleagues in the White House that the President should not be expected to read reports. In his personal experience, the President didn’t even appear to have read the short memos he sent over.
That made it especially troubling that Bush did not ask any questions. There are so many worth asking about each of these areas, O’Neill thought as he sat quietly, dozen of queries running through his head.
“This meeting was like many of the meetings I would go to over the course of two years,” he recalled. “The only way I can describe it is that, well, the President is like a blind man in a roomful of deaf people. There is no discernible connection.” (148-9)
O’Neill’s point is that at meetings there was no engagement between the President and his cabinet. They were like attempted communications between the blind and the deaf. Since the deaf must use visual signs to communicate, they have difficulty getting their point across to a blind person.
Similarly, Bush’s cabinet secretaries had difficulty trying to communicate their complex analyses of policy issues to a disengaged, disinterested, and deeply ignorant President.
8:39:28 AM 
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