Bush unravels at press conference

Posted by Evan Derkacz at 4:32 PM on September 15, 2006.

[See part II of this video HERE] In a contentious outdoor press conference the president had trouble handling himself. His Emily Post went out the window.

After being told that Colin Powell believes that the world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of the war on terrorism, AP reporter Terence Hunt asks whether Bush wonders if his strategy is flawed.

Bush appears to believe his own nearly sociopathically irrelevant response, crowing that he refuses to accept that we're not morally superior to terrorists?

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Common Article III of the Geneva Conventions states that, according to the President: "There will be no outrages upon human dignity."

In defending his push to rewrite the rules of human decency he calls that description "vague" -- the word the administration is consciously employing to blur the argument.

If you believe a restriction is too lax, you don't question its vagueness. You only do that when you want it loosened. Bush stood up and made the case for a way of treating human beings. He wants to violate 60-year-old international standards and put our own soldiers in danger. At least, that's what John McCain argues...

Evan Derkacz is a New York-based writer and contributor to AlterNet.