Bush: ‘Best Friends’ Going To Hell
An new book about Bush admin. puppeteer Karl Rove reports allegations of anti-semitism by President George W. Bush. The book cites comments also previously reported by the reporter in a newspaper that that President made disparaging remarks about Israeli Jews who haven’t accepted Jesus. [Raw Story]
“You know what I’m gonna tell those Jews when I get to Israel, don’t you Herman?” a then Governor George W. Bush allegedly asked a reporter for the Austin American-Statesman.
When the journalist, Ken Herman, replied that he did not know, Bush reportedly delivered the punch line: “I’m telling ‘em they’re all going to hell.”
Bush’s thoughts on the fate of non-Christian souls became a minor source of controversy after he told the Houston Post in 1993 that only those who “accept Jesus Christ” go to Heaven. However, the future president was also earlier briefly engaged to a half-Jewish woman.
The quip never received wider media attention, even though the Austin American-Statesman reported it in December of 1998.
“As he gazed out a hotel hallway at the Superdome and waited for an elevator, Bush — clearly going for a laugh at his own expense — said the first thing he was going to say to Israeli Jews was that they were all ‘going to hell,’” Herman had reported. “Bush, who has both a quick wit and generally good judgment on when to use it, made the comment to the same Austin American-Statesman reporter who had reported his 1993 comments about his religious beliefs.”
