The Bush 41 grocery scanner myth

Writing in the Los Angeles Times, James Rainey revives a longstanding myth that will frequently crop up again in stories about "gaffes" and supposedly out-of-touch politicians:

In 1992, George H.W. Bush reportedly was surprised to find a price scanner in a grocery store, which "proved" he was out of touch with the common man.

In fact, however, the New York Times report on which this claim is based is groundless. The Times had not been at the event in question but instead based its story on a pool report, which indicated that Bush was impressed by new scanner technology that could weigh groceries and read damaged bar codes. Unfortunately, the Times report (which the newspaper did not retract) fit a popular stereotype about Bush and has thus persisted for years.

Update 8/4 3:23 PM -- Rainey responds by email that he meant to cast doubt on the story:

Indeed, that's why I used the term "reportedly". The point of the example was that its takes little or nothing to caricature some candidates.

If this was his intended meaning, my concern is that the wording was far too subtle -- most people (including me) will not recognize that he was implicitly questioning the validity of the report. I read it as him questioning the conclusion (that it proved Bush was out of touch), not the premise (Bush was surprised).

Update 8/5 5:04 PM -- Commenter David points out that the dreaded Mark Leibovich of the New York Times also repeats the myth in the Sunday Times:

Mr. McCain’s sense of wonder evoked the episode in the early 1990s when George H. W. Bush became overly impressed upon seeing a price scanner at a supermarket check-out counter. It suggested to some people that the president, who had spent four years in the White House after spending eight years as vice president, was out of touch with the lives of average Americans.

Comments

[David]

The NY Times repeated this myth today at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/weekinreview/03leibovich.html?scp=

They did less than the LA Times to indicate that the story was bogus. They asserted as fact that, "George H. W. Bush became overly impressed upon seeing a price scanner at a supermarket check-out counter." They went on to say, "It suggested to some people that the president, who had spent four years in the White House after spending eight years as vice president, was out of touch with the lives of average Americans.

The Times didn't mention that none of the people who were present when Bush saw the scanner had this impression.

It seems appropriate that the NY Times repeated the Bush myth in an article designed to create a myth about McCain, namely that he is hopelessly unfamiliary with modern computers.

[Howard Craft]

It's not a myth that McCain is close to being a computer novice - he's said that it's so himself. As have his staff. It's been a running inside-joke on the campaign bus.

And the NYT makes a strong case that it doesn't matter, in terms of being President.

Which is why the McCain camp can all laugh about it.

*****

Regarding the old story - they defended it at the time, so it's not likely they would reverse themselves on it now. It was criticized at the time.

[David]

Good point, Howard Craft. The Times arrogantly believes that they have the power to choose what reality is and isn't. In Timesworld, the Bush scanner story is valid and John Edwards has not been accused of infidelity.

[Howard Craft]

Your bold and broad judgments seem a bit arrogant and reality defining in themselves, but I will take them as nothing more than pleasant conversational hyperbole. Cheerful banter, if you will.

It is sad, though, that they don't seem too tuned in to what you really want to learn more about.

Fortunately, we have Rush to keep us up to date on the John Edwards gossip !

[Brian Dunbar]

I really hate the Bush was surprised by modern technology story.

The upshot from Jonah Goldberg

In 1992 President George Bush went to a Florida trade show. A gentleman showed him the latest development in scanner technology for supermarket checkout lines; it could read and reconstruct the information on torn labels — a pretty big deal for optical-recognition technology and for people like me who get stuck behind customers who like to buy 35 cans of potted meat from the marked-down bin.

The real story is well known and available to anyone who cares to exercise a few minutes digging. But it's just easier to believe and repeat tripe, than to print the real story.

[Retread]

So the NYT wants to pretend Bush 41 was out of touch because he wasn't up on the latest grocery store scanner technology, but didn't blink when Obama famously asked us if we knew the price of arugula. Regular American me wouldn't know arugula if I fell over it.

I don't think either item tells us anything worth knowing about either man's qualifications to be president.

The Bush 41 story is absurd in that the writer can't really know if the President was surprised at all, or, if he was, then to what extent.

Then there is the question Retread raised : do we even care if the President is skilled at grocery shopping? I don't.

Nor do I really care if McCain can make a hyperlink.

*****

Funny line from Jonah Goldberg, "potted meat".

Goldberg happens to be one of the people who wrote at length that Al Gore was a chronic liar.

(Goldberg wrote that Gore claimed to have invented the internet; that Gore said he was the inspiration for the pop novel "Love Story"; and that Gore had claimed to have drafted the Earned Income Tax Credit legislation.

All three statements were untrue. Goldberg didn't let that stop him ranting on caustically about how Gore had learned to lie from Clinton. Talk about a "hater".)

Article subtitle -

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OGMzMzU3OWFlZjQ5YTg0NDkzMDQ2MGE1ODY0NThkNWY= “>Al Gore’s gaffes seem to be very real clues to the inner man

How appropriate to the topic of myths being picked up and spread through the media.