I guess it depends on the President... and the book.

Did reading My Pet Goat twice in a week count for one book or two?

(From what I've heard, President-Elect Obama is a voracious reader.  Being something of a quick reader myself, where I can go through three or four books in a week even apart from my grad school reading, I wouldn't be surprised if he could knock off two a week.)

I differ with you...2 books aweek is fine ...even more.  the president  Iat least the upcoming one) is not reading Zane Grey...he's reading books about the ideas his job addresses.  Books are ideas writ large, books that require thinking are a good way to burst the bubble of 1600 Penn Ave.  
First they take his blackberry and now you want his library? Palli

Preznit B can read?  Wow?  I thought the Pet Goat book was a stretch for him.  Well, he'll have plenty of time to contemplate his navel and read comics and stuff!!   Certainly all  Mr Evil would be into would be Art Of War or Machiavelli.  No?

Were they "Chapter" books?

This defies credibility. I don't for a moment believe that Bush reads. I don't think he even watches the news. He lacks any and all curiosity.

If Bush was reading 1.8 books a week, then I want a President who reads 20, not fucking ZERO.

How on earth anyone could hold the opinion that the President of the United States SHOULD NOT READ is un-fucking-believable.

A List of Obvious Red Flags:

• Bad example to children?
  
• Cutting of a source of new perspective?
  
• Source of mental exercise?
  
• Source of new ideas?
  
• Expanding one's cultural perspective?
  
• Example to the rest of the world?
  
• The President is a human being who's job is leader of this country and just because he's got that job doesn't mean he should sacrifice everything about his personal life because that is completely unreasonable to expect of anyone?

Just because an idiot hasn't turned his reading into anything resembling positive change doesn't mean reading is the problem. An idiot is an idiot.

I'm really, really disappointed with this post.

I want to see the list and exactly how many times "My Pet Goat" is listed... then a Bush written book report on each book.

I'm with jmendonsa on this.  This is a really disappointing post.  Nobody, and I repeat nobody, should be encouraged not to read.  I'd suggest it's you that needs to find more time to read, not the president reading less.

That's the better question.  

It really does matter whether it's Zane Grey or Walter Isaacson.

Shrub certainly doesn't speak or act like an individual who is well read in history, government, economics, foreign affairs or science.

First year law school demands a huge amount of time reading case books.  Once you pass the bar, you'll find that your capacity has enlarged to the point that 2000 pages per week of non-work related reading, not including the daily papers, will seem a relaxed pace.

Now what do you say next year if it comes out that Obama has been reading 3 books per week?

It all depends on the book.  Some books are a breeze to read in a day or two.  Others require weeks, or even months if we're talking about a dense Russian novelist.  

Ivy league students, which Bush once was, are generally expected to read 2+ books per week per class.

A better question is: what is Bush reading?  

I confess I missed the part of this post where it was suggested that the President shouldn't be reading at all.  I'm sure I'd be just as outraged as the others who saw that passage, but I just can't seem to locate it.

What would the perfect number be?  If he had read 56 books, would you have said "darn, he nailed it"?

I forget which conservative smacked Maher down with that when he raised it on Real Time a couple of years back.  I was surprised the guy had such wit.

Seriously, this is such a non-issue.  Bush read some--not a sin, but a virtue.

Typical Rove...if you're going to tell a lie make it a whopper.  My guess is that neither one of them read a single book all the way through last year.

Rove is too hyper and spends his time reading newspapers, polls, etc.  Bush is too dumb, spends his time trying to amuse others in the White House.

95 was in 2006.

Anyway, I do think it is kind of amazing that he reads like that.  The only thing I can think of is that he reads really quickly.  Maybe I'm naive in assuming that he did actually read the books or that he is actually spending a decent amount of time at the Presidency.

But it does make it difficult to believe that he was reading that quickly.  He had to have been skimming/speed reading where he's only moderately comprehending.  There just isn't enough time to yourself as a President to get through that many books.  

I don't believe anything Rove says anyway.

Exactly. This is extremely disturbing if true--the presdiency is not a typical job affording loads of free time to read 2 books a week!

It speaks to Bush's laziness and lack of interest in the job (probably delegating the majority of his authority to the real president Cheney) that he had time to read 100 books in a year.

"The president lamely insisted he'd lost because he'd been busy as Leader of the Free World."

Not that busy.  He has been on vacation or travelling to it fully one third of his time as President.

>But just thinking about these numbers -- 1.83 books per week -- you get the sense that the President could more efficiently use his time.

I get the sense that you shouldn't be so desperate to attack Mr Bush.

Perhaps - like a lot of people - he reads in bed.

Anyway - the tells us more about Jonathon Singer than it does about G Bush.

File under Lame.

Bush?

C'mon. He's never spoken knowledgeably of any of the books he alledgedly read.

That's just all part of the image building stuff, same as the phony ranch and the phony story of him being converted by Billy Graham and all the rest.

I don't believe it, but that does cause some concern in my mind, if true.  I sort of envision a President as working from the time s/he awakes until the time s/he goes to sleep, though clearly Bush would not fit that image.

Your post I found interesting.  The comments however very foolish, George W. Bush is smarter than a good 90 percent of people. I am actually willing to go higher but i mean intelligence as in the ability to learn and understand, so simply within the U.S our average citizen's intelligence is high but adding in the new "Y" generation they're intelligence would throw everything off. Escaping this tangent Bush is most likely reading very insightful books and many for pleasure, I'd guess ones he chooses are greatly related to sports-he's a real man's man.  But I am so sick of the Bush is an idiot joke, I once thought he was an idiotic puppet now I'm not going to write an essay on this but from what I hear his lowest grades ever were C's for a top prep school and ivy leaguer who seems like a bit of a slacker thats pretty good. Some of the most brilliant people simply aren't great public speaker's, I suppose now Nixon wasn't the smartest President-Gimme a break.