"The truth is useless..."

I'm not sure whether others share my interest in political myths. Even so, I plan to pursue the topic from time to time, because it is of unrecognized importance.

A few days ago, we examined (and debunked) a swine flu conspiracy theory. Today, I would like you to contemplate the following words, allegedly spoken by Jeb Bush, brother to our most unbeloved former president:

The truth is useless. You have to understand this right now. You can't deposit the truth in a bank. You can't buy groceries with the truth. You can't pay rent with the truth. The truth is a useless commodity that will hang around your neck like an albatross - all the way to the homeless shelter. And if you think that the million or so people in this country that are really interested in the truth about their government can support people who would tell them the truth, you got another think coming. Because the million or so people in this country that are truly interested in the truth don't have any money.

Many, many sites (most of them featuring the work of "progressives") attribute these words to the former Florida governor. See, for example, here and here, not to mention this page on the official Obama campaign site. The quote's appearance on TV.com appears to have given it credibility and increased visibility.

But did Jeb Bush actually say it?

This DU page from 2004 carries the quote, along with the following background information:

Well, according to George Bush's little brother and Florida governor Jeb Bush, some people just can't handle the truth. Jeb once told retired Naval Intelligence Officer Al Martin (cited in Bushwhacked, Sept. 2002, by Uri Dowbenko)...

A review of that book appears here. We learn that those words were allegedly said to Martin "in 1986, during a visit to Jeb’s Bush Codina Realty office in Miami".

And who is Uri Dowbenko? Well, he's an abstract artist. My favorite Dowbenko painting is amusing titled "The Origin of Specious Theories." Alas, Dowbenko appears to have a quite a weakenss for such theories.

Here, Dowbenko gives a very positive review to Jim Marrs ghastly Rule By Secrecy, a book that resurrects every debunked concoction ever to infest the libraries of paranoia. Marrs uncritically accepts all of the classic conspiracy hoaxes -- the "Silent Weapons" hoax, the Iron Mountain hoax, the Illuminati hoax, not to mention the fanciful inventions of Trevor Ravenscroft. Marrs even tries to sneak in the notorious "Protocols of Zion" hoax. Tellingly, Marrs draws from Eustace Mullens, an elegantly fey Nazi with a long history of bogus assertions, as demonstrated here (and in Morris Kaminski's classic book The Hoaxers).

If Uri could devour Marrs' book without smelling the gullibility, then I have serious reservations about the man's judgment. Alas, Dowbenko's own writings demonstrate that he has a positively Marr-tian affection for some of the dodgier "truths" to be found within the conspiracy underground.

And what of Al Martin, the intelligence officer who (allegedly) gave the quote to Uri? As you may know, he too has a fairly substantive internet presence. His writings are somewhat conspiracy-oriented, although, unlike Dowbenko, he keeps his feet planted on planet Earth, or close to it. I have yet to see him traffic in the kind of fraudulence that Marrs finds irresistable. (On the other hand, I'm not as familiar with his work as some of you might be.)

Martin does claim to have known Jeb back in the 1980s...

All through the 1980s, when Jeb Bush ran the Bush Realty out of Miami at 1390 Brickell Ave. (before he ran Bush Codina Realty in 1992-1993), he represented himself to clients, banks, insurance companies and mortgage brokers as a licensed realtor. In fact Jeb Bush is not a licensed realtor in the State of Florida nor has he ever been.

His application for a realtor's license in the State of Florida was repeatedly rejected due to "outstanding criminal investigations of his business activities conducted by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement."

This assertion is important -- if it is true. I suspect it is.

But we still don't have our quote. A commenter on Snopes claims to have seen the same text attributed to Oliver North. My own googlings have uncovered no web pages in which North is said to have said those words.

So. Did Jeb say it or not? Here's the argument for "not":

1. We have no direct testimony from Al Martin on this score -- just an indirect ascription to Martin by Uri Dowbenko. And to be frank, I don't trust Dowbenko.

2. The quote is long -- too long to commit to memory. Are we to believe that Al Martin secretly recorded his conversation with Jeb?

3. The quote seems rather too literary. I cannot easily believe that any member of the Bush clan speaks off-the-cuff with such erudition.

Unless Martin comes forward and confirms the quote -- and also provides some explanation for objection #2 -- I will classify it under the heading False Quotation Syndrome. (My favorite FQS example is this speech, attributed to Lincoln. It will continue to be attributed to Lincoln long after you and I are dead.)