This is a stupid synopsis! It could have been done in a much more professional manner, listing the mistakes rather than pretending it is an interview with the President.

TAIBBI!

I resubscribe and this is how I’m greeted, with a pretend interview? I knew I should have gone for Tiger Beat.

I was hoping for an apology from Gavin Rossdale & co. for, you know, the mid-to-late 90s.

Surely, this kind of story is better-suited for (and better-written-by) The Onion?

Take the “Brittney, Axl, or Nothing” memo off the brainstorming board and give us something more tangible than making shit up.

When does this issue hit the streets?

What exactly is the point of Matt Taibbi?

You’ve finally done it, this is my last visit to Rolling Stone. Good luck in the future, we’ll all need it!!

Enough with Taibbi! I suspected the magazine was becoming irrelevant, and publishing fake interviews written by this moron just proves it.

I love Rolling Stone, but I love it for its original reporting and writing — which is often the among the best out there.

Making up an interview is stupid and it calls your journalistic practices into question. Putting it on the cover makes you look even dumber.

With the amount of talent you guys have, there’s no reason to stoop to this level.

WTF is this s**t? Fake interviews now? You’ve reached a new low RS. I was already on the fence about whether or not to ever pick up another issue or visit this site again after all the godd**n Britney Spears stories and total bulls**t best/greatest/top lists. I’ll never read another word on this site or the garbage they put in print.

Wow, what happened to rolling stone? I’ve had a subscription for the last 2 years and loved it. I find it fitting that the last issue before my subscription runs out is the issue that changes my mind about the magazine all together. I always looked at this magazine as being important and informational. now I see that they’re like every other tabloid mag with stalker pics of celebrities and gossipy rumours. Farewell rolling stone

This was very unproffesional. At first I was excited at the possibility of Bush actually doing this, mostly because I’ve been a huge Bush critic over the years, but I did think this was a very creative, but very, unorthodox and unproffesional way of telling the truth. This was kind of low. sorry Taibbi. Im just a reader right so i wouldn’t know but I am also a consumer and I was not satisfied by this. It was funny as hell, but totally pissed me off when I learned it wasn’t true.

I’ve read pretty much everything that Matt Taibbi has written for Rolling Stone and I’ve also read one of his books. Obviously I am a fan. However, I do think most of the above comments are just from people who did not realize it was a fake interview at first and are angry at their own mistake and don’t want to admit their own stupidity. Taibbi is an entertaining writer who knows the topics which the average american does not keep track of. It is a service to remind you of everything you have forgotten and everything too small to reach your news papers. John Stewart and Stephen Colbert do the same thing. They give bits of the news, but they also make fun. It is not their fault if the consumer does not recognize it as a joke.

Are you serious? I’m reading this interview thinking, dam, this is crazy talk. Then I find out it’s fake. If I wanted garbage like this I would read the Enquirer.

Tabbai I think you know your wrong. We knew bush owed us an apology, now you do also. That read was a waste of time.

I just read the complete article in the print issue and thought it was hilarious.

“The farewell interview we wish he’d give”

The headline kinda says it all.

Whoever thought that Bush will apologize has been living in lalala land for the last 8 years. He has never back down or thought he was wrong about anything he did or said. And he will die thinking that he did a hell of a job with the cards that he got dealt.
Also watch out on April Fool’s Day. If you thought this was true, you are in danger!!!

I just received the last rolling stone issue I will ever read. The cover of mine read warning! This is your last issue of Rolling Stone unless you renew now. And I ripped it off, saw the real cover, so of course the Bush interview is the first thing I read. I get thru 1 page and say no freaking way! Are you serious? A FAKE INTERVIEW!?!? Well Rolling stone you have sunk to the lowest of the low. Gone are the days of Hunter S. Thompson, a writer who may have started rumors, told wild eyed tales some of which may or may have happened much worse depending on how much liquor or dope he was on but my god man at least he was there!!! Your magazine (eh-hem) tabloid has been going down the s!*@#r month after month and now fake stories!?!?
Well I suppose the saying is true, “you give a thousand monkeys a thousand type writers”… well you should know the rest, although I must say Emile Borel was wrong, you don’t get Shakespeare you get mindless dribble about fantasy lands and apparently the constant B!$%*!NG and woe of what was. Tell you what RS get yourself some real interviews with some real people who can start talking about what we are going to do about the hell storm we are in instead of this constant crap about what may have been the prettiest terd in the bowl over the last eight years. We have real problems right now and people are angry and confused! Do your job, INFORM US!!!
Otherwise the next time I cross a news stand you may as well be trying to tell me how bat boy is now bat man and how he is now with whoever is the new “it” starlet and oh, don’t forget to mash the names up so it sounds cute. I can see it now National Enquirer, Rolling Stone and Star Magazine all snuggled up to one another. Keep writing those fake stories boys because that’s were the credibility lies, who knows maybe you could be the political TMZ?

This is a perfect example of a cheap grab to get people walking by the magizne stand to pick up Rolling Stone. The “interview” itself is fairly pathetic and could have been written by a 5th grader. All in all a bad article and a bad cover to a magizine I’m glad I stopped reading on a regular basis over a year ago.

Last rolling stone I will ever ever read. Not only will I never buy this submarine of a “magazine” but I will never even read it again. Matt’s article puts this publication on pat with the tabloids. They should fire the editor for allowing this insulting “article” to be printed

That article is the most horrible article, I have ever read.
I am sorry, but anyone could have written that. And a cover story?!?
And 4 pages, come on?
You guys must really have nothing else to press, ’cause that is the worst article ever.
I started reading RS for 6 months ago with some sort of respect – I’ll stop reading RS with disrespect.

I personally found it hilarious. I think people need to relax.

do you realize what you’ve done?
how many fools read this as fact?
this is slander.
sure, bush messed up. bad.
but you didn’t have to too,
it’s time for rolling stone to apologize.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m a liberal Democrat and a staunch opponent of George W. Bush’s policies. When I first read this “interview” I was a little bit misled into thinking it was a real interview. (Guess I should have read the caption underneath the headline a little more carefully)

When I found out it was fake,I was disgusted. It’s one thing to print something like this in the tabloids, but when you put it on the front cover of Rolling Stone and dress it up to look like a real, high-profile interview, it’s despicable. No matter how much contempt I may have for our 43rd President, I don’t think twisting his image with a fictitious interview with fictitious accounts is right at all, and I would even stand by Mr. Bush if he were to bring a lawsuit on your hands.

I will never subscribe to your sorry publication again.

Dear RSM & MT
First off – Yes – I did actually think some of the article was true – even with its title. Please know though that I did not find the article’s satire of Bush very funny. No doubt your a clever and witty writer Matt but this article was a waste of my time and focus. Given the misleading information I believe is regularly fed the public by many memebers of the media, this article was just one more example of why no one believes/respects anything that comes out of Washington. Also, I can see why the rest of the world feels the way they do about the U.S. with stuff like this being printed on covers of our magazines. Nice going Matt – Your humor is sure making wonderful contributions to America’s image.

p.s I know – I should lighten up-Right? Well how about I just never buy another Rolling Stone magazine again – given the magazine makes up its stories that inadvertently dupe weary travellers while there taking the red eye back to NY from LA.

Rolling Stone makes me ashamed to be a Democrat.

So… Rolling Stone has no better occupation for its writers than to fabricate entire interviews for the sake of taking cheap shots against Mr Bush….and no more professionalism or maturity than to indicate that defamation of character is a totally hilarious joke.

Shame on you for stooping to this level.

I read this article while I was waiting in the dentist office, during my visit, and stayed after to finish it. I was intrigued. I do have to say that I read the title a few times, off and on, as I read the “interview”, trying to figure out if this was real or not…hoping it was but not quite believing it was.
I came home and excitedly told my husband and kids about it, detail by detail. Then I went on-line to find the article and low and behold, it’s fake. Wow! A few people support it and most people are pissed. I just think, hey, if alot of these people (including myself) thought it might be real, then that says it all…just the fact that we could even think it’s real, even for a moment, is all that has to be said about Bush. I can guarentee that if this was done about Obama or George Washington, Abe Lincoln…no one would believe it. George W., hell yeah! Who wouldn’t think that those things happened behind closed doors?