Dear Leader Bush didn't let me down.
Bush press conference short version (Bush's preferred message):
America good. Foreigners evil. We make evil foreigners live like good Americans. We gone git them terrorist summabitches.
All as expected. But instead of "Mission accomplished. Brang 'em on," his message was: Mission will never be accomplished. Brang 'em on. And on. And on.
Bush press conference short version (what most everyone but terminal Republicans heard):
We're sending more troops to Iraq. And the war in Iraq will go on for a long time.
I don't think anyone who reads more than a couple of posts on this blog will imagine that I'm sympathetic to Bush. But even if I try real hard to see what people might find positive in this, it's hard to see what it is.
Bush is out of touch. The paradigm has shifted for the public. And even the pathetic press corps is having a long moment of doubt on their preferred script for Bush the Magnificent, Defender of the Homeland and Fearless Straight Shooter.
I'm sure Bush thought the questions tonight were near-brutal, although in reality they were pretty restrained. And the reporters mostly let him get away with ducking the questions. There was a good question toward the end about the large number of mercenaries and semi-mercs in Iraq which Bush didn't even make a gesture toward answering, partially because the the reporter sloppily combined it with a vague question about the "coalition."
The Big Pundits will be busily putting together their official verdicts on it during the next day or so. My take is that the general impression most viewers will take away from this was that Bush was quite defensive and unresponsive to their concerns about the Iraq War. And it was very striking to me how completely bull-headed the man is about never, ever admitting a mistake.
As many puzzled observers have wondered recently, why can't they just say, "Of course, we made mistakes. In retrospect, we should have given terrorism a higher priority, moved faster on airline safety," whatever? Given the disaster unfolding in Iraq, I think most viewers would have liked some assurance that the Bush team can recognize mistakes and change course when appropriate.
3 comments:
Bruce, I appreciate the fact that you are disappointed with the "pathetic press corps." But as someone who works IN the media, I'd like to suggest this:
It is NOT the job of the media to attack with the veracity YOU would. The media isn't supposed to treat a Republican as though they are liberal. The media is SUPPOSED to be impartial. If it's disappointing that the media isn't making him squirm a little more, it shouldn't be.
That he squirmed as much as he did in your view after being presented with questions that weren't as aggressive as you might have posed them should speak volumes to you as it is. It's called letting the viewer decide FOR THEMSELVES.
You went into this with the decision already made. I suspect that there are people who were on the fence this afternoon who are no longer there this evening. Can you not find comfort in that?
Patrick, I agree that its not the ideal job of the media to make partisan points. I do think they should be more aggressive in challenging Bush and other members of his Administration when they come out with misstatements of fact, although in politics even those can be somewhat subjective. And I think the reporters last night did a fair job of raising some important though uncomfortable points, and even of following up on some things. Overall, I think Bush came off poorly.
One thing that's changed in the last decade or so is that we now have a major cable news channel, Fox News, that *is* pretty blatantly partisan. And the Moonie-owned *Washington Times* harks back to 19th-century standards, when commercial newspapers were partisan outlets. The Democrats have nothing comparable.
The political press corps has some serious problems, though, that aren't strictly partisan. Briefly put, they include: (1) a focus on trivia; (2) adopting "scripts" on individual politicians that are used uncritically (Bush is a decisive war leader, Gore always reinvents himself); (3) celebrity focus (the continuing movie-star treatment of Schwarzenegger); (4) pandering to official sources (Bob Woodward going from serious investigative reporter to court historian); and (5) sloppiness with facts (Bush never mentioned "uranium from Niger" in his 2003 State of the Union but that shorthand factoid was reported endlessly).
I think the press should also be much more cautious about letting "senior officials" go on background if all they offer is the standard spin.
By the way, Patrick sent me a note offering to repost this with spell correction. But I couldn't even see any spelling errors! I usually make one or two every time I post a comment somewhere. :) - Bruce
Captain George Bush finds himself onboard the Mideast Titanic . He has promised to " stay the course " . Osama bin Laden's telegraph message read : " Clear sailing..... Full speed ahead " . The dwindling crew of the Unwilling message reads : " Its the captains mess , let him clean it up " .
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