Here's the truth if you can handle it.
President faces an attention deficit
Polls show public is tuning out Bush
By George E. Condon Jr.
COPLEY NEWS SERVICE
July 16, 2001
WASHINGTON -- Even as his approval ratings rebound in new polls, President Bush is facing a more daunting problem previously unseen in post-World War II presidencies: The American public seems to be paying less and less attention to what he says and does.
Top Bush aides prefer to put the spotlight on the approval numbers. But they also see the signs that much of what the president says isn't resonating with the public, and have stepped up the search for new ways to get his message out.
Increasingly, Republicans are concerned that Bush has failed to make extensive or effective use of what Theodore Roosevelt called the "bully pulpit" of the White House. With only a few exceptions, the new president has yet to find a comfortable way to command the public stage and make his opponents feel constituent pressure.
This concern was heightened when GOP pleasure over the president's recent European visit was dampened by a poll showing that the public paid less attention to that five-nation tour than they had to any previous presidential trip measured by polls.
Only 10 percent said they followed Bush's trip "very closely," with 25 percent following it "fairly closely," according to the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press. An amazing 64 percent indicated they barely followed the trip, if at all.
"Those numbers were very, very surprising," said Carroll Doherty, Pew's political analyst. "You would expect there to be more interest in Bush's first trip to Europe than in a second-term president's trip to Africa, but there was much more interest in (Bill) Clinton's trip there."
Intrigued by what they were finding, Doherty said researchers tried to compare public interest in Bush with his predecessors.
"In the rollout of major initiatives and the major speeches, we've seen less interest in him than in Clinton and other presidents. We compared the rollout of Bush's energy plan to Clinton's unveiling of the health care plan and there was far less interest in Bush's speech," he said.
Time and again with Bush, he said, "We find few people paying attention."
Doherty attributes this to public apathy about government and to Bush's personality.
"It's a combination," he said. "Bush hasn't been aggressive in seizing the spotlight, and there is less interest in Washington news."
The president, who came into office touting his ability as a manager and joking about his shortcomings as an orator, draws much of the blame.
Lee M. Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion in New York, said Bush "hasn't done a lot to arouse and stimulate the public. He is more low-key."
"Rhetorically speaking he is not the most nimble," said Charles Cook, a respected nonpartisan political analyst who suggested Bush has failed thus far to use rhetoric to maximize victories or minimize failures.
"Clinton was able to milk a victory for everything it was worth. But he also had the political skills to get out of scrapes that you wouldn't expect him to be able to escape," Cook said. "Bush doesn't have those skills."
Doug Bailey, a veteran Republican strategist and publisher of the Hotline political newsletter, said Bush's biggest problem is trying to follow Clinton in office.
"Clinton was simply spectacular with his ability to command a room, command an audience, command the media and the coverage," Bailey said. "Inevitably, President Bush is still compared subconsciously with Clinton. But Clinton set a standard that nobody can match. ... Bush is not in that league."
Both the president and the White House have seemed to go out of their way to strip his speeches of drama and news value, proving less than sure-footed in staging big announcements.
That was particularly true on the much-anticipated energy speech, and has also been seen in the president's lobbying for a patients' bill of rights. Along with generally effective events in the White House, the president has made two trips to Virginia hospitals. Those stops were often awkward, almost embarrassing, with some feeling the visits exploited patients who were used as props.
"They are too clever by half," said Stephen Hess, presidential scholar at the Brookings Institution and a veteran of the Eisenhower and Nixon White Houses. "They are looking for gimmicks, and they don't understand you don't need gimmicks if you're a president."
White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer staunchly defends how the president has delivered his message.
"I think the White House is doing very, very well on that front," he said, rattling off what he sees as the president's early successes and suggesting the president's use of the bully pulpit helped secure the votes needed to cut taxes.
Asked about the communications strategy, he cited new Gallup Poll numbers showing high personal regard for Bush.
"The American people are getting their perceptions of the president from somewhere and that somewhere is from the things the president does and says," said Fleischer.
But he quickly added, "There is constant room for a White House to re-examine what it does to always do better, and we will always continue to do that."
Bailey called this overdue in light of the recent switch of the Senate to Democratic control.
"The new realities of Washington require a new approach, but I don't think that's easy for Bush," he said.
The White House is considering more campaign-style events and town-hall meetings. But those changes are more related to the public's personal impressions of Bush. There is little sign of second thoughts about the way the energy policy was unveiled, with little focus on maximizing television and newspaper impact.
"In our numbers, you can date Bush's decline almost precisely from the energy speech," said Democratic pollster Mark Mellman. "It was stunning. When was the last time any president gave a major speech and had the public turn against both the president and the policy? It is unprecedented."
Republican strategist Whit Ayres cautioned against overstating Bush's problems with the bully pulpit.
"With most presidents this early in the term there is some grousing among their friends -- just like now -- that they are not being as good as they could be. But don't take that very seriously right now," he said. "You learn by doing, and I suspect that they'll continue to try different things to find what works." |
