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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Carolyn who wrote (173267)	8/21/2001 6:49:30 PM
From: FastC6	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 769670

<<What bothers me is the refusal of the Dems to give Bush a chance>> The success of Bush means the failure of the Dems.....there is inherent conflict of interest for those that are selfish and those that are "fighting" for the selfish....does that help? . .

To: Carolyn who wrote (173267)	8/21/2001 7:07:35 PM
From: Glenn Petersen	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Chris Matthews on the Bush summer activities msnbc.com George Bush, media master With a vacation full of inspiring images, Bush advances his political agenda WASHINGTON, Aug 21— George Bush has pulled a head-fake on the American press corps. Under the cover of a four-week vacation, he has launched an August media offensive. In a maneuver worthy of Washington or MacArthur, the scrappy Texan has again outflanked his pursuers and produced the best TV images of his presidency. His speech to the nation during primetime last week won a 70-percent approval rating among those who watched. BUT THE MOST compelling pictures of August have been his Jimmy Carter-like house-building with Habitat for Humanity, his Ronald Reagan-like brush-clearing in the Rockies. His schedule promises more outdoorsy video in the weeks remaining before Labor Day. Those who denigrate such imagery as “form over function” must have forgotten how this cowboy got his current job. During the month before the two 2000 presidential candidates stood side-by-side on TV, the Gallup polls showed the country leaning to Gore. For the two weeks afterwards, the Gallup had Bush in the lead. Had it not been for Gore’s last-week campaign blitz, and Bush’s stupid hiding of an aged DUI charge, the picture we all got in that debate could have given this president a clear-cut victory. Last week, the country got another comparison shot of the two men. Bush was in the “heartland” hauling trees around like a real American. A bearded Gore spent the time instructing young Democrats on electioneering techniques. What a side-by-side! Bush looked like a Marlboro commercial. Gore had the off-putting appearance of some Bolshevik labor organizer. Or, worse yet, some geek teaching kids how to be geeks. Ask yourself: If we are going to have clones in the future, do we really want more Al Gores? MEDIA SNOBBERY What worked for Bush this week, once again, was the media snobbery of those in New York and Santa Monica who love looking down their noses at a man they want to believe is Alfred E. Neuman’s idiot nephew. Keep thinking that. Keep teaching it at Columbia Journalism School. Keep sharing the in-joke over the dinner table in Beverly Hills. It only makes life easier for the White House ballyhoo boys. Every time you lower the bar on this fellow, the easier it becomes for him to clear it. You know what I think sells about Bush? Humility. Yes, you can quote Churchill and say Bush is a “modest man with much to be modest about,” but I challenge you to say he is as dumb as the sophisticates say he is. Is he as smart as those Democratic favorites, Adlai Stevenson and Mike Dukakis? Maybe. Maybe not. But when Bush spoke to the nation about stem cells, he admitted right up front up front that such issues are not solvable by brainpower alone: Good people disagree on the subject. Nobody’s necessarily right. Nobody’s provably wrong. We’re all in this together, trying to square our religious views with our medical hopes, our deepest human values with our scientific potential. “The issue is debated within the church, with people of different faiths, even among the same faith, coming to different conclusions,” Bush said. Most people, and not just those in that “red” part of the Electoral College map who voted for him, agree with Bush’s decision. Politically, he faced hazards on both left and right. Had the president rejected stem-cell funding outright, the decision would have painted him indelibly with the religious right. If he’d gone whole-hog for stem-cell research, he would have been The New York Times’ flavor of the week, but also a man who broke a well-known campaign promise. Polls show he threaded the needle. Bush has retained his high Gallup number (59 percent) for being a president who “keeps his promises.” CUE THE MUSIC But pretty cowboy pictures and shrewd “values” politics are not enough. If I know my presidents, what Bush now needs to project is the music to go with it. I’m talking about the optimistic spirit that lifted the nation in the past. I’m talking about a national sense of mission. For FDR, it was “Happy Days are Here Again.” For JFK, it was “High Hopes.” For Clinton, it was “Don’t Stop Thinking about Tomorrow.” The silence in the American air, the absence of any apparent national mission, is what keeps Bush’s pictures from putting some bounce in the country’s step.