The problem is more and more people just don't believe it. A president with better communication skills would have helped keep them on message. Dubya spent 1/2 of 2005 and all of 2006 not making a particularly good or convincing case for anything.
Keep this in mind for election 2008.
Yes.
Clinton was comfortable with using empty platitudes or lying when he didn't want to share his thoughts about something in particular.
Bush is not at ease with vagueness or abstraction or dissembling. He is more down to earth.
The current fashion is for politicians to be glib, to have the verbal skills of a successful lawyer, to have a quick answer for everything.
I think Bush should say, "No comment," more often. He's allowed to do that, just as presidents prior to the Garrulous Bill Clinton have done. I noticed, just today, that Harry Truman could say, "No comment," quite a bit.
Bush is not dumb. He can see the big picture, think through problems, and plan well into the future.
I think he is a visual thinker who is aware of too many things when he talks. The result is that he combines the different ways of looking at things into one sentence which is disjointed to listeners who are verbal thinkers , rather than visual thinkers.
Bill Clinton, media star, was a hard act to follow.
Whoever follows Bush will have a much easier time.