Posted on 05/07/2008 9:46:55 PM PDT by The_Republican
We are in one of the longest presidential campaigns in modern memory -- and haven't even started focusing on the general election.
It's been enough to drive most of us mad, but if there's one person in particular suffering the most, it may be President Bush.
It's been noted here before that we have not had an election since 1952 in which an incumbent president or vice president was not running in at least partial defense of an existing administration's record.
That means Bush is not just a lame duck but an easy target for all three current candidates -- none of whom have any investment in the president's legacy.
Consider that the last president in a similar position was Harry Truman. He left office with an approval rating in the 20s, and it took years before historians revised the standard negative and mostly unfair view of him.
When there is no incumbent in a long race, almost everything of the last four years becomes fair and uncontested game. In 2004, Bush defended his record for months on the stump; now it has become almost second nature for all three candidates to denounce it daily.
John McCain has distanced himself from Bush as much as he can, even as his Democratic opponents dub him John McBush -- when they are not outdoing each other in their denunciation of the president.
Last week, I asked a fierce Bush critic what he thought were the current unemployment rate, the mortgage default rate, the latest economic growth figures, interest rates and the status of the stock market.
He blurted out the common campaign pessimism: "Recession! Worst since the Depression!"
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
We are in one of the most corrupted Presidential elections in history.
Consider that the last president in a similar position was Harry Truman. He left office with an approval rating in the 20s, and it took years before historians revised the standard negative and mostly unfair view of him.
The only problem with a perspective like this is that, unlike klintoon, GW never GAS about poll ratings. He did things based on whether or not he thought they were the right things to do, not the most popular.
He didn’t care when the left hated him for it, and he doesn’t care when the right hates him for it.
Bush was dealt a crap hand but he’s done a poor job. Sunseted tax cuts and a couple Supremes? I expected more than that.
He gains points for attempting SS reform though.
However the slide the party has taken under his watch is unacceptable. And let’s not forget he signed McCain-Feingold and numerous bloated spending bills.
Truman was an awful President. I noticed when they asked the GOP candidates which recent dem President was the best they ALL picked Truman. Sickening.
McCain sure as heck needs not to be the incumbent this November.
In terms of the economy, it’ll be pick your poison: $5 gas and $5 loaves of bread, or if you don’t get that, it’ll be because severe recession finally cutting down inflation. With the end of the “surge,” Iraq will be worse than it is now, although hopefully not nearly as bad as in late 2006. Housing — far more likely to be worse than better, and infinitely worse than in 2004, when most Americans felt they were making another paycheck a month from their home appreciation.
Don’t blame Bush on failing to extend the tax cuts. Without reforming entitlements (Social Security and Medicare) there simply can no net tax cut in the long run. Bush tried to reform entitlements, but failed.
If the next President and Congress similarly fail (or don’t try), then it’s simply a question of which taxes to raise. As much as I’d hate to see marginal income tax, capital gains, and dividend taxes revert to 2000 levels, it’s far preferable to the open war on the upper middle class which would be FICA “reform” — uncapping the 12.6% both-sided OASDI payroll tax and raising the 2.9% both-sided Medicare payroll tax to something like 5% or 6%.
A family which earns $175,000 at work and interest income and $5,000 in qualified dividends and gains would face perhaps $4,000 more in taxes lapsed to the 2000 tax regime, maybe even less depending upon the AMT impact. With FICA reform that family would face $12,000 or more in tax burden.
Bush has done good things and bad things.
What strikes me is the extremity of it all.
He’s either way right or way wrong.
No middle of the road.
W never lead the party. He just allowed it to decay along with his popularity, and the public's support of the war under a relentless, uncontested propaganda onslaught from the Left.
Maybe if he had a White House communications team...
Maybe if he could complete a sentence in public without bumbling...
Let me know if you want in or out.
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At the few moments when Bush decided to persuade and go to the American people he usually did so brilliantly, such as after 9/11. But for whatever reason, I would argue that Bush not only decided to go quietly into the night, but he also rarely ever decided to actually come out of the night during his administration on anything other than small bore items, save Social Security.
From my vantage point I can only scratch my head and wonder what might have been accomplished had this president followed the advice of his predecessor who often went directly to the American people and bypassed Congress, as Reagan often did. Sadly, we will never know and are only left to wonder what might have been.
Communication skills are important part of a Leadership. If you have no oratorical skills yourself, find other means. It was always important. Now, in the time called “information age” - even more. But Bush administration abandoned communications, and pretended that info-war is not happening. Media bias is an obstacle, of course, but not an excuse.
I share your frustration.
Theodore Roosevelt once said “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
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