What were they supposed to do?
And please don't roll out the tired, old "Go over the heads of the media, directly to the American people like Reagan did" bromide.
The DBM is much more vicious and cynical than in Reagan's day.
If you're out on stage and the guy in the back cuts your mic, there's not much you can do about it.
The President could hardly say every-time he was interviewed that the press had it in for him or say this during “speak to the nation” slot.
It impossible to counter the attacks and to come out with plastic PR response from the Press Secretary which in any case would not have been shown I feel that GWB felt was not the correct behaviour of a President.
He respected the office of the Presidency far to much to have got involved in any of this and for those who cared enough to find out the truth it was easily available.
I won’t list a bunch of items. I could but that would not be productive.
Bush was content to let history judge. Too often the Bush White House would not counter smears and attacks, and they failed to explain things well. One small example was “Mission Accomplished”. Conservatives battled as well as we could but the White House and members of congerss remained silent for the most part. Bush himself said said he was going to stand on his record and ignore the attacks.
We can think what we like as to 0 and the gang, but they do put forth numerous people defending him and voicing support of every dumb a$$ thing he says or does. Even congressional Democrats sing his praise. That simply did not happen during the last Bush Administration.