Dubya will have the last laugh
The Leftist blogosphere is agog with the remarkable news that according to a CNN poll, a strong majority of the American people give Bill Clinton better ratings than George W. Bush in every aspect of the job.
Gee. I guess we're supposed to be shocked that a poll taken at the nadir of a president's popularity doesn't result in his getting good ratings- and that the previous president- a media darling- gets better marks than he did.
The remarkable Bush economy continues to be ignored by the media, as is the responsibilty of Clinton administration bumbling for everything from the dissolution of America's intelligence capabilities (leading both to 9/11 and the bad intelligence which led to the Iraq invasion) to the the failure of the United States to press for enforcement of UN resolutions against Iraq or take effective steps to neutralize Osama bin Laden . Ignored as well is that ultimate bit of liberal hypocrisy: Clinton's signing of the the Kyoto accords- followed by his failure to even bother submitting them to the Senate for ratification (a piece of history conveniently ignored by Clinton admirers who fault Bush for failing to submit them himself!). Bush has Iraq, falsely portrayed by the media as a disaster; Clinton had the real disaster in Somalia- and Kosovo, that somehow permissable war waged without UN approval.
And yes, Somalia was a disaster. We had pictures of the dishonoring of the American dead then, too, and the reverses and defeats which are a part of war. The big difference between Somalia and Iraq is that- though the media won't admit it- we'll probably see a successful end to our involvement in Iraq, as the war is turned over to Iraqi forces, some time in the next year.
I'm curious about the methodology of that poll, by the way. Even at the low point in the President's popularity, those numbers strike me as suspicious. But whatever the percentage of Democrats in the sample, it's worth remembering that at this time in 1998 even the domesticated media were writing about "Clinton fatigue." The media were cheerleading for the Administration then; today, nobody is more frustrated with the Bush Administration than the American media, who have had to endure six years of dedicated placing of every gaffe in the worst possible light, the artificial keeping alive of thelong- discredited slanders about the President's military record, the prominence given the the grandstanding of Richard Clarke and the misrepresentation of his counter arguments on issue after issue- all until recently without success in turning the American people against a president whom they realized, with all his faults, was a man of principle and courage dedicated to keeping them and their families safe in a very frightening and uncertain world.
Four years ago, the Clinton boom was over; the robust economy which had characterized most of his administration was going into the tank. At a similar time in his administration, George W. Bush has not only brought us out of the economic doldrums of the late Clinton administration, but presides over a booming, expanding economy. The media lionized "the Clinton recovery," despite the fact that it actually began under his predecessor, the current president's father. They have steadfastly refused to even acknowledge the economic success of the current administration. Is it any wonder that Clinton gets better marks on his management of the economy than does Bush?
Historic tax cuts- weighted to the middle class, who saved a much higher percentage of their tax money than the wealthy- were misreported as "tax breaks for the rich," and only the personal experience of the American middle class prevented that lie, told by the president's opponents and repeated largely without rebuttal by the media, from being accepted at face value. It's certainly true that those cuts, combined with the increased cost of the war on terror, have resulted in a budget deficit, whereas the Clinton adminstration was able to eliminate a huge deficit by ignoring its responsiblities in the realm of national security and taxing Americans to the breaking point. Yet it was his inheritance of a growing economy which allowed Clinton to pull it off; whatever else may be said about the Bush tax cuts, they have fueled that recovery which the media has so widely ignored- and brought it out of the decline in which Clinton had left it.
We continue to hear the half-truths that Saddam Hussein never had WMD's (he admitted having them, used them both against the Iranians and his own Kurdish popularion- and was required by the armistice that ended the Gulf War and seventeen seperate United Nations Security Council resolutions not simply to get rid of them, but to destroy them under UN supervision), and that no WMD's were ever found. In fact, they have been found- admittedly, in nowhere near the numbers expected. But the media- when they have reported these discoveries at all- have buried them back with the obituaries, and dismissed them as leftovers from the 1991 era.
Hello! What weapons did the 1991 armistice and those seventeen resolutions over a twelve-year period contemplate Saddam destroying, if not the ones he had at the time?
The media, moreover, have over and over again repeated the lie that WMD's were the only justification given for the invasion of Iraq. Mr. Bush's repeated assertion before and during the invasion of its admittedly secondary, humanitarian aims have been dishonestly treated as "new" reasons for the invasion when they have subsequently been invoked.
Also ignored has been the satellite intelligence showing large numbers of planes and trucks moving into Syria and Lebanon in the period immediately prior to the invasion- planes and trucks Mossad insisted from the beginning contained those WMD's!
As American wars have gone, our losses in Iraq have been small. Although the media ignores the fact- even to the point of spreading the whopper that we lack an "exit strategy" in Iraq- we are rapidly reaching the point where we will be able to turn over security and counter-insurgency operations to the Iraqis. Yet the doom-and-gloom reporting of the war has convinced Americans that it is a "quagmire" which we cannot win.
Having to stave off a rabid opposition, of a character which has been personal to an unhealthy degree, has been a problem for both of our last two presidents. Republicans sensed blood in the water- wrongly, as it turned out- when the Clinton was found to have lied under oath about the Monica Lewinski affair. And now, it's the turn of the Left- and the media. Mr. Bush is at the point in his administration every two-term president faces, when lame-duckdom sets in, dissatisfaction with his handling of the various crises the nation faces turns testy, and a normally generous people's instinct to give their leader the benefit of the doubt turns into an automatic willingness to see everything he does in the worst possible light.
For the country to have two consecutive two-term presidents in a row has been unusual in modern history; it's hard to find an exact parallel. But I have to wonder, had Bill Clinton succeeded a generally popular predecessor who had served two terms, how the American people would have rated him in comparison with his predecessor.
I strongly doubt that he would have come off any better than the incumbent does.
The real test, though, will be the judgment history. It will have the benefit of perspective, and an objectivity which no president in the middle portion of his second term receives the benefit of from his fellow Americans.
And it won't be recorded by a profession whose members vote Democratic by a margin of about two-to-one.
Gee. I guess we're supposed to be shocked that a poll taken at the nadir of a president's popularity doesn't result in his getting good ratings- and that the previous president- a media darling- gets better marks than he did.
The remarkable Bush economy continues to be ignored by the media, as is the responsibilty of Clinton administration bumbling for everything from the dissolution of America's intelligence capabilities (leading both to 9/11 and the bad intelligence which led to the Iraq invasion) to the the failure of the United States to press for enforcement of UN resolutions against Iraq or take effective steps to neutralize Osama bin Laden . Ignored as well is that ultimate bit of liberal hypocrisy: Clinton's signing of the the Kyoto accords- followed by his failure to even bother submitting them to the Senate for ratification (a piece of history conveniently ignored by Clinton admirers who fault Bush for failing to submit them himself!). Bush has Iraq, falsely portrayed by the media as a disaster; Clinton had the real disaster in Somalia- and Kosovo, that somehow permissable war waged without UN approval.
And yes, Somalia was a disaster. We had pictures of the dishonoring of the American dead then, too, and the reverses and defeats which are a part of war. The big difference between Somalia and Iraq is that- though the media won't admit it- we'll probably see a successful end to our involvement in Iraq, as the war is turned over to Iraqi forces, some time in the next year.
I'm curious about the methodology of that poll, by the way. Even at the low point in the President's popularity, those numbers strike me as suspicious. But whatever the percentage of Democrats in the sample, it's worth remembering that at this time in 1998 even the domesticated media were writing about "Clinton fatigue." The media were cheerleading for the Administration then; today, nobody is more frustrated with the Bush Administration than the American media, who have had to endure six years of dedicated placing of every gaffe in the worst possible light, the artificial keeping alive of thelong- discredited slanders about the President's military record, the prominence given the the grandstanding of Richard Clarke and the misrepresentation of his counter arguments on issue after issue- all until recently without success in turning the American people against a president whom they realized, with all his faults, was a man of principle and courage dedicated to keeping them and their families safe in a very frightening and uncertain world.
Four years ago, the Clinton boom was over; the robust economy which had characterized most of his administration was going into the tank. At a similar time in his administration, George W. Bush has not only brought us out of the economic doldrums of the late Clinton administration, but presides over a booming, expanding economy. The media lionized "the Clinton recovery," despite the fact that it actually began under his predecessor, the current president's father. They have steadfastly refused to even acknowledge the economic success of the current administration. Is it any wonder that Clinton gets better marks on his management of the economy than does Bush?
Historic tax cuts- weighted to the middle class, who saved a much higher percentage of their tax money than the wealthy- were misreported as "tax breaks for the rich," and only the personal experience of the American middle class prevented that lie, told by the president's opponents and repeated largely without rebuttal by the media, from being accepted at face value. It's certainly true that those cuts, combined with the increased cost of the war on terror, have resulted in a budget deficit, whereas the Clinton adminstration was able to eliminate a huge deficit by ignoring its responsiblities in the realm of national security and taxing Americans to the breaking point. Yet it was his inheritance of a growing economy which allowed Clinton to pull it off; whatever else may be said about the Bush tax cuts, they have fueled that recovery which the media has so widely ignored- and brought it out of the decline in which Clinton had left it.
We continue to hear the half-truths that Saddam Hussein never had WMD's (he admitted having them, used them both against the Iranians and his own Kurdish popularion- and was required by the armistice that ended the Gulf War and seventeen seperate United Nations Security Council resolutions not simply to get rid of them, but to destroy them under UN supervision), and that no WMD's were ever found. In fact, they have been found- admittedly, in nowhere near the numbers expected. But the media- when they have reported these discoveries at all- have buried them back with the obituaries, and dismissed them as leftovers from the 1991 era.
Hello! What weapons did the 1991 armistice and those seventeen resolutions over a twelve-year period contemplate Saddam destroying, if not the ones he had at the time?
The media, moreover, have over and over again repeated the lie that WMD's were the only justification given for the invasion of Iraq. Mr. Bush's repeated assertion before and during the invasion of its admittedly secondary, humanitarian aims have been dishonestly treated as "new" reasons for the invasion when they have subsequently been invoked.
Also ignored has been the satellite intelligence showing large numbers of planes and trucks moving into Syria and Lebanon in the period immediately prior to the invasion- planes and trucks Mossad insisted from the beginning contained those WMD's!
As American wars have gone, our losses in Iraq have been small. Although the media ignores the fact- even to the point of spreading the whopper that we lack an "exit strategy" in Iraq- we are rapidly reaching the point where we will be able to turn over security and counter-insurgency operations to the Iraqis. Yet the doom-and-gloom reporting of the war has convinced Americans that it is a "quagmire" which we cannot win.
Having to stave off a rabid opposition, of a character which has been personal to an unhealthy degree, has been a problem for both of our last two presidents. Republicans sensed blood in the water- wrongly, as it turned out- when the Clinton was found to have lied under oath about the Monica Lewinski affair. And now, it's the turn of the Left- and the media. Mr. Bush is at the point in his administration every two-term president faces, when lame-duckdom sets in, dissatisfaction with his handling of the various crises the nation faces turns testy, and a normally generous people's instinct to give their leader the benefit of the doubt turns into an automatic willingness to see everything he does in the worst possible light.
For the country to have two consecutive two-term presidents in a row has been unusual in modern history; it's hard to find an exact parallel. But I have to wonder, had Bill Clinton succeeded a generally popular predecessor who had served two terms, how the American people would have rated him in comparison with his predecessor.
I strongly doubt that he would have come off any better than the incumbent does.
The real test, though, will be the judgment history. It will have the benefit of perspective, and an objectivity which no president in the middle portion of his second term receives the benefit of from his fellow Americans.
And it won't be recorded by a profession whose members vote Democratic by a margin of about two-to-one.
Comments
You'd think it had actually amounted to something. I was there. It didn't, really.
From Worldnetdaily.com article March 13:
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is warning that the immigration bill favored by Senate Republicans will permit up to 36 million illegal aliens, as opposed to the 11 million being cited by proponents, to remain in the U.S. – a number that will make the average American "furious" when learned and will hurt the GOP.
"I am very worried that the Republican leadership in the Senate and potentially the White House are just going to end up very alienated from the vast majority of Americans on this issue," Gingrich told Human Events in an exclusive interview.. "The Senate bill is an absolute disaster."
Robert
Nor does Newt Gingrich saying something automatically make it true.