President in Disneyland speech
Didn't play to well in Peoria apparently. Oh well. There's always Orange County...Oh wait.
A Pathetic Performance by Alan Bock
I really should have learned by now. The White House offers some tantalizing hints that this time the president is really going to lay things out in a way the American people can understand, demonstrate that he is conversant with the facts on the ground and how to overcome them. He might even offer a modicum of frankness that demonstrates he understands not everything has gone swimmingly but we are fixing problems. There's even the hint that he will offer something of an exit strategy that involves a draw-down of troops.
Silly me.
http://www.antiwar.com/bock/?articleid=8195
'...isn't it rather pathetic that this president now appears in public only before a military crowd? (All right, he also spoke before federal border enforcement officers and a fundraiser for a conservative Colorado congresswoman.) It suggests that even though the president himself seems to be securely insulated from reality – and to be fair, that's a phenomenon that happens to most presidents, although this one has cultivated and even demanded it from the outset – somebody at the White House can read the polls and decipher the signs suggesting that this war and this president are not exactly popular these days.
From a PR perspective, there are advantages for a president to speak at military installations, but there are downsides as well. On the positive side, you can reliably anticipate that at the very least the crowd will not erupt in catcalls, and it is likely that there will be genuine enthusiasm, especially at a service academy where auditors have not yet had the sometimes exhilarating but definitely fantasy-puncturing experience of actual combat. And there is a substantial segment of the population that still views the military with something approaching reverence, and will see a president explicitly identifying with it as a sign that he is the right kind of guy.
On the other hand, there is also a substantial segment – although few may be on the fence about Dubya these days – that sees such explicit identification with the military as distasteful if not downright alarming. You don't have to be trembling in fear of an imminent military dictatorship to see that there's something exploitative in the appearances, sort of like a CEO facing a scandal only appearing before groups of employees whose very livelihood depends on him emerging relatively unscathed.
The president is in part using the military, which is supposed to be the supremely nonpartisan institution dedicated to the country rather than to a particular president or party (I'm old enough to remember when career officers made it a point of pride not to vote because they were pledged to obey the commander in chief and didn't want to have even the scintilla of mixed feelings about loyalty that might arise from having voted for his opponent) to help revive his sagging political fortunes. This is supremely cynical, and there must be some in those crowds who recognize and resent it, but they can be counted on to swallow their resentment and be polite if not enthusiastic.
More than cynical, however, the image of a president who avoids crowds of civilians and ordinary American workers and taxpayers is pathetic. I don't know if Seymour Hersh is right that, unlike LBJ at a similar point in his presidency, this president is blissfully unaware that he has become a prisoner in the White House...'
'...the president – I don't know about others in the administration – still seems not just clueless but determined not to learn or to know anything that conflicts with the rosy scenario he tries to convey to the American people...'
'...The president will have to do a lot better than this if he wants to restore flagging public support for this ill-advised war. I think he's a goner, that he will serve out his term as an increasingly ineffective and pathetic figure...'
Maybe Florida Disneyworld next time? Cane' season over Jebbie boy?
A Pathetic Performance by Alan Bock
I really should have learned by now. The White House offers some tantalizing hints that this time the president is really going to lay things out in a way the American people can understand, demonstrate that he is conversant with the facts on the ground and how to overcome them. He might even offer a modicum of frankness that demonstrates he understands not everything has gone swimmingly but we are fixing problems. There's even the hint that he will offer something of an exit strategy that involves a draw-down of troops.
Silly me.
http://www.antiwar.com/bock/?articleid=8195
'...isn't it rather pathetic that this president now appears in public only before a military crowd? (All right, he also spoke before federal border enforcement officers and a fundraiser for a conservative Colorado congresswoman.) It suggests that even though the president himself seems to be securely insulated from reality – and to be fair, that's a phenomenon that happens to most presidents, although this one has cultivated and even demanded it from the outset – somebody at the White House can read the polls and decipher the signs suggesting that this war and this president are not exactly popular these days.
From a PR perspective, there are advantages for a president to speak at military installations, but there are downsides as well. On the positive side, you can reliably anticipate that at the very least the crowd will not erupt in catcalls, and it is likely that there will be genuine enthusiasm, especially at a service academy where auditors have not yet had the sometimes exhilarating but definitely fantasy-puncturing experience of actual combat. And there is a substantial segment of the population that still views the military with something approaching reverence, and will see a president explicitly identifying with it as a sign that he is the right kind of guy.
On the other hand, there is also a substantial segment – although few may be on the fence about Dubya these days – that sees such explicit identification with the military as distasteful if not downright alarming. You don't have to be trembling in fear of an imminent military dictatorship to see that there's something exploitative in the appearances, sort of like a CEO facing a scandal only appearing before groups of employees whose very livelihood depends on him emerging relatively unscathed.
The president is in part using the military, which is supposed to be the supremely nonpartisan institution dedicated to the country rather than to a particular president or party (I'm old enough to remember when career officers made it a point of pride not to vote because they were pledged to obey the commander in chief and didn't want to have even the scintilla of mixed feelings about loyalty that might arise from having voted for his opponent) to help revive his sagging political fortunes. This is supremely cynical, and there must be some in those crowds who recognize and resent it, but they can be counted on to swallow their resentment and be polite if not enthusiastic.
More than cynical, however, the image of a president who avoids crowds of civilians and ordinary American workers and taxpayers is pathetic. I don't know if Seymour Hersh is right that, unlike LBJ at a similar point in his presidency, this president is blissfully unaware that he has become a prisoner in the White House...'
'...the president – I don't know about others in the administration – still seems not just clueless but determined not to learn or to know anything that conflicts with the rosy scenario he tries to convey to the American people...'
'...The president will have to do a lot better than this if he wants to restore flagging public support for this ill-advised war. I think he's a goner, that he will serve out his term as an increasingly ineffective and pathetic figure...'
Maybe Florida Disneyworld next time? Cane' season over Jebbie boy?
posted by professor rat at 3:06 AM
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