[Peace-discuss] A Question about the Puppet

[C. G. Estabrook]

[The following is from the interesting "Talking Points Memo," on Tuesday.
--CGE]

The White House didn't want to have the president out last night making a
slashing campaign speech in late February. They also didn't want to start
hitting the airwaves this early with their campaign commercials. And they
definitely did not want the president jumping off the high dive into a gay
rights culture war.

The strategy was to bank the president's rock solid support from
Republicans and spend the year above the political fray with soft sounding
proposals aimed at the political middle.

But it hasn't worked out that way.

The support among conservatives has taken some real hits. The White House
has decided that the long-predicted rising economy won't float them
through this election. The situation in Iraq looks wobbly and likely to
get worse before it gets better. So deprived of the ability to run on his
record he's decided to save his political hide by trying to tear the
country apart over a charged and divisive social issue which is being
hashed out through the political process in the states.

It's his dad and the flag burning amendment all over again. Is there
really anything that tells you more about a man's character than this?

A couple weeks ago I said we should be on the look out for stuff like this
-- not just the move on gay marriage, but the whole descent into
scurrilous attacks and divisive wedge politics as the president's
popularity drifts downward. (Isn't the White House a bit worried that
their line about the Democrats being negative and haters will be a little
undermined by these tactics on their part?)

One might suggest that the idea we should have in mind here is that old
line about judging a man's character and mettle by what he does when the
seas get stormy rather than what he does when they're calm. But I think
the real metaphor to keep in mind is how dangerous and unpredictable an
animal becomes when he's cornered.


On Thu, 26 Feb 2004, Randall Cotton wrote:

> Yeah, it's pretty wacky. It cannot be anything other than the result
> of a purely political calculation, though. Voters still do count for
> something, (perhaps less and less as time goes on, granted) and it's
> commonly accepted that Christian right folks are generally Bush
> die-hards. There are plenty of them around (15-20 % of the U.S.
> population according to polls) and this may be a (largely
> inconsequential) move intended to help dissuade them from leaving the
> flock, lest they tempted to vote Democrat or (more likely) stay home
> in November. It's a risky strategy that may or may not pay off, it
> seems to me. It does, yet again, expose the administration as
> increasingly desperate, to my eye. It's as if they're pretty much
> giving up hope on a very large chunk of the political spectrum and
> willing to bear the brunt of whatever backlash results in an attempt
> to lock up their base. Also, it seems to me that to some extent, Rove
> et al know they may be headed for trouble come November and they're
> brainstorming now, trying out various ideas to see if anything gets
> traction. Things like the mission to Mars thing (most folks just cock
> their head and say "ok, whatever"), putting Bush in front of Tim
> Russert on Meet the Press (another flop) and now this. I think we can
> look forward to a few more crazy experiments as the election
> approaches.
> 
> And, as Carl often reminds us, the experimentation could extend to
> military adventures as well. We all know that happened last election
> cycle (and it worked). They'll have a tougher time of it this time
> around, but to pretend they've learned their lesson in Iraq would be
> naive. There will be at least some Republican strategists, it seems to
> me, that will advocate going with what worked before, and if the
> supply of new ideas runs short, they may prevail. And if another
> "threat" miraculously emerges that affords Bush the opportunity to
> present himself as a bad-ass turrurist killer protecting the securuty
> of the amurucan people (preferably against nukyular attack), it will,
> indeed, benefit the party in power immensely. Therein lies the
> greatest danger.
> 
> R
>