I Was Wrong…
…for the first time ever (well, okay, for the 30th time this week). It appears that the Katrina backlash IS sticking to President Bush, after all. The most recent polls show his approval rating dropping considerably, and he seems to be taking a good share of the blame. A temporary blip or something more permanent? My money’s on a temporary blip, but let’s face it…this president has most likely seen his most popular days (excluding the 91% approval rating in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, quite obviously a one-time thing).
I don’t really see that as much of a problem (though it’s perhaps more of a problem if you’re planning to run for Congress as a Republican). Bush’s presidency has been, to say the least, eventful; the easy, and more popular, thing to do re:Iraq would have been to make a lot of noise and bluster and pass a bunch of meaningless resolutions while Saddam grew stronger and rearmed. If the price of action is an unpopular president, that’s disappointing, but not surprising.
Then again, the really disturbing thing is that this is another example of how terribly misinformed most Americans are: to put things in perspective, 38% of Americans (and 33% of ‘investors’!) say America is in a recession. The commonly accepted definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative real GDP growth. By that definition, even the recession of 2001 was not really a recession, but certainly, we are not in a recession now by any stretch of the imagination. The point is, most Americans, sadly, know more about J-Lo than they do about anything of importance. In other words, take the poll numbers with a healthy dose of skepticism.
Nevertheless, these same Americans are the ones that vote, so the Bush Administration has the unenviable task of selling both the War in Iraq and the Katrina Response to a hostile public.
Come on, Mark. This is pretty naive. The easy and popular thing to do would have been blustering and accomplishing nothing, so what did Bush do? The second easiest thing! Win a war no one doubted we could win and then sit on your hands while Iraq tumbles into disaster.
This Katrina thing is sticking because Americans are finally – and blessedly! – tired of having their government run by a moron.
Sure there’s no recession, but the only group actually experiencing the growth lives at the top. Lower and middle class quality of life and income are stagnant. This is what today’s Republican Party thinks is the essence of American values: cut taxes for the rich and who gives a damn about anyone else?
If I were a Republican in Congress, I would be calling for this president’s resignation. He’s a disagrace to his country.
Ryan, I’m surprised at your level of venom; Bush is most assuredly not a moron, and surely you know that…a disgrace to his country? Come now…I respect your opinion, and I saw your recent post about Bush being a failure, but I couldn’t disagree more. I’ve stated on many occasions that I don’t wish to be an apologist for the Bush administration, and the man has made many, many mistakes (as every man in his shoes would). Yet even if Bush were only remembered for deposing the Taliban and Saddam, isn’t that huge? What do you remember Clinton for? Seriously, I’m not being partisan…but what did he accomplish that compares with that (and don’t give me the economy and the surplus – it was Clinton’s good fortune to ride on the wave of the dot-com boom, and Bush’s misfortune to come into office as that wave crashed).
On this issue, I think the gulf is too great between us; I admire this president, I think he has a high level of personal integrity, and I think he will do quite well in the history books, current events notwithstanding (though much, of course, depends on Iraq).
Mark-
I think you just lost any shot of a rational response from the left when you praised GWB’s “personal integrity”. I wholeheartedly agree with you, this is a President who says what he means and means what he says — but I’ve never managed to say that in front of a Democrat without receiving an impassioned lecture on how Bush lied to us about Iraq.
Re: the poll regarding Katrina-response…
Parse the numbers- 32% are satisfied, 66% are not.
of the 66% who are not 27% of those blame bush — or a total of 18%.
This is not measureably different than the 13% number we had a few days ago(*), and surely represents those who would heap scorn on Bush if he personally cured cancer (primarily “a disease of the rich white male,” I can hear them screaming now.)
Note that a full 40% of the 32% who are satisfied (that’s 13% right there) give Bush full credit for it.
Also keep in mind that the blame is likely to be at its worst right now. From here on out, things on the Gulf Coast will be getting better, and the credit will start to rise while the blame fades from memory. Not saying that’s how it should be, but it’s how it is.
(*) Keep in mind the +/- 2.9% on the new numbers (not sure what the error was a few days ago) — if I understand correctly that that means a 62% chance that the actual number is within 2.9% (i.e. between 15% and 21%) and a 95% chance that it’s within twice that (i.e. between 12% and 24%).
In short… no you weren’t.
“This Katrina thing is sticking because Americans are finally – and blessedly! – tired of having their government run by a moron.”
So, apparently the majority of the American people believed the government was run by a moron less than a year ago, yet they weren’t tired with it at that point, right?
The first lesson in politics really ought to be that if the polls suddenly go your way, it’s probably not wise to assume it’s because the majority had an epiphany and recognized your genius. It’s more likely events, and having Bush hammered every day on the news for a couple of weeks is quite an event.
I’m still surprised that, given the hammering, Bush’s ratings aren’t down further, so that alone makes me think this isn’t the crushing blow his opponents dream about. And in any event, it’s just so backwards-looking. He’s not running for anything anymore. He’s not going to resign. And there’s no guarantee any Democrat will benefit from any of this, given that even in Zogby’s poll, the one active Democrat polled up against Bush still lost.
The real question is how this affects 2006 and 2008. Maybe it’ll hurt the GOP in 2006, but those elections are still a year away, and I think the Republicans are more likely to be hurt by the reasonable perception they’ve been in power too long, not to mention the local concerns that inevitably fly under the national radar yet often dictate how senate races go.
In 2008, who knows? If the GOP nominee is Allen or someone else more or less campaigning as Bush Version 2.0, then a weak Bush hurts him. But if it’s someone like Giuliani, someone who has already shown real leadership, this hurricane probably helps him in the eyes of voters.
Well, Clint, I hope you’re right…it’s somewhat comforting to remind myself that polls tend to lag events by a few days…I’ll be interesting to see what similar polls say around Tuesday or Wednesday of next week…
I personally think it is a total waste of time dissecting these polls. All the responses you see in these polls have a tilt based on party lines.
And that would mean a minimal negative effect on the Republicans. Democrats are running out of tricks and their punches seem more like shadowboxing.
If Bush is hovering around 40% at this juncture, I agree with Clint, the numbers have bottomed out and once the rebuilding starts, things will only get better. I also think, that Alabama and Mississippi will recover a whole lot sooner and better. That again will point out the stark difference between those who whine and moan versus those take personal responsibility seriously and get back on their feet.
I don’t tend to take “on the fly” polls like this one too seriously. It’s 1157 people (according to the Zogby site), and who knows what the demographics of the respondants are, etc.
Oh, great, now you guys are gonna make me admit to being wrong about being wrong…and that’s just wrong…
You’re right about that.
Mark, I have to take issue with you on this. I really doubt many people who are fans of J-Lo actually vote.
Heh!
BSR
Mark, I understand that my venom might be a little shocking, but I’m really tired of smart people in the Republican Party (this includes you) excusing Bush for a set of policy disasters that we would be calling grounds for impeachment if he were a Democrat.
I make no pretense of not appreciating the removal of Saddam and the Taliban, but what are the results? Is the Middle East more free? Maybe. Do we any longer have the credibility to press for continued progress there? Almost certainly not. The Iraq occupation is pretty much a grade-A mess and has been from the start. Afghanistan is still pretty much ruled by warlords and Osama is off the radar. Exactly what have we accomplished?
I don’t know that Bush is actually a moron, but I’m not so sure. He betrays all of the personality indicators of someone who is profoundly immature. His unwillingness to assess mistakes made by himself and his administration, his habit of making jokes that are in extremely poor taste (see the looking-under-the-sofa-for-WMD spot or calling Michael Brown “Brownie” in the aftermath of a horrific national disaster), his sophomoric grinning and posturing. This is not a shrewd political operator; this is the revolting love child of a Republican Party devoid of morality and a Democratic Party devoid of brains.
As for Clinton, there’s always welfare reform. You might suggest that that had something to do with a Republican Congress, and you’re right. But there’s an easy counterargument: we’ve had a Republican Congress since 2002 and exactly what comparable steps have we taken? There’s also Kosovo, a humanitarian intervention that actually worked. There’s also NAFTA. And, uh, there’s the part where Clinton didn’t do his level best to permanently destroy the best hope for freedom in the Middle East. So, on balance, Clinton might have been a pretty average president, which still leaves him light years better than Bush.
I’ll give Clinton NAFTA, the single most important presidential decision he made, in hindsight. I’m not sure what Bush has done that would be impeachable; I am sure that no matter how big a mess you or I may think Iraq is, Syria is out of Lebanon, Israel out of Gaza, the Kurdish minority in Iraq is no longer under the boot of Hussein, and Afghanistan no longer allows Osama to openly run terrorist training camps. We know Osama, if he’s still alive, is in the mountains of Pakistan, hiding, under heavy guard, and pretty much out of the operational picture of al-Qaeda. All of these things are important…
I’m not going to convince you that Bush is a great president, obviously, but I’m not making excuses, I’m stating my opinion; I don’t see a single thing, and I truly mean it, that George Bush could have done to help New Orleans. It’s easy to lash out at the current White House occupant, but as Jimmy Carter recently said, for decades, we’ve known New Orleans would be wiped out by a large hurricane, and for decades, we’ve lived with that, collectively. As I said once before, we rolled the dice with New Orleans, and we crapped out, big time…
All of which brings me the long way around to my point; lay blame on Bush where he deserves it (and yes, there are many things I would have done differently in a perfect world), but don’t blame him for New Orleans…
Let me put it to you this way: if we had never invaded Iraq, or even if Bill Clinton were still in office, what would have been different with Katrina?…
Mark said
“…even if Bill Clinton were still in office, what would have been different with Katrina?”
That’s easy. The first words out of Clinton’s mouth would have been “It’s not my fault!”
What will Clinton be remembered for? Geez, eight years of relative peace and prosperity aren’t so bad. Those halcyon days…
peter, don’t get me wrong…I’m not knocking the guy, honestly…my statement was more along the lines of what major accomplishments will he be remembered for, or world-changing events…as you say, hey, eight years of peace and prosperity is not a bad legacy…but it’s not gonna excite the historians much…
Peter-
Calvin Coolidge led us through eight far more peaceful years of far greater economic growth, prosperity and optimism. I doubt more than a quarter of Americans could identify Calvin Coolidge as a former president, much less guess which decade he served in.
That’s not something Presidents are remembered for.
Clinton will be remembered, sadly, for Monica Lewinski (just as the biggest section in any U.S. history text on Calvin Coolidge details the “Teapot Dome” scandal). Some AP students will also read about NAFTA, the Camp David talks, the 1994 agreement with NoKo, Whitewater and his appearance on Arsenio playing the saxaphone.
Re: peter’s comment (9/9/2005 @ 10:59 PM)
Clinton will be remembered for the 1993 WTC bombing, the 1995(?) Kobal Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, the 1998 bombings of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the bomb attack on the USS Cole in 2000, the planning and preparations for 9/11 and his wholly inadequate and sometimes non-existent responses to same.
As for the prosperity of his administration, let us not forget that Enron, Worldcom, Global Crossing and the bursting of the dot com bubble all happened on Clinton’s watch, leaving Bush with one humongus mess to clean up. Which he did.
“Clinton will be remembered for the 1993 WTC bombing, the 1995(?) Kobal Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, the 1998 bombings of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the bomb attack on the USS Cole in 2000, the planning and preparations for 9/11 and his wholly inadequate and sometimes non-existent responses to same.”
Nonsense. Pure conservative hogwash. He’ll be remembered for none of that and you know it as well as I do.
———
Mark,
I understand that Clinton wouldn’t have changed anything about the Katrina disaster. But the point I’m attempting to make is that Katrina will stick to Bush’s approval ratings because it’s just one more debacle in a long line. Americans are starting to tire of Bush and any little thing helps. Not only that, but this is one of those cases where big government is clearly the answer and Bush can be (perhaps not rightly) perceived as on the opposite end of that argument.
Ryan, I will agree with you on this…people are getting tired of Bush. I think that often happens with two-term presidents, though, even the ones who don’t face all the obstacles this one does. I quite clearly remember all the stories about ‘Clinton fatigue’.