One of the roles for the presidency is as National Leader.
Americans ask their presidents to do more than govern; they expect them to lead. No aspect of the chief executive’s job is more important than articulating the nation’s principles, taking on new challenges, providing comfort and inspiration in times of crisis, and, in Abraham Lincoln’s words, appealing to “the better angels of our nature.”
In times of crisis, we look to the presidency. The problem with President Bush is that he has squandered the currency of the highest office in the land in a Nixonian grab for power for his party. So now, as the economy tumbles down, his plan for relief is being greeted with a wall of skepticism. Even assuming the plan is a good plan (and it doesn’t look like that), the president faces immediate skepticism because he’s deceived us so much in the past. It is not healthy for the republic to have a president with such weak credibility.
When the president makes a statement or proposes an initiative, we should be in the kind of place nationally where even if he is from the opposite party his idea becomes worth consideration. George Bush gave that up for vanity of the worst sort.
we should be in the kind of place nationally where even if he is from the opposite party his idea becomes worth consideration.
Unfortunately, we’re not in that place all up and down the political ladder. But especially in the race for the next President.
How often here, for example has anyone said “Yeah, I disagree with my candidate on that position. He kinda screwed up there.” or “Yeah, that’s not a bad idea the other guy has. He has a point.”
Before folks start hurling accusations of naivete or a accuse me of wanting everyone to sing kumbaya let me be clear I’m not advocating some kind of love-fest. But the “Obama is absolutely zero accomplishments” and “McCain is nothing but a liar” takes a lot out of the credibility of the fair points folks try to make.
The dialogue is mirroring the leadership, or possibly vice versa. According to the software used by the authors of ‘polarized America’ (Poole, McCarty and Rosenthal, hot shot poli scis from some hotshot university), the 109th Congress is the most polarized (in terms of voting record) since the Reconstruction era.
My instinct is that members of congress have too much to lose, in terms of domestic politics, to allow a member of the opposition credit for a good plan (not that they aren’t quick to tie it around their neck if something they proposed fails). President Bush’s record and reputation for politics-first multiplies that effect by at least an order of magnitude. Obviously, in an ideal world, we could discuss a plan based on its merits rather than its source. But you’re correct that the president’s well is poisoned, and he has nobody to thank for that but himself.
Bush is a 60 something toddler who only cares about riding his bike
It goes from the head down. Bush has run his presidency based on the principle that he doesn’t give a shit what anyone on his left thinks. I don’t expect that from Sen. Obama, and to be frank as much as I think he would suck, I don’t think McCain would do it as much as Bush if God forbid he won.
There have been presidents that aroused passion of political opponents who did not lose the American people – specifically Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.
“his plan for relief is being greeted with a wall of skepticism”
Not skepticism, outrage. Bush II has made the Fed bigger in his terms than LBJ could have ever imagined, even if you don’t include military spending.
Republicans = bigger government, more government spending, and shitty government to boot (”Brownie,” etc.). They love spending your tax money to make the beauracracy bigger.
We need a change, and it ain’t McCain.
There’s a Mexican proverb;
The fish stinks from the head.
OW and Duros, you may be right. The afore-mentioned Poli scis argue that greater economic polarization has coincided with greater political polarization; oddly enough the two DO tend to mirror each other perfectly, in the 100-plus years for which there are congressional voting records.
But whatever the root cause, the President has obviously done nothing to his case. I think he lost his last shred of credibility for me when he started using the pejorative ‘Democrat Party.’ It’s pretty clear that neither major candidate has any intention of being as divisive.