Good policies-poor communications
By SHEILAH PEPPER
The Gazette Staff
The long window of history will be the arbiter of the presidency of George W. Bush. I'm guessing the judgment will put him somewhere in, or close to, the top tier of presidents partly because of his efforts on national defense, homeland security and his Supreme Court appointments. The verdict will be less kind on his domestic policies and a lack of really notable successes in that area.
Some of these, I thought, were ill-advised, such as the No Child Left Behind program Bush pursued with Senator Kennedy which poured a lot of money down the black hole of public education. He also misjudged the immigration debate totally, along with Senator McCain.
A notable failure was the failure to reform some aspects of Social Security. In this case, the failure could not be attributed to the policy, but to the President's inability to communicate his policy. This is a failure that will affect our children and grandchildren.
The policy was eminently sensible - in fact - highly desirable. The proposal was that we would be able to set aside a small portion of our FICA taxes, somewhere between eight to 16 percent, in a private savings account. As the account grew, some other limited options would be available, such as movement of a portion of these funds to safe instruments such as a Money Market account. After the funds reached a certain level, a small portion could be invested in very low-risk instruments such as, for example, a mixed bond fund or a choice of some mutual funds with a long, conservative track record. The list of funds would be pre-approved by a government panel. If I had been able to do this 35 years ago, I'd be in a better situation today, as would many others.
The Left and some very powerful special interest groups, such as AARP, began a repetitive barrage against the proposed reforms. Taking a leaf from Herr Goebbel's propaganda notebook, they repeated and repeated one single mantra" "George Bush wants to risk your Social Security in the stock market."
The President never spoke those words. But every left wing outfit unleashed them over and over and the White House was basically mute. AARP bashed the plan on their web site. Daily, National Public Radio, CNN, MSNBC, the broadcast networks, the major newspapers and news magazines repeated the charge that the plan was "risky."
A few outlets, such as FOX News, the New York Post and the Washington Times along with some talk radio hosts, tried to present the plan fairly. But the Big Lie technique worked, big time.
The one source that could have stopped this nonsense was the White House. But from the President on down, the failure to clearly communicate was acute. In the early days, Ari Fleisher did well as the president's press spokesman but the appointment of his successor, Scott McClellan, was an unmitigated disaster. He continually fumbled and hesitated in the face of questions from the carnivorous White House press corps.
Many of the questions were basically diatribes faintly disguised and McClellan seemed to shrink before them. At long last, he was ushered out and the late beloved Tony Snow took over. But the damage was done. The program that could have helped our children and grandchildren along the path of a more secure retirement was dead. Lobbyist from AARP and other groups had turned it into the third rail of domestic politics, with the help of the mainstream media.
In the first term, especially in the aftermath of 9/11, Bush seemed to hit his stride in terms of communicating plans and policies, particularly in the case for taking the war to the terrorists. But in the second term, "W" seemed to lose his footing, especially during the nastiness over Saddam's weapons of mass destruction. (Personally, I think Saddam himself was a WMD) Even his tone altered. Gone were declarations such as "Bring it on!" Whoever advised him to drop the Texas style just didn't understand the American heartland.
After the 2006 elections when the Democrats took the House of Representatives, the White House seemed to give up on communications. Dana Perino, Snow's successor, did her level best, but the anti-war shrieks and the Bush hatred had spread like venom.
I believe George W. Bush is a good and honorable man who never let the polls dictate his actions but did what he felt was right. He, along with Senator McCain, warned early on about the mess over at Fannie Mae. They were ignored. If he and the senator had followed Ronald Reagan's example and gone over the head of the hostile press to lay out their case, they might have met with success and we might be avoided at least of today's economic misery.
I think history will judge George W. Bush more kindly than most believe. But if he and his people had just one slice of Reagan's ability to communicate directly to the people, history's judgment of him as one of our best presidents might have been assured.
Copyright©2009SheilahPepper
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