I've been trolling comment boards the last few days, trying to get a grip on the Bush/Kerry feeling. (
Political Animal's boards are pretty good for that sort of thing).
So, some thoughts:
First things first: The conservatives are
desperate. It's getting damn ugly out there, and I'm guessing it's only going to get worse. I'm starting to think the SBVT ad is only a tase of things to come. The push-back they're using is
insane. It's not even rational. The White House burned a British mole? It's
Dean's fault for questioning the White House.
Bush was asleep at the wheel for seven minutes, reading my Pet Goat? He was reassuring third graders and, besides, he "trusted his subordinates". He was showing leadership by sitting still, idly leafing through a child's reading book while people died by the thousands.
Second: Why the love for Bush? This spin, these response, these attacks...they're acts of desperation. They're not rational, they're risky as hell, and odds are they're not going to do anything but hurt Bush.
And yet they're being ardently defended.
I know why I dislike Bush. I know why I'm so supportive of Kerry. I consider Bush a fool, out of his depthy, hideously incompetent, and his mistakes have grave consequences to the nation. My urgency, my need, is driven by a desire to get Bush out of office.....to replace him with anyone, Republican or Democrat. If Bush resigned tomorrow and appointed pretty much anyone outside his immediate staff (no Cheney, no Rummy, no Wolfie, and no Tom Delay) I'd be considerably less interested in the upcoming election. Sure, I'd want Kerry to win....but I'd feel that the GOP would have put up someone marginally competent. Someone willing to, you know, address problems.
Give me Bush the Elder, give me Reagan again, give me Dole, or any Republican willing to exercise his brain once in awhile...someone I can count on to care about America.
My burning need to replace Bush has little to do with Bush being a Republican, and everything to do with what he's done to my country for the last four years.
But my question is: Why are his supporters just as ardent? What has Bush done to get such knee-jerk support? Such blind loyality?
Look, if Kerry's first four years are as miserable a failure as Bush's first term, I'll be voting for someone else in 2008. Hell, even on partisan grounds, Bush is a lousy conservative President....other than opening up the enviroment to wholesale rape, what "conservative" goals as he achieved?
Bush didn't even face a primary challenge.
What's the deal here? Why the love? What's he done to inspire such blind loyalty?