Tim Russert, (NBC) George W. Bush today at National Defense University (base image by Mary F. Calvert, Washington Times
Bush on the Ropes: Lessons for the Democrats
Washington - Wednnesday, FEbruary 10, 2004 - by: Mark Weisbrot
lesson	But there is a more important lesson here than the fact that this president has a lot to hide and doesn't interview well. We already knew that. The lesson is that when the Democrats actually muster the courage to go after George W. Bush, he turns out to be extremely vulnerable.
sinking in polls	Bush agreed to this TV interview because he has been steadily sinking in the polls. The main reason for his troubles is that finally, after spending most of the last three years adhering to the conventional wisdom that politicians should not attack "a popular president," the Democrats have begun to go after him.
attacks	Not across the board, and not with anywhere near the ferocity that Republicans attacked former President Clinton. Most of the attacks have come from Democratic presidential candidates.
AWOL	But NBC's Tim Russert would never have raised the issue of Bush's military service, if not for the harsh words of Democratic National Committee Chair Terence McAuliffe, whom Russert quoted: "I look forward to that debate when John Kerry, a war hero with a chest full of medals, is standing next to George Bush, a man who was AWOL in the Alabama National Guard."
draft dodgers	This is the kind of offensive they will need if they are to win in November. They will need to attack the soft underbelly of the "chicken-hawks" -- draft dodgers like Vice President Dick Cheney who are quick to send American kids to war for dubious and shifting rationales, but never seemed to be available when it was their turn to fight.
jobs	Bush is vulnerable on the economy at least as much as on the war. He claimed that "there is good momentum when it comes to the creation of new jobs." But at the present rate of job creation it will take two and a half more years just to reach the number of jobs that the country had when he took office.
Haliburton	And then there are the scandals. There seems to be a new scandal involving Haliburton every week. The company that Dick Cheney headed until 2000 has made hundreds of millions of dollars from no-bid government contracts in Iraq, over-billed more than $33 million for army meals, and last week was accused of massive bribery in Nigeria.
CIA exposure	But the Bush team has been able to dodge one scandal after another -- including the investigation, so far, of their exposure of an undercover CIA agent for political aims - - because the Democrats have not been aggressive enough. Imagine the Republicans, who impeached Bill Clinton for lying about sex with an intern, if they had this kind of dossier on a Democratic president. That president would be gone by now.
legitmate election	The Democrats might even question the legitimacy of a president who lost the popular vote, and according to the Florida recount sponsored by the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal, the election as well. Yet he has governed as though he had a mandate from an overwhelming, far-right, Republican majority.
Gore	"He betrayed this country!" shouted Al Gore on Sunday. "He played on our fears. He took America on an ill-conceived foreign adventure." But Gore's remarks drew limited attention.
Democrats must attack	The Democrats need a chorus -- a bold and unrelenting one. Until recently they have been hoping that the press would do it for them, but the media -- as Russert showed last Sunday -- will only expose this presidency for what it is if the Democrats take the lead. The White House is theirs, if they only have the guts to take it.
Mark Weisbrot
	Co-Directors Center for Economic and Policy Research 1621 Connecticut Ave NW, Suite 500 Washington, DC 20009-1052
	distributed to newspapers by Knight-Ridder/Tribune Information
References:
	SNBC News Pres. George W. Bush Interview highlights, Sunday February 8, 2004
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