The Bush Years from the Inside

Michael Gerson, who was once speechwriter for George W. Bush has just written an interesting overview of the Bush years and it is not pretty.

First, the historical perspective since it is easy to forget just how high the Bushies were riding at the end of 2004:

The Republican Party, at that moment, was on a roll. Between 2000 and 2004, the president increased his total vote by 23 percent. Republicans in the House held their highest majority since 1946. It was the first time Republicans had controlled the presidency and both houses of Congress in back-to-back elections since the 1920s. One respected conservative commentator said that Republican hegemony in America was "expected to last for years, maybe decades."

Well, "decades" was a bit optimistic.

Now, however, things have changed:

In early 2008, by nearly every measure, the Republican Party is in trouble. Republicans in the House and Senate have been exiled from leadership and are retiring in large numbers. Fund-raising—the most tangible measure of enthusiasm—is weak. In the first three quarters of 2007, Democratic presidential candidates out-raised their Republican counterparts by $77 million. One adviser to a major Republican campaign recently complained to me that a significant number of wealthy donors on their fund-raising list were giving to … Barack Obama. Voter turnout on the Republican side in the early primaries has been weak compared with Democrats. And the party, well into the primary process, lacks a unifying candidate.

The cause of all this? Partly Bush, especially his (now) unpopular stand on the war in Iraq. But Gerson makes a good case for spreading the blame:

Then came the congressional losses of 2006, which were related to a sour public mood on Iraq—but only in part. Republican congressional leaders had assumed the same earmark-seeking and ethical corner-cutting image of their Democratic predecessors. The "bridge to nowhere" became a Republican symbol of waste and hypocrisy. Some conservatives tried to shift the blame to the president's "reckless spending" for the midterm defeats of 2006—conveniently forgetting that more than 15 Republican members of Congress had been implicated in sexual and financial scandals.

So much for the decades long triumph of conservatism and Republicanism. It still amazes me that the Republican candidates are generally running as Bush III. Well, I suppose it could work, if the Demos were dumb enough to nominate someone totally inept or unlikeable.

And they would not do that.