Every Potus Must Have Grace- Bush Had It, They All Have Until Now

Certainly I (along with a few others I suspect) ponder why is Trump so awful.  Not awful like W. Bush's policies but like awful as a human being.  It strikes me that he lacks grace.

Grace has numerous definitions some religious some secular but sticking with the latter would include:

"to honor people by taking part in something"

"the quality of being pleasantly polite, or a willingness to be fair and honest"

W. Bush was an poor president because his policies were bad.  But the man has grace (and humor).  He exhibited both in his eulogy to the late John Lewis this week.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BPHye-3XY0

Many remarked at the grace displayed not only by Bush but several others at the Lewis service.  It is inconceivable that Trump would have done so.  In fact he could not even bring himself to honor Lewis by visiting his casket while it lay in the cupola at the Capital.

Every president going back at least as far as FDR had grace, even Nixon had it.  Grace is a requisite of leadership and we have become rightly accustomed to it from our presidents. It enables a partisan from one party to demonstrate empathy and respect for those from the other party.  It also is calming and a palliative in times of crisis and stress.

When it is absent as it is now, a void is created.  Partisanship worsens, stress increases and ultimately anger results.  We need, in fact must have. a president with grace.

Another point.  This photo was taken recently while Trump played catch with former Yankee closer Mariano Rivera.  It struck me because it is the first photo I recall in which Trump actually appeared to be enjoying himself and genuinely smiling.  Usually his smile is more of a sneer typically whilst denigrating someone or something.  So I would add another requisite- a Potus should possess joyfulness.  

Tea-Infused BS

TW: I cannot take it anymore. All of this hypocritical BS from the tea-infused Republicans must be stopped.

From Barry Ritholz:
"Once upon a time, there was a President. He was elected in the middle of a recession, following an economic crisis and a decade long bear market. He came into office on high flying oratory, but was regarded by many as a lightweight.
Once in office, he passed a variety of legislation over the objections of a hostile opposing party. The pundits and the thinktanks derided his big spending, his tax cuts, and his reorganization of government. He had very different priorities than the prior president, and tried to put his stamp on government in a variety of reprioritizations.

The President had barely been in office for 18 months when the pushback to his agenda became fierce. The media and the opposing political party all focused on the budget deficit. Most of it had been accrued long before this President came into the office, but that did not stop him from getting the full blunt of the blame. “We must stop this fiscal profligacy, or it will be the end of us!” the critics all cried.
But the president ignored the critics, and put forth a deficit laden budget that contained a massive stimulus and tax cuts. He even joked about the debt issue: “I am not worried about the deficit. It is big enough to take care of itself.”
By the second year of his presidency, the stimulative effects of the deficit had their impact. Unemployment began to come down, incomes went up, and the stock market roared ahead.

By now, it should be obvious that we are not discussing President Barack Obama, but rather the 40th President of the United States, Ronald Reagan.

Which raises an interesting question: We seem to be overrun with Austerians, newly minted deficit chickenhawks who recently have discovered the evils of deficit spending.

What would all of these deficit foes have said to Ronald Reagan during the first 2 years of his Presidency? Mr. President, we cannot spend more than we take in? Mr. President, we cannot afford those tax cuts — or to spend so much on the military?
The current president, who obviously has very different priorities than RR, is in many ways following his path: Huge deficits, tax cuts targeted to his electoral base, allowing policiies of his predecessor to expire.

I find it terribly amusing that some conservatives have latched onto the deficit as their key issue, when they took the idea of deficit spending to great new heights! Whether you are looking at the economic policies of Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush, reining in the deficit was clearly of no concern. (Forget speechifying, I refer to actual policies).
~~~
I continue to see the Austerian movement in the United States as thinly disguised partisan politics. These are people who will say anything to keep the subsidies and tax benefits flowing to their electoral base. They will say anything –regardless of whether they actually believe these things — to thwart the opposing fellows priorities.

Anyone who believes the new deficit fighters care about deficits has not been paying attention. This is simply about power and money and legislative priorities and cash. With only a very few exceptions, it has nothing to do actual fiscal priorities and debt loads and deficits.

The vast majority of these new deficit chickenhawks — who voted for unfunded entitlement program (prescription drugs), who gave away trillions in unfunded tax cuts, who voted for a trillion dollar war of choice, are simply not to be believed. Their past actions speak far louder than anything they might say today."

Plus Ca Change, Plus C'est La Meme Chose (cont.)

TW: Folks get frustrated, agitated and generally sour during tough economic times. The media takes these moods and extrapolates away. I do not think the Dems are going to lose either half of Congress. The Scott Brown victory in Mass will be seen as the apex of the wave against Obama. FDR's Democratic coalition was done by 1982 although it was not 100% clear. The Dems will take losses in '10, then the big test will come in '12.

From David Broder (circa 1982) via Ezra Klein at WaPo:
"It is customary in the second January after each inaugural ceremony to write a midterm assessment of a presidency. That is what I set out to do. But it quickly became clear that in the case of Ronald Reagan, something else is required.

What we are witnessing this January is not the midpoint in the Reagan presidency, but its phase-out. "Reaganism," it is becoming increasingly clear, was a one- year phenomenon, lasting from his nomination in the summer of 1980 to the passage of his first budget and tax bills in the summer of 1981. What has been occurring ever since is an accelerating retreat from Reaganism, a process in which he is more spectator than leader.

One measure of that transition was last week's Gallup Poll showing Reagan trailing two leading Democrats in trial heats for the 1984 election. Former vice president Walter Mondale had a 52-40 percent lead, and Sen. John Glenn of Ohio had a 54-39 advantage.

Such leads for opposition candidates are extremely rare at this stage of the cycle when all presidents, including Reagan, enjoy an aura of authority. But presidential polls change. Much more significant is the way in which power is moving away from Reagan in the ongoing work of government. What began as a process of delegation is rapidly approaching abdication."
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/03/the_1982_election_and_pundit_f.html

Sage Comments From Bubba

Bill Clinton as quoted by Ezra Klein at WaPo:
"I still think there is some chance the Israelis and the Hamas government and the Palestinian government could make a deal. Because I think that the long-term trend lines are bad for both sides that have the capacity to make a deal. Right now, Hamas is kind of discredited after the Gaza operation, and yet [the Palestinian Authority] is clearly increasing [its] capacity. They are in good shape right now, but if they are not able to deliver sustained economic and political advances, that's not good for them. The long-term trends for the Israelis are even more stark, because they will soon enough not be a majority. Then they will have to decide at that point whether they will continue to be a democracy and no longer be a Jewish state, or continue to be a Jewish state and no longer be a democracy. That's the great spur.

The other thing that has not been sufficiently appreciated is the inevitable arc of technological capacity that applies to military weaponry, like it does to PCs and video games and everything else. I know that these rockets drove the Israelis nuts, and I didn't blame them for being angry and frustrated -- it was maddening. But let's be candid: They were not very accurate. So it's only a question of time until they are de facto outfitted with GPS positioning systems. And when that happens and the casualty rates start to really mount, will that make it more difficult for the Palestinians to make peace instead of less? Because they will be even more pressed by the radical groups saying, "No, no, look, look, we are making eight out of 10 hits. Let's stay at this." I think one of the surprising things that might happen this year [2010] is you might get a substantial agreement. Nobody believes this will happen, and it probably won't, because of the political complexity of the Israeli government. But all I can tell you is, I spent a lot of time when I was president trying to make a distinction between the headlines and the trend lines. If there was ever a place where studying the trend lines would lead you to conclude that sooner is better than later for deal-making, it would be there."
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2009/12/clinton_how_better_weapons_cou.html

TW: Clinton makes good points (as he usually does, honest I am keeping my eyes out for similar insight from W. Bush...). Trend lines in the Israeli-Palestinian realm are troubling mostly for the Israelis although every day that goes by with the Palestinian mired in their poverty and partial anarchy is a day lost for them as well.

The weapons technology is also very interesting, one would think more accurate missiles would create a greater threat for Israel which it certainly does at a certain level. But the current inaccuracy provides a certain level of cover for the missile firers. Should they hit something it would be due to "bad luck" and the inaccuracy allows the perpetrators to maintain a certain level of terror without actually setting off the direct retribution should mass casualties occur.

Should they have missiles capable of actual accuracy then they would have to assume direct responsibility for their actions. Should mass casualties occur "chance" would no longer be part of the equation. The blame would be direct, retribution therefore more likely and most importantly more widely supported by outsiders such as Europe etc. As asymmetry between Israel and Hamas is reduced, the ability of Hamas to play the victim diminishes even as their ability to inflict damage potentially increases. As the conflict becomes more conventional the Israelis would retain their head to head superiority arguably making increased accuracy undesirable for Hamas/Hezbollah et al. There is a reason one frequently hears Hamas et al. boasting of rockets with increased range but not necessarily increased accuracy.

Agita or Reassurance?

TW: I suppose at this point one either sees this photo and feels reassurance or serious agita. Obviously for me it is the former.

46 Years Ago

TW: Walter Cronkite passed away earlier this year. This clip captured as well as any the contemporaneous shock of the event he covered 47 years ago today.

We Know What To Do Just Not How To Do It

From Newsweek's review of Taylor Branch's new book on his Bill Clinton tapes taken during Clinton's presidency:
"...Clinton tells Branch that the embargo on Cuba is a 'foolish, pandering failure' but seems unable to do anything to lift it, while the ruling Assad dynasty in Damascus apparently has access to the State Department and the White House at all times. There is daily concern about the volatility of Israeli politics and the spread of irritating yet apparently somehow unstoppable Jewish "settlements..."

From Karen Tumulty at Time interviewing former Republican Senate majority leader Bill Frist (TN):
"...Were he still in the Senate, "I would end up voting for it[health care reform]," he said. "As leader, I would take heat for it. ... That's what leadership is all about...

Frist also faults some in his own party for injecting alarmism into the debate. "Clearly, the death panels and public plan arguments have been overblown," he says. Frist noted that Republicans themselves voted for a Medicare prescription drug bill that would have established a version of a public plan--with the government negotiating directly with drug companies--if private-sector competition had failed to materialize. That is similar to the approach that Republican Senator Olympia Snowe is taking with her amendment to establish a public option with a "trigger."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/216052

While Frist believes that the bill will pass, he worries that the Obama Administration and Congress have not given enough attention to what happens next: the implementation. The first few years are likely to be rough, he predicts. States will be struggling to set up new marketplaces for insurance coverage, their medicaid rolls will grow, taxes will go up, and consumers will not yet see the benefits. "The Republicans will go wild," using the start-up difficulties as a tool for fundraising and for making their case in the next election... "
http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2009/10/02/bill-frist-on-health-bill-id-vote-for-it/

TW: It is all very easy when out-of-power. Clinton states the obvious (and recall these were comments when he was still in office) on things like Cuba and Israel but could do little to shift policy. Frist sounds imminently reasonable on health care but I strongly doubt he would have stated the above had he still been in office. The solutions are not always the difficult part (AfPak is a likely exception). Getting democratic institutions to implement them is a different story. Why is that? Competing parochial interests (wanna lose several Florida house seats, open up Cuba), dysfunctional institutions (perpetual campaigning, what about actually governing for a bit) and a hundred other reasons.

40% Of Americans Want a Fundamentally Different Nation

Taegen Goddard:
"A new CNN/Opinion Research poll finds that 41% of Americans believe that President Obama's health care reform plan will lead to government panels withholding life-or-death treatments from patients. Said pollster Keating Holland: "That's a minority, but it's a pretty sizable one, and that could spell trouble for the White House."This comes after President Obama called such claims -- made by Sarah Palin and others -- as "lies" in his speech before Congress last week."

TW: This death panel meme has been around now for a couple of months. It is no longer a "rumor", folks at this point either believe their POTUS or believe Sarah Palin/Limbaugh etc., facts be damned (I am personally done trying to argue about it). This is where demagoguery leads. Little nuggets of truth are twisted into falsehoods which become embedded within the public's consciousness.

When folks lament the inability of our government to act decisively one should remember the results above. Folks choose to "trust" Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh over their POTUS. Such is the challenge of democracy. Are things getting worse? The only thing that provides (mixed) comfort for me is the knowledge that right-wing nuttery is not new and we have survived. What is new perhaps is their embrace by senior Republican leadership but the transition of the Barry Goldwater bloc into the leadership of the Republican party was already in motion by November, 1963 (and Goldwater himself would likely puke if he saw how far right some of his Republican colleagues have evolved). This genre of folks is reactionary with a perverse view of what constitutes "real" America.

From Vanity Fair:
"...[JFK biographer]Manchester...discovered that Dallas “had become the Mecca for medicine-show evangelists … the Minutemen, the John Birch and Patrick Henry Societies, and the headquarters of [ultra-conservative oil billionaire] H. L. Hunt and his activities.”

“In that third year of the Kennedy presidency,” Manchester wrote, “a kind of fever lay over Dallas country. Mad things happened. Huge billboards screamed, ‘Impeach Earl Warren.’ Jewish stores were smeared with crude swastikas.…Radical Right polemics were distributed in public schools; Kennedy’s name was booed in classrooms; corporate junior executives were required to attend radical seminars.” A retired major general ran the American flag upside down, deriding it as “the Democrat flag.” A wanted poster with J.F.K.’s face on it was circulated, announcing “this man is Wanted” for—among other things—“turning the sovereignty of the US over to the Communist controlled United Nations” and appointing “anti-Christians … aliens and known Communists” to federal offices. And a full-page advertisement had appeared the day of the assassination in The Dallas Morning News accusing Kennedy of making a secret deal with the Communist Party..."



From

Eisenhower On the Peril Of Ignorant Populism

From Max Blumenthal at NYT:
"IN this summer of town hall disruptions and birth-certificate controversies, a summer when it seemed as if the Republican Party had been captured by its extremist wing, it is worth recalling a now-obscure letter from President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Although Eisenhower is commonly remembered for a farewell address that raised concerns about the “military-industrial complex,” his letter offers an equally important — and relevant — warning: to beware the danger posed by those seeking freedom from the “mental stress and burden” of democracy.

The story began in 1958, when Eisenhower received a letter from Robert Biggs, a terminally ill World War II veteran. Biggs told the president that he “felt from your recent speeches the feeling of hedging and a little uncertainty.” He added, “We wait for someone to speak for us and back him completely if the statement is made in truth.”

Eisenhower could have discarded Biggs’s note or sent a canned response. But he didn’t. He composed a thoughtful reply. After enduring Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, who had smeared his old colleague Gen. George C. Marshall as a Communist sympathizer, and having guarded the Republican Party against the newly emergent radical right John Birch Society, which labeled him and much of his cabinet Soviet agents, the president perhaps welcomed the opportunity to expound on his vision of the open society.

“I doubt that citizens like yourself could ever, under our democratic system, be provided with the universal degree of certainty, the confidence in their understanding of our problems, and the clear guidance from higher authority that you believe needed,” Eisenhower wrote on Feb. 10, 1959. “Such unity is not only logical but indeed indispensable in a successful military organization, but in a democracy debate is the breath of life.”

Eisenhower also recommended a short book — “The True Believer” by Eric Hoffer, a self-educated itinerant longshoreman who earned the nickname “the stevedore philosopher.” “Faith in a holy cause,” Hoffer wrote, “is to a considerable extent a substitute for the lost faith in ourselves.”

Though Eisenhower was criticized for lacking an intellectual framework or even an interest in ideas, he was drawn to Hoffer’s insights. He explained to Biggs that Hoffer “points out that dictatorial systems make one contribution to their people which leads them to tend to support such systems — freedom from the necessity of informing themselves and making up their own minds concerning these tremendous complex and difficult questions.” The authoritarian follower, Eisenhower suggested, desired nothing more than insulation from the pressures of a free society.

Alluding to Senator McCarthy and his allies, Eisenhower pointed out that cold war fears were distorted and exploited for political advantage. “It is difficult indeed to maintain a reasoned and accurately informed understanding of our defense situation on the part of our citizenry when many prominent officials, possessing no standing or expertness as they themselves claim it, attempt to further their own ideas or interests by resorting to statements more distinguished by stridency than by accuracy.”

It is worth noting, of course, that these Cold War exaggerations weren’t just a Republican specialty: John F. Kennedy was making a supposed “missile gap” between the United States and the Soviet Union a key element of his presidential campaign..."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/opinion/03blumenthal.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=max%20blumenthal&st=cse

Say What You Will...

TW: about this family- the carousing, the deviousness, the Freudian petrie dishiness of the whole thing- but Mr. and Mrs. Kennedy created a family with some talent. That Edward was the only son to die of natural causes is amazing in and of itself given their exploits.

Ronald Reagan Railing Against Medicare And Those Damn Socialists

TW: A 1961 audio of then political pundit Ronald Reagan railing against the possibility of socialized medicine which at the time was the pending Medicare legislation. LBJ did not pull Medicare out of his backside it was originally proposed by Truman (health care reform is never fast). Reagan's arguments/scaremongering hardly differ from much of today's debate.

Waxy POTUSes

TW: I don't recall ever stepping foot into a wax museum. This display I think validates my policy. Those are some strange looking folks.

If You Have Not Seen "John Adams" Do So

TW: Adams led an extraordinary life during a tumultuous period and the acting by Laura Linney and Paul Giamatti was very good.

Fourth Of July Quotes: Jimmy Madison

We continue our Fourth of July quotations with Mr. Madison our fourth POTUS and key contributor to the actual design of our constitution.

"Each generation should be made to bear the burden of its own wars, instead of carrying them on, at the expense of other generations."

"And I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together."

"America was indebted to immigration for her settlement and prosperity. That part of America which had encouraged them most had advanced most rapidly in population, agriculture and the arts."

"It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood. " [TW: the lobbyists have shredded this hope]

"Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. "

"Ambition must be made to counteract ambition."

"All men having power ought to be distrusted to a certain degree"

"If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy"

"A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce, or a tragedy, or perhaps both."

TW: I could go on all day with Madison quotes, he was a genius on par with Jefferson. You can thank those two for most of the good bits of our governance.

Fourth Of July Quotes: Tommy Jefferson

TW: On the Fourth I thought it would be interesting to pull up some quotes from our distinguished forefathers who designed and built the greatest governmental structure ever created (or at least greatest compared to all others before or since).

We start with Mr. Jefferson:

"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."

"A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine."

"Conquest is not in our principles. It is inconsistent with our government. "

"Books constitute capital. A library book lasts as long as a house, for hundreds of years. It is not, then, an article of mere consumption but fairly of capital, and often in the case of professional men, setting out in life, it is their only capital."

"An injured friend is the bitterest of foes."

"Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty."

"Experience demands that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor."

"He who knows best knows how little he knows."

Working For Obama v. Bubba Clinton

TW: Another example of why I think our current POTUS might just be able to get some things done. Obviously the sausage making process currently underway relative to climate and health care reform shows an almost super-human person is needed in order to have any chance of actual reform occurring.

As for Bubba C., an unbelievable talent ultimately diminished tremendously by the lack of discipline. He was a very good POTUS who could have been so much more. Discipline in his governing style and discipline in his personal life would have made him a real force. It took Bubba a couple of years to really figure out the governing piece. Then he f'ed it all up with the Monica thing. He should have resigned btw. If he had, Gore would have been POTUS instead W. Bush, leaving the world in far better shape than it was on Jan 23rd, 2009.

From Christian Science Monitor interview with Rahm Emanuel:
"EMANUEL: I think President Obama has one of the most disciplined minds and styles I've ever seen. And I think of my – I exercise every day. I've been doing it for umpteen years. I read a book, one every three weeks, I think I'm personally pretty disciplined. This guy is incredibly disciplined. And not only, structured, but his mind is unbelievably disciplined.
Q: For instance?

EMANUEL: He goes into a meeting and he'll have read the brief the night before, and have the crux of his argument written down that he wants to drive that discussion to basic points. And he goes right to either the assumptions, the presumptions of the case. Now, I mean, I loved, as you know, working for President Clinton, who had an unbelievably creative mind. And I think was, for a host of reasons, was a very significant president. I was honored to work for him. Their contexts are different, so while every president has a domestic issue and an international issue, etc., I mean, President Obama has what President Clinton had, but, I don't want to say, it's not appropriate to say on steroids, but by a quotient of 10."

Do We Really Need All Of These Real Estate Subsidies?

TW: This goes in the category of something that will NEVER happen, but probably should. Housing and real estate are supported by so many government subsidies. Many forget about the old capital gains rules whereby real estate gains were treated like other capital gains. Why should they be treated differently? Why for that matter should mortgage interest be deductible? The Canadians make do without it as does many other nations.

The other point is how decisions taken many years ago fester and then create implications far down the road. I have posted about pension decisions made during the 1990's coming back to haunt us. The 1990's were the real Goldilocks economy. There was a very real peace dividend related to the collapse of the U.S.S.R. and the favorable demographics of the baby boomers were at their peak. Many policies made back then are not sounding so useful now (Glass-Steagall was ended then as well).

From Ezra Klein at WaPo:
"...Bill Clinton might have left office before the worst of the financial sector's excesses. But he wasn't blameless in hyping the housing bubble:

In 1997 Congress made the first $500,000 of capital gains on the sale of a home tax-free for a married couple and $250,000 tax-free for a single person. This gave real estate a distinct advantage over other capital investments and distorted investment decisions from that time on. I'm sure you could find a graph that would show the beginnings of the housing bubble in 1997. I'm not blaming the entire crisis on this tax change or on the Clinton Administration but it definitely constituted a significant Governmental puff into the housing bubble.

This wasn't only Clinton, of course. Ceaselessly pushing homeownership has been a bipartisan preoccupation in America. For readers who want a fuller picture of this, I'd recommend Alyssa Katz's forthcoming book, Our Lot: How Real Estate Came to Own Us..."

We Are All Big Spenders

TW: Norris specs out federal spending by party over the past 50 years. His point is the old cliche that Dems spend more than Republicans is not borne out. To me the point is that just about everyone spends too much but just on different things. Broadly speaking Dems generally want to spend more on things like education and health care, the Republicans defense and prisons. Clinton was the only one who saw material decreases and some of that was due to the "peace dividend" post-Cold War.

The net result is there never has been a clear consensus to cut spending everyone always has their pet priorities. So again if and when Americans decide they are serious about building a more secure economic future (i.e. less reliant on debt), they will sacrifice their own pet priorities and demand politicians cut the Big Three- social security, health care and defense. Until then the discussions are all BS.

From Floyd Norris at NYT:
"...It used to be — before Ronald Reagan — that the federal government grew when the Democrats were in office, and became smaller when the Republicans were in the Oval Office.
Since then, the relationship has reversed.

The figures that follow are the increase (or decrease) in real gross domestic product caused by federal government spending...In 2008, the federal government gain was 3.0 percent, according to preliminary data. That was the largest since 1967, when it was an increase in Vietnam War spending, coupled with the Great Society, that produced the surge in government growth. (Remember “guns vs. butter”?)

Here are the figures for average contribution of the federal government to growth in G.D.P., by four-year terms. A positive sign means the government grew in real terms. A negative one means it got smaller. The figures are compound annual changes for each term.
1949-52 (Truman, D) +8.7%
1953-57 (Eisenhower, R) -1.3%
1957-60 (Eisenhower, R) -0.2%
1961-64 (Kennedy-Johnson, D) +2.1%
1965-68 (Johnson-D) +4.3%
1969-72 (Nixon, R) -2.8%
1973-76 (Nixon-Ford, R) -0.7%
1977-80 (Carter, D) +1.0%
1981-84 (Reagan, R) +1.1%
1985-88 (Reagan, R) +1.7%
1989-92 (GHW Bush, R) +0.7%
1993-96 (Clinton, D) -2.6%
1997-2000 (Clinton, D) -0.1%
2001-04 (GW Bush, R) +0.9%
2005-08 (GW Bush, R) +0.9%
http://norris.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/06/big-government-republicans/

How Times Have Changed

TW: When I dug up yesterday's LBJ reference from White's "Making of the President 1964" I recalled another passage"

From "Making Of the President 1964":
"On October 7th [1964], Walter Jenkins, the President's closest personal associate...walked...to the basement of the DC YMCA, a notorious gathering place of homosexuals...35 minutes later, in the men's room, he was arrested...within 48 hours the story leaked to the Republicans...Barry Goldwater...had been informed...but he remained silent...[several days later the story leaked out to the MSM and was publicized widely]

...it was apparent...that Jenkins...must be hospitalized...the nation had to face the fact that the President's closest assistant...was a sexual deviate...

For 24 full hours Republicans and Democrats alike held their breath to see how the nation would react. And perhaps the most amazing of all events of the campaign of 1964 is that the nation faced the fact fully- and shrugged it shoulders.

...the only important matter was national security- had Jenkin's illness weakened or opened a latch on matters of security..."

TW: Two things struck me from the passage. One, the event occurred on October 7th just about a month before the election amidst the white heat of a race for the White House (albeit one that was not close at the time). In today's environment a scandal of this sort would have blown into the central theme of the campaign for at least a week. Whereas Barry Goldwater and his surrogates largely ignored the event, I suspect pundits and surrogates in either party would have turned the scandal into a complete 24/7 obsessive free for all overflowing with righteous indignation and extrapolated implications. In this respect, the good old days are perhaps missed.

Secondly, the way homosexuality was treated. Ted White was a progressive but took pity on Jenkins as a diseased deviate requiring hospitalization. Perhaps one of the reasons for the muted public reaction was how far beyond the pale such matters were considered 45 years ago. Nevertheless, to say the role of gays in society has evolved in the past decades is a considerable understatement.

LBJ "100 Days" Post-Mortem

TW: I was thumbing through Theodore H. White's "Making Of the President 1964" as I recalled White's glowing praise for LBJ in the book and wanted to use it as a metaphor for LBJ's "100 Days" critique. Unfortunately the narrative does not fit into a sufficiently concise summary to get into here, but there was this one sentence:

"There is no less word than superb to describe the performance of LBJ as he became POTUS...his calm, his command-presence, his doings, his unlimited energies- endow him with superlative grace.

TW: Understanding White's "Making Of the President" series used a more hagiographic style than more contemporary (e.g. post Watergate) chroniclers. And White was certainly a huge JFK fan, but if one reads the 1968 or 1972 books, one would find Nixon being described in glowing terms as well, even if the 1972 book (written in mid-1973) started to reflect concerns about the then just emerging Watergate scandal.

Nevertheless, the above sentiment is somewhat stunning given the atmosphere by the end of LBJ's second term. On the other hand, the sentiments regarding LBJ's personality were largely accurate much like how Sidey's impressions of Reagan and Time's impressions of Carter were more or less borne out by their later actions. LBJ was a bundle of energy and strong-willed unfortunately those traits only exacerbated his path towards quagmire in Vietnam, the issue which clouds beyond any recognition LBJ's legacy.

Yes, LBJ's Great Society has been criticized ex post facto but at the time it was very popular and those critiques were representative of a secular shift in American politics not a personal critique of LBJ. Are all of the "100 day" critiques of any use? Perhaps only in providing an initial definition of the POTUS' style and overall approach to the role. Ultimately that style and approach will have to fit either snugly or not into the various and highly unpredictable circumstances which confront a POTUS, those circumstances combined with the POTUS's skills will define the final legacy.