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All the President's FlunkiesWhy Bush stands by his incompetents.

By John Dickerson
Posted Monday, Aug. 27, 2007, at 1:12 PM ET

Click here to read more of Slate's coverage of Alberto Gonzales.

Alberto Gonzales. Click image to expand.

Like the pope, the president doesn't admit error. This was an early governing principle in the Bush White House. Policies could "evolve." Talking points could be replaced by new ones that contradicted the earlier ones. The president could even resist a centralized approach to homeland security and then announce the creation of the second-largest department in the history of the federal government devoted to that purpose. But a president could never admit a blunder, because it irrevocably diminished his authority. This led to a famously awkward press conference in April 2004 where President Bush was unable to come up with a mistake he had committed and explain what he had learned from it. Since then, he has tried to improve on that answer but has admitted aloud only that he wishes he hadn't used certain phrases, like "Bring 'em on" when referring to insurgent attacks in Iraq.

Nowhere has this approach sapped Bush's credibility more than with his personnel goofs. As Alberto Gonzales resigns today, he joins Donald Rumsfeld, Harriet Miers, and Michael Brown—animated failures who could not be controlled or improved with good public relations. The pattern has been consistent: The president resists and resists calls for a change. Then he gives in. In Gonzales' case, it's almost as if Bush were perfecting this failed approach, wringing out of his embattled old friend so many embarrassing gaffes that he couldn't be hurt anymore. Then he let him go.

The more radioactive his aides become, the more Bush embraces them. With Gonzales, the president was particularly alone in this stance. Conservatives who might otherwise defend Bush against Democrats were appalled by Gonzales' incompetence and the utter waste of time and energy devoted to cleaning up his messy department. Why does Bush hang on until his mistakes are glowing? In Gonzales' case, there is their long-standing personal relationship. Bush brought him up from Texas and admires his up-by-the-bootstraps story. "I think of my friend Al Gonzales, recently sworn in as a Supreme Court justice," Bush said in his second inaugural address as governor, back in 1999. "His parents reared eight children in a two-bedroom house in Houston. They sacrificed so that their children would have a chance to succeed. Al Gonzales has realized their dream."

As a broader management practice, though, Bush has made a fetish of loyalty even when unaccompanied by ability. He saw how disloyal aides undercut his father. To win loyalty, Bush shows it. He also delights in riling his opponents and the Washington elites. If the "hand-wringers" and "second-guessers" wanted Gonzales out, that was even more reason to dig in his heels. Bush once said in an interview that he liked to lean forward a little during his State of the Union speeches when he knew what he was about to say would rile Democrats.

Bush also feels the essence of virtue is resisting any public outcry. He does this for public as well as internal purposes. "A president has got to be the calcium in the backbone," Bush told author Bob Woodward. "If I weaken, the whole team weakens. If I'm doubtful, I can assure you there will be a lot of doubt." Most famously Bush did this with FEMA Administrator Michael Brown, declaring that he'd done a "heck of a job" during the early days after Katrina. More glaring, though, was his consistent defense of Gonzales. In April, only moments after Gonzales gave a spectacularly inept and dishonest performance before the Senate judiciary committee, Bush said his confidence in Gonzales had increased.

The personnel failures make it very hard for Bush fans to defend the president because they so deeply undermine the tenets of his management style as he articulates it. Bush has often talked in almost mystical terms about his ability to take the measure of people by looking them in the eye. His most infamous snap judgment, early in his first term, was peeking into the soul of Vladimir Putin and finding goodness. But even with years of presidential experience, he continues to make terrible judgments about the aptitudes of his own staffers. Harriet Miers and Alberto Gonzales may be very nice people, but they were never competent for the jobs Bush wanted them to have.

In talking about the skills necessary for any president, Bush has almost always focused on personnel first. "If I were interviewing a guy for the job of president," he said when I interviewed him for Time in August 2004, "I'd ask, How do you make decisions? How would you get unfiltered information? Would you surround yourself with hacks? Are you scared of smart people? I've seen the effect of the Oval Office on people. People are prepared to come in and speak their minds, and then they get in there, and the place overwhelms them, and they say, 'Gee, Mr. President, you're looking good.' I need people who can walk in and say, 'Hey, you're not looking so great today.' "

This kind of talk thrilled Bush supporters, but the president has never exercised the kind of emotion-free decision-making he bragged about. When it came to personnel decisions, his personal sense of loyalty, his hostility to the Beltway establishment, and his stubbornness all clouded his judgment. Tolerating incompetence has harmed Bush in any number of ways. The worst of these is locking in the idea that he's oblivious to reality.

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John Dickerson is Slate's chief political correspondent and author of On Her Trail. He can be reached at .
Photograph of Alberto Gonzales by Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images. Photograph of George Bush on Slate's home page by Evan Vucci/AP Photo.
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Remarks from the Fray:

As to why Bush hires so many incompetent people in the first place, there is a simple explanation. At my old company, there was a human resources axiom: A people hire A people; B people hire C people. In other words, if you hire top managers, they'll hire top people for their teams, but mediocre managers will hire people even less competent than themselves. Bush is the quintessential B manager, and one has only to look at the people he hires to know it.

--AlexP

(To reply, click here.)

Most of us have known this for a while now, as John Dickerson's examples attest to. We've also known that this sense of unreasonable loyalty envelopes the Gonzales situation. What's new is that he eventually gave up on Gonzales, just like he did on the others. We know why he sticks with people, but not why he gives up on them.

I'm wondering about the questions: "Why now?" and "Who's next?" But mostly I'm trying to figure out if there's a pattern with when Bush gives up on people. Does he just do it when it's unexpected? Rumsfeld went the day after the 2006 elections, but Rove didn't, and Brownie was fired as soon as it became apparent that his competence couldn't be spun.

It's all very confusing to me. Anyone have thoughts?

--scottyhope

(To reply, click here.)

Your column would have made much more sense after the firing of Michael Brown, a man who truly seemed incompetent, even in President Bush's eyes.

Alberto Gonzales, though, was not at all incompetent at the job he was assigned by the President. He was, of course, highly incompetent at the typical job of Attorney General, in which he is was supposed to serve the People and the Constitution. But that wasn't the job that Mr. Bush wanted him to do. Mr. Bush wanted Mr. Gonzales to fire US Attorneys who were prosecuting Republicans or who were refusing to file bogus charges against Democrats. Mr. Bush also wanted Mr. Gonzales to appear to be forthcoming with Congress while at the same time steadfastly avoiding giving any impression that the directives to politicize the DOJ originated in the Whitehouse, in Karl Rove's and/or Dick Cheney's offices. This was, of course, an impossible task (it required lots of "I don't recall"s and a bit of lying), but Gonzales tackled this job that the President had assigned him masterfully. The Democrats in Congress were hoping finally to be able to pin the politicization of Justice — probably obstruction of justice — on the Whitehouse, and Gonzales entirely stymied them. Almost any other man would have rolled on his bosses, in order to preserve a shred of his own good name. Not Alberto Gonzales: he allowed himself to be the scapegoat for all that is wrong with the Administration's handling of Justice, and in so doing whitewashed the Whitehouse.

Incompetent? Not by a long shot.

--dslack

(To reply, click here.)

The unfortunate fact is, when the political system becomes envenomed by partisan hatred, a president more and more needs loyalty. Just name me a president who didn't keep advisors who were subpar because of their loyalty. Griffin Bell, anyone?

The only solution is a return to civility in our public life, but, judging from the current positioning of the Democrat party, which positions seem to be against everything and for nothing, that seems unlikely in the short term. And no, I do not exclude the lunacies of the religious right from this condemnation.

--buzzerbill

(To reply, click here.)

Unfortunately for the current administration, I have had the displeasure for the past several years to suffer under management in my personal working life that looks and acts suspiciously like that in Washington. Does anyone else recognize a co-worker in the irritating condescension of Condi? The godawful self importance and abrasion of Rumsfeld? Or the general incompetence of ____ (fill in the blank)? (S/He could have been any member of the clueless upper management where I worked.)

My real life experiences of being passed over for promotions in favor of the far less qualified, working with dumbasses in positions of power, and enduring the daily onslaughts of yet more tiresome ignoramuses up the food chain have made me very suspicious of the entire bush group.

I feel I am not alone in this, which is why I believe so many people in America simply tune out of Washington - it doesn't do any good to complain, either at the office or in the voting booth. The cronies, suckups and backbiters continue to get promoted, make more money than God, and get recognized far in excess of their contributions. (Class warfare? Nope. Just the way it is.)

So the next time we hear that some administration wants to run things "like a business" remember how much fun it was to be at the office and have the whole country run like "that" department.

--hastings

(To reply, click here.)

(8/30)

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