From: Evan Smith
To: Greg Curtis, Paul Burka, Skip Hollandsworth, Joe Nick Patoski, Pam Colloff, and Patricia Kilday HartPosted Tuesday, March 28, 2000, at 9:00 PM ET
How conservative is George W. Bush? How capable? This week, the staff of Texas Monthly magazine allows Slate readers to eavesdrop as they discuss what kind of president Bush would make.
Comrades,
Many thoughts generated by your postings.
Fearless Leader: No, let's do get you started on education. All I hear from Bush and others is how he's done this or that on education—yet the Gore folks and their fellow travelers in Austin insist that statewide SAT scores are actually down during the Dubya Era. Which is it? Once and for all, I'd like to know precisely and exactly what it is that allows Bush to make the dean's list, as it were, and not wear the dunce cap. He got them to write a curriculum … ? Or his education advisers did? And what does "got them" mean?
Which brings me to another question, perhaps best answered by Paul: What can a governor of Texas do on education or any other issue, given the fact that Texas is a so-called weak governor state—that is, one in which the legislature, and specifically the lieutenant governor, wields the real power? Bush may be great at palling around with folks and shouting "Wazzup?" from the window of his guvmobile, but what effect can he actually have, constitutionally speaking? I wonder if, in fact, the answer is nothing, in which case we'll be faced this November with a contest between a guy who spent his time going to Rangers games and a guy who spent his time going to state funerals.
Joe Nick: Cranky suits you. And it's nice to listen to/read an intelligent crank for a change. The people who attack him regularly—I mean really attack him—are straight out of the bar scene in Star Wars: hit-man-hiring biographers, alternative weeklings, and, predictably, Molly Ivins, the Jar Jar Binks of unreconstructed liberalism. I don't doubt that she and my close personal friend Lou Dubose are sincere in their desire to prune Shrub, but their book reads like one long rant. Not a single person who isn't already disposed to dislike the guy is going to be swayed. Ah, the Bush books. Pam, as a connoisseur of the genre, do you think they're about advancing the ball or just about pocketing the advance? Biz Mitchell collected more during the primaries than Alan Keyes and Gary Bauer combined. Scary.
Over to you,
Evan
From: Evan Smith
To: Greg Curtis, Paul Burka, Skip Hollandsworth, Joe Nick Patoski, Pam Colloff, and Patricia Kilday HartPosted Tuesday, March 28, 2000, at 9:00 PM ET How conservative is George W. Bush? How capable? This week, the staff of
Texas Monthly magazine allows
Slate readers to eavesdrop as they discuss what kind of president Bush would make.The participants in this dialogue include
Texas Monthly Editor Greg Curtis, Executive Editor Paul Burka, Deputy Editor Evan Smith, Senior Editors Skip Hollandsworth and Joe Nick Patoski, Associate Editor Pam Colloff, and Contributing Editor Patricia Kilday Hart.
Reader Response from The Fray:
[Note: Should be read after most recent Dialogue entry of the week.]
I find Ms Hart's (perfectly legitimate) complaint [Wednesday] about the "news columns"--ie, that they're showing an abominable if visceral loathing of Mr Bush--quite charming in its innocence. She seems to have somehow managed to avoid realizing that such an attitude has colored reporting of the Clinton administration for years, of Mr Gore, and indeed of just about any gopher who stuck his head up far enough to be hit with a mallet. The sole recent exception---the esteemed Senator from Arizona---avoided this solely by pandering to the reporters' idiot sense of their own moral and intellectual superiority and even he would have been savaged had he had any chance of victory.
I don't particularly like Mr Bush, but he was elected twice by a real state and he did manage to generate an awful lot of money and support among real people. I'm not awfully fond of Mr Gore, but he is pretty smart and well-educated and any sensible analysis of his fundraising activities needs to balanced against a history in which Republicans outspent Democrats dramatically--it's hard not to see Republican complaints about the Clinton/Gore fundraising as analogous to their complaints about many of the administration's policies: how dare they steal our issues/our techniques?
I think they both deserve to be treated seriously, courteously, and dispassionately. The chance of this happening in the current media atmosphere is about equal to the chance I will wake up tall, blonde, and skinny. Why does not a professional journalist realize this as well?
--Alan Kornheiser
(To reply, click here.)
(3/31)
I'm not surprised Governor Bush could impress the Texas Monthly writers with his policy expertise in a friendly, sympathetic small-group discussion. Most journalists hardly study policy at all; very little expertise is required to impress them. And, there isn't a politician alive who does not look more impressive talking to a sympathetic small group than he does to a large audience.
I didn't see any recognition in their discussion that a Governor's education policy, however successful, might not be terribly relevant to the conduct of foreign relations and management of the Pentagon. Yet the next President is very likely going to spend much more time in each of these areas that in education, all campaign rhetoric to the contrary notwithstanding.
Finally, I had to laugh at the comment that a dropped "g" at the end of the word "asking" identifies Bush as a Texan. Here in Wisconsin we have a very successful Governor who uses only two "g's", the one in "Governor" and his middle initial. I promise you that no one will ever mistake Tommy Thompson for a Texan.
--Joseph E Britt
(To reply, click here.)
Uh, who the hell is Joe Nick? And what is he so cranky about? Am I missing something?
--Paul
(To reply, click here.)
[Yes you were. Joe Nick Patoski replied here, filling in with the missing entry that made everyone else think he was cranky.]
(3/28)
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Reader Response from The Fray:
[Note: Should be read after most recent Dialogue entry of the week.]
I find Ms Hart's (perfectly legitimate) complaint [Wednesday] about the "news columns"--ie, that they're showing an abominable if visceral loathing of Mr Bush--quite charming in its innocence. She seems to have somehow managed to avoid realizing that such an attitude has colored reporting of the Clinton administration for years, of Mr Gore, and indeed of just about any gopher who stuck his head up far enough to be hit with a mallet. The sole recent exception---the esteemed Senator from Arizona---avoided this solely by pandering to the reporters' idiot sense of their own moral and intellectual superiority and even he would have been savaged had he had any chance of victory.
I don't particularly like Mr Bush, but he was elected twice by a real state and he did manage to generate an awful lot of money and support among real people. I'm not awfully fond of Mr Gore, but he is pretty smart and well-educated and any sensible analysis of his fundraising activities needs to balanced against a history in which Republicans outspent Democrats dramatically--it's hard not to see Republican complaints about the Clinton/Gore fundraising as analogous to their complaints about many of the administration's policies: how dare they steal our issues/our techniques?
I think they both deserve to be treated seriously, courteously, and dispassionately. The chance of this happening in the current media atmosphere is about equal to the chance I will wake up tall, blonde, and skinny. Why does not a professional journalist realize this as well?
--Alan Kornheiser
(To reply, click here.)
(3/31)
I'm not surprised Governor Bush could impress the Texas Monthly writers with his policy expertise in a friendly, sympathetic small-group discussion. Most journalists hardly study policy at all; very little expertise is required to impress them. And, there isn't a politician alive who does not look more impressive talking to a sympathetic small group than he does to a large audience.
I didn't see any recognition in their discussion that a Governor's education policy, however successful, might not be terribly relevant to the conduct of foreign relations and management of the Pentagon. Yet the next President is very likely going to spend much more time in each of these areas that in education, all campaign rhetoric to the contrary notwithstanding.
Finally, I had to laugh at the comment that a dropped "g" at the end of the word "asking" identifies Bush as a Texan. Here in Wisconsin we have a very successful Governor who uses only two "g's", the one in "Governor" and his middle initial. I promise you that no one will ever mistake Tommy Thompson for a Texan.
--Joseph E Britt
(To reply, click here.)
Uh, who the hell is Joe Nick? And what is he so cranky about? Am I missing something?
--Paul
(To reply, click here.)
[Yes you were. Joe Nick Patoski replied here, filling in with the missing entry that made everyone else think he was cranky.]
(3/28)