Do you think media criticism of Bush has increased because:

[lostnfound]

The thread on the Boston Globe article http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=1083737">"Endgame for the President?" refers to one example of press articles that are getting more openly negative towards Bush. Got me to wondering whether you all attributed this to the same things I do, or if you have other theories. Here's the exerpt from the Globe article:

"After an excruciating delay, chickens are finally coming home to roost for George W. Bush. For over a year, critics have been pointing to the president's systematic misrepresentations of everything from Iraq to education to budget numbers. But the charge hasn't really stuck, until very lately.

This past week, however, Bush seems to have hit a tipping point. Chief arms inspector David Kay testified before Congress that the intelligence reports were entirely wrong about Saddam's supposed weapons and that the much maligned UN inspectors were right.

[plurality]

1. The corporate aristocrats have a backup plan...

and his name is Kerry!

[RapidCreek]

19. Hopefully I am wrong...

but I believe this to be the case as well.

Bush has served his intended purpose....He has done to the United States what he has done with every business he ever headed. Destroyed it.

Rich get rich by buying low and selling high. A cyclically destroyed economy and wars provide the necessary exit and entry points in such a strategy. Continuous growth and progress and the elements of expertise that are required to exact either are impediments to the over all goal...the procurement of quick money.

RC

[salin]

2. There comes a point

when it is too hard to gloss over too many items that are in the public domain - without permanently damaging one's own reputation - not with the liberals and moderate liberals (that credibility has been long gone) - but with the majority of the population. We may have just begun to reach that point. Too many big problems on too many fronts - and very little cover given from the WH starting with the anemic SOTU. Remember how much build up there was to the SOTU - he was going to take all of the wind out of dem momentum from the primaries.... that talk that ended about 15 minutes after his speech concluded.

From math so fuzzy that they couldn't gloss - annual deficits of more than 500b that are GROWING being sold as 'being cut in half' in the future (according to the wh before - the budget deficit should have been shrunk to well under 100b - but not with their drunken sailor spending)

From a war that was pumped with testostorone that now looks like it was pumped with placebo.

From an economy being cheered - that is still shedding jobs (or stabilizing at a much, much lower level than before bush got started) and whose indicators that ARE positive demonstrate some long-term troubling structural issues ... dwelling on the positive (productivity gains while losing jobs - net ave salary levels declining - gains in salaries (small) being outpaced by increases in consumption (eg folks going further into debt.) - Hard to keep selling these as positive.

The list goes on and on. I could be wrong - but I think that more and more journalists are realizing that the thin veneer of reporting news vs propoganda - is becoming more clear to a larger portion of the public.

I suspect that if voter turnout was higher in yesterdays primaries as it was in the first primaries (the huge media attention on the first two could give an artificial impression) and if that trend holds - it is sending a big message to the media... the public sentiment is turning despite your glossy, fluffy coverage... and that more awakened, critical public is going to be looking at pure puff/cheerleading reporting that doesn't jibe with reality more and more critically.

[BigDaddyLove]

3. Absolutely fantastic and dead-on post.

:yourock:

[Beetwasher]

5. Critical Mass

Yeah, you pretty much nailed it.

It's just too damn much. People are catching on, albeit much slower than we geniuses at DU ;-)

[Hamlette]

7. what salin said

There is a sea change. It happened last fall when Bush asked for an additional $87 Billion for the war. (note the timing, if Bush was asking for $87 Billion for the war post Kay report he'd by lynched.) But it faded. We were back to "don't say anything bad about Bush" within a couple of weeks. Now it has been unleashed again because of the Kay report. The question is, how long will it last?

The string I grasp for hope is that the American people supported Bill Clinton by 70%. That was his approval rating during the impeachment trial when the media had been giving us nothing but "Clinton is a rapist" for 6 years. The danger is that some people supported Clinton because they thought he was being unfairly treated. Will they come to think that of Bush?

[ProfessorGAC]

9. Big Money Has A Way Of Hanging Around The Neck. . .

. . .like a millstone. Remember the bulk of the press and the american public believed that Iraq was a threat (because they were told that it was so) and didn't really mind the $87B because it was "the right thing to do".

Now, that folks are seeing that the whole thing was a boondoggle, it's a different story. It doesn't matter to the average MOR voter why we screwed this up, only that we did. They don't have to even believe Bush lied, but now it's a matter of "A hundred billion dollars for nothing?!?!?" That gets people's juices flowing.

I don't think this is as temporary as the earlier ones and i also don't think the parallels you draw to Clinton are valid. Remember that ALL OF THIS IS BUSH'S OWN DOING! His people were wrong about the size of the deficits. His people were wrong about the Iraq threat. His people were wrong about how the economy would generate jobs. Now this is all on him. He's not the victim and i don't think people will see him that way.

No matter how much conventional economists and econopundits(like Amity Shlaes, for instance) want to describe the recovery, a recovery is not a recovery in perception if people are worried about their next paycheck being there.

This is sticking right now and i think will do so later, because the whole smoke and mirrors thing was blown away by two things; Iraq and $500 billion.
The Professor

[Beetwasher]

10. Good Points Prof, but also

They are STILL not admitting they were wrong about anything. They are sticking to their same stories. Economy good, deficits no problem, jobs coming, Rummy's even saying today they may still find WMD. People recognize that they aren't even the least bit repentant, so how could they have pity or even forgive them when they aren't even asking for forgiveness or admitting mistakes? With WMD's they are not admitting they were wrong, they are blaming the CIA and shirking responsibility. People GET this intuitively and no longer trust them because of it, and there's just been SOOOOO much of it from these thugs that it's reached a critical mass.

[ProfessorGAC]

11. We're Both Right

They're sticking to their stories, but the press is more bold and people are starting to hold their noses a bit from the stink.

For 2+ years after 9/11, people were willing to ignore the malodor. It's now too strong to ignore.

Look at the numbers. Kerry beats him head to head in two polls. Dean beats him in one and is a dead heat in another. Clark, same thing. His approval ratings are down to 48% on Zogby, 49% on CNN/Gallup, 47% on ARI. A wartime president with approval numbers below 50 and falling???? The middle of the road folks are starting to be UNABLE to ignore the smell. 9/11 or no 9/11, there are people who are now thinking he's NOT the right guy to lead this long term fight. Those are the MOR folks who voted 50% for him last time. That's why the shift in ratings now. And, don't forget, that they started their re-election campaign 5 months ago! And he's still falling in the polls!

So, while they're still sticking to their story, the people who are now smelling the stench realize where it's coming from. The more they stick to those stories, the less likely it will be that they'll win back those folks. Come November, he only wins by the skin of his teeth, or he loses. No mandate. No landslide. I think, personally, you can stick a fork in him. But, even if i'm wrong, it will be at least as close as last time. He's losing the middle. Very bad for him.
The Professor

[Beetwasher]

13. Agreed!

Honestly though, I don't even think he can win a fair election anymore. That's not to say he won't "win", he might, but it won't be because he got the most votes.

BTW, I think this would also be the tipping point where your bandwagon theory kicks in at full speed!

[ProfessorGAC]

16. You Remembered That?!?!?

Wow, good memory! If you remember i had the inflection point at 54% last June. He hit that for week last July, but he didn't fall lower and actually went back up for a while. But, he hit 54% again just before the Holidays and has never bounced back up. Hopefully i had the right number, just the wrong time.
The Professor

[LeahMira]

12. It's reaching critical mass...

There is a sea change. It happened last fall when Bush asked for an additional $87 Billion for the war. (note the timing, if Bush was asking for $87 Billion for the war post Kay report he'd by lynched.) But it faded. We were back to "don't say anything bad about Bush" within a couple of weeks. Now it has been unleashed again because of the Kay report. The question is, how long will it last?

Maybe when the budget figures get more attention and people begin to realize just what they have to give up in order to support this "war on terror." I just wonder how many seniors and nearly seniors are willing to volunteer to turn over their Social Security money to the military so "America is safe." People yell about the schools now, but what's it going to be like when they understand that their children are going to be in classrooms of fifty kids and using textbooks from the 1980s so "America is safe."

Too many things are coming to light about the Bush administration these days. I think it's finally coming to a critical mass. Although it certainly took a while, I think that now people are starting to think that maybe Democrats were right about Bush. I don't know that they are ready to give up their conservative points of view, but I do think they are having serious concerns about this administration. Let's hope.

[Hamlette]

18. some pundit last night said it all

he said Americans do not think Bush cares about them and lying about WMD is further evidence of that.

When you lie to someone (or 280,000,000 someones) you show contempt for them. For Bush to come out now and say "the real reason we went to war is _____." compounds the problem. If that was the real reason, why didn't you tell us at the time? Do you really think we are so stupid we wouldn't have been able to follow your logic?

The problem is, Bush is no boxed into a corner. He has NO money. Presidents usually propose social spending during an election year to win votes. He is such an idiot he thought going to Mars and immigration reform would help. Of course it just shows how out of touch he is. He should have waited a year on drug benefits. It would have been the only thing he had and we wouldn't have discovered before the election that his numbers were wrong.

It is FASCINATING to watch what he will do to dig out of this hole. If the pundit is right (and I think he was) how does Bush show us he cares?

(While I'm on the subject, the pundit was on with Scarborough who was completely dissing Kerry for his speech patterns and expressions. Why or WHY didn't someone say: "he's not one tenth as bad as Bush." Hypocrites all.)

And for clarification, my point about Clinton's approval rating was just that given enough time Americans get it.

[calimary]

14. I think you spell it out pretty well.

We're reaching critical (!) mass.

[rman]

4. backup plan - except that the already had such a plan,

it's just that now is the time to implement it.

[eissa]

6. Just temporary

With the coverage the primaries are getting, it would be expected that criticism of the president would be more prevalent now. I worry once the nominee is chosen though; we'll see the entire * machinery come down hard on our poor guy. That's why I'd like to see the primaries drawn out a bit; if our guys could tone down the rhetoric against each other and focus on * only, it makes for great coverage and helps influence the public.

[Zero Gravitas]

8. Tipping Point

I think the Kay revelation was a tipping point. The lies and cynical politcal ploys have built a large latent mistrust of Great Leader Bush, but it was out weighed by the whole We're At War thing. Now it turns out that the WMDs were Weapons of Mass Delusion and, bad intelligence or not, there is no way to positively spin spending 100s of American and 1,000s of Iraqi lives, 100s of billions of dollars on a non-existent threat not to mention alienating the entire planet. I don't care how clever Rove is or how craven the media whores are you just can't make the Iraq situation look good no matter how big a bastard Saddam was.

[GreenPartyVoter]

15. It's currently fashionable, dahlink!

[SpiralHawk]

17. The shit has backed up so deep and is spilling so wildly

all over the frikking place, that the media cannot really ignore it totally. But they have yet to roll up their sleeves and actually tackle this mess in any substantive way. They have lost my respect altogether.