MTP Deconstruction: Bush the Uniter???

[Taeger]

Bush the Uniter????

Bush, the Uniter????
Russert: And we are back.
Mr. President, last time you were on the show you said that you wanted to change the tone in the nation.
President Bush: Yes.
Russert: This is Time magazine: "Love Him or Hate Him: Why George Bush arouses such passion and what it means for the country."
President Bush: Yes.
Russert: Tom Daschle, the Democratic Leader in the Senate, said that you've changed the tone for the worse; that it's more acrimonious, more confrontations, that you are the most partisan political president he's ever worked with.
Our exit polls of primary voters, not just Democrats but Independents in South Carolina and New Hampshire, more than 70 percent of them said they are angry or dissatisfied with you, and they point to this whole idea of being a uniter as opposed to a divider.
Why do you think you are perceived as such a divider?
President Bush: Gosh, I don't know, because I'm working hard to unite the country. As a matter of fact, it's the hardest part of being the president. I was successful as the Governor of Texas for bringing people together for the common good, and I must tell you it's tough here in Washington, and frankly it's the biggest disappointment that I've had so far of coming to Washington.
I'm not blaming anybody. It's just the environment here is such that it is difficult to find common ground. I‘ll give you a classic case: the Medicare bill. The Medicare bill was a tough vote, but the Medicare bill is a bill that a lot of people could have signed on to and had it not been for kind of the sense of, well, ‘Bush might win, we might lose,’ you know, or ‘Bush might lose, we might win’ kind of attitude.
And… but I will continue to work hard to unite the country. I don't speak ill of anybody in the process here. I think if you went back and looked at my comments, you will see I don't attack. I don't hold up people. I talk about what I believe in, and I lead, and maybe perhaps I believe so strongly in what we are doing around the world or doing here at home.
Russert: But around the world, in Europe, favorable ratings unfavorable ratings, 70 in Germany, 67 in France.
President Bush: But you know, Tim, that
Russert: Why do people hold you with such contempt
President Bush: Heck, I don't know, Ronald Reagan was unpopular in Europe when he was President, according to Jose Maria Aznar. And I said, ‘You know something? ‘
He said to me, he said, ‘You're nearly as unpopular as Ronald Reagan was.’ I said, ‘so, first of all, I'm keeping pretty good company.’
I think that people when you do hard things, when you ask hard things of people, it can create tensions. And I heck, I don't know why people do it. I'll tell you, though, I'm not going to change, see? I'm not trying to accommodate I won't change my philosophy or my point of view. I believe I owe it to the American people to say what I'm going to do and do it, and to speak as clearly as I can, try to articulate as best I can why I make decisions I make, but I'm not going to change because of polls. That's just not my nature.
Russert: Two polls out this weekend show you --
President Bush: See there, you're quoting polls.
Russert: you're trailing John Kerry in both U.S.A. Today and Newsweek polls by seven and five points.
President Bush: Yeah.
Russert: This is what John Kerry had to say last year. He said that his colleagues are appalled at the quote "President's lack of knowledge. They've managed him the same way they've managed Ronald Reagan. They send him out to the press for one event a day. They put him in a brown jacket and jeans and get him to move some hay or move a truck, and all of a sudden he's the Marlboro Man. I know this guy. He was two years behind me at Yale. I knew him, and he's still the same guy.”
Did you know him at Yale?
President Bush: No.
Russert: How do you respond to that?
President Bush: Politics. I mean, this is—you know, if you close your eyes and listen carefully to what you just said, it sounds like the year 2000 all over again.


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