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December 10, 2003
Bush, Dean, and low expectations
For the last few months, we all know that Bush has been doing badly in the polls. Iraq, the economy, Medicare, Karl Rove-- he's been getting bad press, and public support has dropped accordingly. The recent media reporting of some positive indicators, like a supposedly recovering economy and that Thanksgiving in Iraq stunt, might be worrying some people, who would prefer to see his approval ratings continue to drop. New York magazine's Michael Wolff has an interesting piece about Bush's ability to bounce back, and go through reversal after reversal, seemingly unscathed. The article thinks this is due largely to the low expectations we all have for Bush: "When bad things have happened, we池e not shocked, nor disappointed擁n some sense, we池e surprised it wasn稚 much worse. We have a unique tolerance for him."
The surprising bit is how public views about Howard Dean also seem to bounce up and down with little long-term damage. Because Dean was such an unknown at the start of the campaign, we didn't have any expectations for him, either. "Dean, an unlikely and confounding Democratic nominee, may be, in some partially comic sense, perfectly matched to George Bush. Each has a cultivated lack of stature, a sense of unprepossessingness, which seems to earn them the benefit of the doubt. They may be similar ciphers." Then Wolff says he thinks that Bush will clearly come out ahead.
I'm not so sure about that: whereas Bush's whoppers, misjudgements, and poor speaking skills have led him on a steady decline in public support for two years now, as the public has learned more about Dean, his supporters have only increased. And can I just say that since no primary elections have actually been held yet, we still don't have a Democratic candidate. So hold your horses, people. -amy
Before we can judge Dean's resiliency, I think we need to wait until we see how he handles the pressure of taking on GWB. -adm
