Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)

There's a moment when a school of fish all changes direction at the same time. They watch each other, or some lead fish, and in the wink of an eye they're all going somewhere else.

Watch for the media whores to do the same thing as Bush's popularity drops. I'd say we're right at the threshold now.

"And where, on where were those film clips Tim loves—the clips where he highlights his target’s past statements?"

You can be sure that when they were negotiating the show with General Electric, Karl Rove was on the phone yelling, "No film clips!"

What could Tim Russert have done with film clips. Andrew Tobias has some ideas.

http://www.andrewtobias.com/

Not really a comment on Russert, but yesterday I recalled something that led to a question I'd like to ask George Bush. It's about the October 11, 2000 debate.

First I'd ask Bush if he'd say that there was agreement extending back to Clinton that Saddam was continuing to develop WMDs, and whether it would be fair to say that it was the events of 9/11 that suddenly made it urgent to act. (He should agree, because that's the spin du jour.)

Now play the tape:

George Bush, 10/11/2000 "The coalition against Saddam has fallen apart--or it's unraveling, let's put it that way. The sanctions are being--are being violated. There's--we don't know whether he's developing weapons of mass destruction--he better not be, or there's going to be a consequence, should I be the president."

Doesn't the current administration position amount to a complete reversal of the above? It seems that candidate Bush is saying Saddam may not have WMDs but that IF he does, it will be urgent to take some kind of action.

Of course, the followup question is "Mr. President, what sort of consequence were you referring when you made that statement?" (A: War. You got me! We were always planning to invade. Happy now? [yeah, yeah, in my dreams.])

Oh, and here is the transcript of the October 11, 2000 debate. Meant to include it.
http://www.npr.org/news/national/election2000/debates/001011.transcript1.html

His failure to ask his usual tough followups is just a reflection of the deference many people feel they have to show to the office, regardless of who occupies it. Something that has protected Bush all along. I thought Russert did pretty well, and his last question, about what Bush would do if he lost, was quite cheeky.

Russert only had an hour and there was a tremendous amount of ground to cover because Bush hasn't had an interview in so long. Russert had to decide, Do I follow-up and have him repeat his non-answers? Or Do I move along so that I can get important questions asked? The White House Press Corps will have all week to hammer Mclellan on Bush's interview.

I don't think Russert was soft. I think he asked the best questions he could given the time contraints.

Bob H has a point. The public doesn't like it
when a bully beats up on a weakling.

While the questioning may have been lackluster, the interview got a representative of The National Review(!) to declare on NPR's Diane Rheim this morning that what Bush said about spending "just wasn't true." It's not quite "Bush lied to Russert about the budget," but I'll take it.

Russert merely let Bush be Bush, the follow up will surely come later in the game. The mere fact that Bush had this type of interview means that he and his handlers are concerned about how he is doing versus Kerry. The lack of follow up by Russert will allow a later interviewer or other reporter do some back ground work and come up with the correct answers just as some of the Blogger's/Bloggee's above have done. THe next big issue will be was Bush AWOL or not. By the way did you see the article in todays WSJounal about O'neill buried towards the back of the first section where it was determined that there were not leaked information by O'neil and that in fact Treasury people had sent him some information without having it vetted first? There is a lot of negative news coming out about Bush: Economic, political, personal, and international and Americans are starting to wake up to what Bush is really about. By the way how does he use 20% of the budget to drop the deficit in half in 5 years unless he goes back on No Children Left behind and the other social legislation that his is so proud of?

From economy.com:

Bush Misstates Spending Record on "Meet the Press"

The president was wrong yesterday when he said federal spending grew more quickly at the end of the Clinton administration.

Host Tim Russert asked President Bush about rapid growth in federal spending. The president responded : "If you look at the appropriations bills that were passed under my watch, in the last year of President Clinton, discretionary spending was up 15%, and ours have steadily declined."

However, according to the budget the Bush administration released last week (Table 8.1), discretionary spending grew less than 6% in FY2001, the last budget under President Clinton. In FY2002, growth in discretionary spending was 13%; in FY2003 12%; and in FY2004 is estimated at 10%. It is not just defense, growth in nondefense discretionary spending has also been greater under President Bush than under President Clinton.

http://www.economy.com/dismal/pro/blog_main.asp?e=9661F70C-D711-42DA-B198-4560E04B7358#9661F70C-D711-42DA-B198-4560E04B7358

Obviously GWB placed a Vulcan mind-meld on Russert. Bush probably did the same thing to Gore during the election debates. Kerry better watch out!!!

The defense of Russert above that he had to cover a lot material and so couldn't follow up is ridiculous. Surely he should have at least followed up on the 2 or 3 of his most important questions rather than making sure he got to ask about Skull and Bones' secret number?

This Russert stuff is fun and all, but has anybody taken a look at the Economic Report of the President? Productivity growth forecast below the 10 and 5-year average (just at the 43-year average, according to the White House), to justify a forecast for 2.6 mln jobs for the year (greatest acceleration in job growth since 1983, if I calculate right, and we are already behind, unless January is revised sharply higher). White House notes that its preferred method of privatizing part of Social Security leads to higher deficits for 30 years, but then, boy the good news starts to kick in. Federal debt rises over 20 GDP percentage points over the troubling first 30 years as a result. C'mon, Russert is old hat. Time for today's bad-Bush story.

I agree with somebody--- the story isn't the size of the softball, it's the fact that the President swung and missed at those giant softballs repeatedly.

Also, I'm thinking that maybe they did let Russert ask follow-ups, but informed him ahead of time that they would be edited out. Everybody's happy.

I thought Russert did a poor job. He knew going in what Dubya would say to a question in a certain area, so Russert should have prepared questions or follow ups that would get around those standard answers. For example, Russert should have known that Dubya would answer any question about poor job growth or the deficit with that it is the fault of everything but his policies. Russert should have asked "In April of last year, you said that if an additional tax cut was passed, the economy would created 344 thousand jobs per month. Since that tax cut has been passed, the economy has created only (I am guessing) 40 thousand jobs per month. Why were your projections so far off the mark?" Then Dubya couldn't say "It was because of 9/11, the recession and fighting two wars". Or, "If Saddam had no chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, how was he a danger to the United States?" It was Russert's job to get around the boilerplate answers and he rarely did that.

norbizness:

russert couldn't have asked any follow-ups, bush never lost his composure. bush is not a capable speaker and when challenged, he prone to more gaffes than usual. he stayed with his (limited) stack of 3x5 card-borne answers and wasn't really put into a position to defend an answer.

i tell you what, though. unless they really decide that it is necessary to pad the playpen, the eventual democratic nominee will be able to push him until he looses control.

that should be fun to watch...

Thankfully I missed the interview but read the transcripts.

It was very distrubing, to say the least. Since when is it the USA's job to democratize the entire world? I must have missed that part of the Constitution.

Oh what jaded eyes we are seeing through now. That performance was so much like the clown in the empty flight suit. But it is his style, alas. I encourage everyone to read this analysis of Dear Leaders style: aka victimizing the populace:

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030630&s=brooks

and pass it around. I don't know how to create a hyperlink here, sorry.

Kosh: I saw the same figure in a chart next to Josh Bolten on page 10 of section 3 of the NYT (the business section). Do you know what the difference is?

"The public doesn't like it when a bully beats up on a weakling."

Yep. Poor Timmy. Georgie should have to go stand in the corner.

The words of truth are always paradoxical.

There was no immunity to cuckoo ideas on Earth.

Without hope, the rest is nothing.