Debt On

From The New York Times, re: Bush’s vacation.

Instead of parking here for the whole month, Mr. Bush, who arrived Thursday night, will spend just 10 nights before returning to the White House. During his stay, his aides are taking pains to present Mr. Bush as deeply engaged in world events; on Saturday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and the national security adviser, Stephen J. Hadley, arrived to brief him on the Middle East.

“It basically reflects busy times and a busy schedule,” said Dan Bartlett, counselor to Mr. Bush, explaining the abbreviated visit.

It also reflects a political decision made by Mr. Bush’s advisers, and the president himself, to prevent a repeat of the public relations debacle of last August. That month began with highly publicized protests by Ms. Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq, and ended with the image of the president on vacation while New Orleans drowned, an image that helped start his slide in popularity.

Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans “helped start his slide in popularity”???? Reality continues to elude the New York Times, who in their desperate search to seem credible to even the wingnuts constantly complaining about the “liberal media,” misrepresent the severity of recent history. Bush had been declining in the polls all year. The Social Security fiasco hadn’t gone over well, Iraq was getting worse and worse, and yes, Cindy Sheehan was occupying his ranch destroying the serenity of his vacation.

Bush’s popularity plunged after Katrina, and all he’s done is gain ground since. Not much since he stands around 40% or less in most polls, up from somewhere around a third or less after Katrina.

To me, what’s written here is blatantly inaccurate. And it drives me crazy, because they probably wrote it that way so they don’t seem like they’re headhunting when they print valuable investigative pieces about covert government documents. That may gain them credibility with the Republicans, but it diminishes it in my eyes. And I’m much more likely to buy their newspaper.