January 22, 2007

You Wanted a Principled Leader, Right?

In the film Air Force One, the president played by Harrison Ford announces a righteous policy, and when weasel-like aides fret about what the polls will say, he implores them: “It’s the right policy. Get behind it!”

Yeah! Americans cheered. If only we could find a guy like that to be president!

Are you sure you wanted a principled leader?

George W. Bush was once seen as strong and steady. Now he’s seen as stubborn and delusional. Study groups filled with graybeards urge changes in course. He doesn’t change. Media pound him nightly. He remains steadfast. Bush’s approval rating hasn’t sniffed 40 percent in ages.

And yet, even a Democratic sweep in the mid-term elections – supposedly driven by the electorate’s dissatisfaction over the Iraq war – doesn’t inspire a policy change in Bush, who promptly calls for even more of the troops the voters supposedly want brought home.

You wanted a principled leader who would stick to his guns regardless of what the polls said. You did want that, right? I mean, you did at the movies. Does America really know what to do with a president like this?

To get a sense of the real Bush, it’s useful to recall his uninspired early days. In the months following his 2001 inauguration, Bush mixed the good – a major tax cut – with the admirable but hardly presidential, such as an initiative to discourage the use of “hurtful words” between Americans.

We could certainly do without so many hurtful words, you dumb bastards, but I’m not sure this is a presidential agenda item.

The 9/11 attacks were supposed to have “changed everything,” and they did, temporarily. But they changed Bush permanently. He found his voice and his mission. He found his sense of seriousness and purpose. He has maintained it ever since.

He aimed high and thought big. Bush doesn’t “contain” troublesome tyrants. Bush gets rid of them. Bush doesn’t monitor terrorist phone calls and financial transactions only to the extent that judicial blessings and political realities will allow. Bush does it as much as he thinks he needs to.

Don’t like it? Too bad. He’s George W. Bush. America loved it when we’d just been attacked, we needed to do something, and there was no doubt that this guy was going to do something. He told us this was the fight of our lives, and a fight for our lives. We agreed. We were glad he saw it that way. He echoed the words of a 9/11 hero by imploring us, “Let’s roll.” We rolled.

But he also warned us, even way back in September 2001, that there would be difficult days ahead, that this would not be like other wars, and that it would take a very long time. We nodded. OK. We’re ready for that.

We weren’t ready for that. Bush was. We weren’t. Bush was gripped with a permanent, soul-altering sense of purpose. Most of the rest of the country was caught up in the moment. We weren’t quite as ready as we thought for the president to really mean it.

It’s not as if Bush has never made a political move. He raised steel tariffs. He expanded Medicare. He does pick his battles. But not in the way that most politicians do. He saves his political capital for the battles he really believes in, and when his political capital is gone, he just keeps on with those same battles.

I believe Bush when he says he doesn’t care about polls. If he did, he would have changed course a long time ago. I also believe that he doesn’t much care to effectively work the media and get his message out through them. He gives every indication of disdaining the process. That is understandable. It is a process worthy of disdain, and Bush seems to believe he attains a certain virtue by opting out of it and accepting the political consequences.

Where the country pays a price, however, is in the president’s failure to win more of the nation over to his mission. Bush will serve only two more years. Will the next president be committed to this fight? Will he or she believe the nation wants that? I fear that the nation is losing its will to continue this fight, and to some degree Bush bears responsibility because he has been fixated on fighting the battle but disinterested in selling the battle.

If the war on terror ends on January 20, 2009, Bush might consider whether he could have better primed the country to demand a continuation of the fight he will no longer be around to lead. And the country might consider whether it knows what to do with a president who really means what he says. Like we always say we want.