There seems to be a growing trend among members of this administration and its defenders. Last week it was former Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith claiming he had never done nor said things he had very explicitly done and said. Then, earlier this week it was former CIA Director George Tenent trying the same line. And this week? This week it is former Bush senior strategist and pollster Matthew Dowd
In a new article in Texas Monthly analyzing the Bush presidency so far, Dowd writes what can only be described as a fairly conflicted defense of Bush. As I read through it, one part in particular stood out:
As most of us know—and it’s why I switched parties and went to work for him—he was best at what he did in Texas, which was working with Democrats like Bob Bullock and Pete Laney. The biggest hope and aspiration of those of us who were brought in as former Democrats was that we could make Washington into a place, like Texas, where people could sit down, have a conversation, socialize, not judge one another as good or evil, not question intentions, and actually get things done. But when all the levers of power in Washington became Republican, creating consensus seemed to become unnecessary at the White House. That hurt him. Now, near the end of his presidency, when many of us thought we would have helped solve the problem of polarization, we’re in an even more polarized place.
Coming from Dowd, this is, as Digby points out, absolutely bizarre. As Thomas Edsall explained in the pages of TNR back in September, Bush's decision to forgo uniting in favor of dividing wasn't accidental. Dowd knows this because he was responsible for it:
In late 2000, even as the result of the presidential election was still being contested in court, George W. Bush's chief pollster Matt Dowd was writing a memo for Rove that would reach a surprising conclusion. Based on a detailed examination of poll data from the previous two decades, Dowd's memo argued that the percentage of swing voters had shrunk to a tiny fraction of the electorate. Most self-described "independent" voters "are independent in name only," Dowd told me in an interview describing his memo. "Seventy-five percent of independents vote straight ticket" for one party or the other. Once such independents are reclassified as Democrats or Republicans, a key trend emerges: Between 1980 and 2000, the percentage of true swing voters fell from a very substantial 24 percent of the electorate to just 6 percent. In other words, the center was literally disappearing. Which meant that, instead of having every incentive to govern as "a uniter, not a divider," Bush now had every reason to govern via polarization.This ran counter to Rove's previous thinking. In 2000, he had dismissed the tactic of running on divisive issues like patriotism, crime, and welfare as "an old paradigm." And Bush had followed his advice by explicitly reaching out to the center-left. For instance, during the campaign, he held a press conference with a dozen gay Republicans and sharply criticized the GOP Congress for a plan to save money by slowing distribution of tax credits for the working poor. But Dowd's memo changed all that. For Rove and the president he served, soon it would be out with the new GOP and in with the old.
Dowd wrote the memo that made it all happen. Edsall detailed this history just 5 months ago. Nevertheless, Dowd writes as if he himself doesn't understand what happened.
I realize that lack of accountability has become something of a national policy under Bush, but really... how dumb do these people really think we are? Google exists. It has existed for quite some time. And yet somehow, these people expect that no one will ever both to look up the things they have previously done and said.
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