As politicos and political observers, we have a problem. It has been bubbling down the surface for some time now and we have just been ignoring it – yes, we miss George W Bush.
There has always been a historical perception that a US President needs more than experience (military, executive or political) or intellect – there is a historical narrative that states that a US President needs what Simon Cowell now calls the X-Factor, a characteristic much attributed to JFK and Reagan. Bush had that quality.
Whether people like it or not, George W Bush changed the face of American politics. As much as people attribute Obama’s rise in the 2008 election to the mess that Bush left, I also attribute the problems Obama is facing to the work of 43.
As much as people hate to admit, legislatively Bush was a very effective President. This was due to him being able to exert party discipline and control the framing of the national debate to his favour – a talent which the minority GOP uses to great effect to this day. This makes it difficult for Obama to gain support from Republicans who come from red states, on any moderate agenda item simply because they are programmed to think that he, as a Democrat, is dangerous for the country, he projects weakness and doesn’t abide to the traditional values held by Americans.
But one of Bush’s most damaging legacies which people misconstrue as a positive is his “firing from the belly” or his gut instincts. Now many declare this an attribute so a President doesn’t appear as a Jimmy Carteresc President, but everything about the public need for a President to have the quality of being able to “follow his gut” over his intellect is disconcerting.
Reading Mike Signer’s piece at the Daily Beast made me realize how preposterous the notion is but on the other hand how (almost) embedded into the American political culture the idea of anti-intellectualism has become. The premise of following your gut was even extended to the 2008 elections where there was a lot of talk on which of the two candidates had the instinct to be President of the United States – my question is simple how can you quantifiably measure that quality?
The relatively new idea of “following your gut” has me thinking about the nature of American politics for the foreseeable short term – progress i.e. political success is dependent on winning the “middle” because anti-intellectualism as an idea is overtly a Republican and embraced almost wholeheartedly by the right.
Obama and the Democrats need to make an iron clad case to the middle (and by the looks of it his own party) that being thoughtful, thinking over a situation and over an analysis is of the national interest. As much as people are reminiscing about the good old Bush years, where the country had a man who shot from the hip and went with his gut, they need to remember where that process got the country.
Just a normal everyday bloke writing about films.