Every weekend, I look forward to reading the latest column from Fred Barnes, the executive editor of The Weekly Standard. There are plenty of Bush shills in the conservative media, but Barnes is in a league of his own. He seems to enjoy being an unpaid public relations rep for the White House.
Barnes’ latest is no exception. He acknowledges that things appear rough for the president right now, but that’s alright — because Bush is just so darn chipper.
The White House staff reflects the president. This is obvious to the point of being a truism. Yet it needs to be remembered in the context of a Bush presidency smacked by Scooter Libby’s felony conviction, the Walter Reed Army Medical Center scandal, and the overblown flap over the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. And of course there’s still the war in Iraq, which remains unpopular. Given all this, why hasn’t the president’s staff drifted into despair and gloom and given up? Because President Bush hasn’t.
Bush’s relentlessly upbeat demeanor, which he flaunts at press conferences and other public events, infuriates his political opponents and much of the mainstream media. They want him to act like the broken man they think he should be. Sorry, but he’s a healthy man, mentally and physically. He’s bolstered by his religious faith, his sense of mission, his scorn for elite opinion, and what an aide calls “his really good physical shape.” Exercise and sleep help to “keep his spirits high,” the aide says.
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