MEET THE PRESS RECAP

Here's the transcript.

Russert did a miniscule fraction better than I thought he would, which isn't saying much, especially since he never really pressed Bush on much of anything.

He started out with the WMD committee, asking Bush why he had been reluctant, for a while, to support its creation. Bush gave a long, talking-point-infused answer . . . that completely dodged the question. Did Russert push harder to get him to answer the question he actually asked? Nope, he moved on. (Had a Democrat been in Bush seat...) Though he did get Bush a little bit on the timing of the committee's final report (after the election), I didn't find his answer that satisfying.

(Question for Mister Bush: In responding to one of Tim's questions, you referred to Saddam as someone who has taken to "paying suicide bombers". Uh George, suicide bombers commit suicide, they can't take the money with them. You should probably revise and extend your remarks.

Dubya is probably referring to Saddam's paying of expenses for the families of suicide bombers in Israel or wherever. That's not "paying suicide bombers". Yeah yeah, it's not a big deal by itself, but it's indicative of what the Bushies do with language: They cast a wide net, cutting out relevant logical middlemen so they can paint more people as *evil* or whatever else to serve their needs. For example, Ba'athist remnants who fire RPG's at US Army helicopters are insurgents or guerrillas, but not terrorists, yet the administration has called them so. While the loss of US troops' lives is terrible, calling the insurgents terrorists doesn't help. It's guerrilla warfare. I guess we committed acts of terrorism when we terribly stormed the beaches of Normandy, and terrorized those Nazis!)

But back to Russert and Bush...

In three early questions, Bush used the old trick of "if I may step back", to happily answer a question never asked.

On Iraq, Bush went to that old standby, "Saddam Hussein is an evil man, and was a danger". He even played the "gassed his own people" card a couple times, neglecting to add "in the 1980's".

Apparently, North Korea is still part of a "peninchula", just as it was in the 2003 State of the Union address.

On the AWOL issue (which Russert employed more than I had expected), we see how Bush identifies with the common American military serviceman in the 1960's:

Russert: You did were allowed to leave eight months before your term expired. Was there a reason?

President Bush: Right. Well, I was going to Harvard Business School and worked it out with the military.

Bush also played a dishonest, aloof political card when he attacked nameless people for supposedly "denigrating the guard". George, who the fuckityfuck is doing that? This is just like the RNC ad from last fall, where a vague charge ("some are now attacking the president for attacking the terrorists") was intended to be aimed at those who never made such attacks. This was Bush's attempt to appear "above the fray" on the AWOL issue.

To draw a name at random... John Kerry isn't denigrating the guard. John Kerry is denigrating your disservice to your country, George, by skipping out on the guard. And George, it doesn't matter how many times you say "honorable discharge", we know that connections got you into the guard, there's no reason that connections couldn't get you out in a passable way.

Looks like Roger Ailes was right on with the vague deficit question that Bush could answer however he wanted. Dubya had fun drawing an imaginary straight line between his tax cuts and economic recovery.

Here's one of the more egregious budget softballs from Russert:

Russert: The Bush Cheney first three years, the unemployment rate has gone up 33 percent, there has been a loss of 2.2 million jobs. We've gone from a $281 billion surplus to a $521 billion deficit. The debt has gone from 5.7 trillion, to $7 trillion up 23 percent.

Based on that record, why should the American people rehire you as CEO?

The question is cute, no doubt. What would have been a better question to ask is how would Bush explain the current deficits, in light of the fact that in 2002 - after 9/11 - his administration was projecting a 2004 deficit of only $14 billion. Because Tim went back to 2001, Bush was able to hide behind the "9/11 changed everything" mantra. See, this is how Russert works, tough on the surface, but with a soft, shill center.

Dubya also cited dropping unemployment. That might have been an opportunity for Tim to mention that unemployment has dropped, in large part, because many have stopped looking for work, effectively dropping out of the workforce. Yeah, I didn't think it was gonna happen either.

Overall - and I'm adjusting for the fact that I do not like this man - I thought he looked shaky. He really was President Long Pause, and when things finally emerged from between his lips, they sounded more like a string of talking points than a direct answer to Tim's question. If I were a family member of one of the 530+ American soldiers lost in Iraq, I don't know if I'd be able to swallow the "he had the ability to make weapons" excuse floated by Bush.

STUFF RUSSERT FORGOT TO ASK

On the WMD committee, Russert didn't ask Bush about how it won't have any subpoena power, the limitations of its scope, the appointment of Laurence Silberman as co-chair, and the recent comments of committee appointee John McCain suggesting that he's already made up his mind on the matter.

On the 9/11 commission, Russert didn't ask why Bush extended their deadline, and furthermore, why he had been opposed to extending it for so long a time.

On the Medicare bill, no peep about the administration's drastic underestimation of its cost.

Also on Iraq and WMD, no mention of Hans Blix and his team of inspectors, and the fact that his findings, before the war, were strikingly similar to those of David Kay. This is especially annoying, since Bush referred to Saddam having "defied the world once again" after UN 1441, and Russert didn't say a damn thing.

And in true Russert fashion, no questions about the Valerie Plame leak.

ONE LAST ANNOYANCE

Among the ads featured during the hour was the taxpayer-funded Medicare propaganda commercial put out by the Bushies.

UPDATE: As I like to do my first post of the day - especially if it's something like this - before I read my daily blog fixes, I'm delighted to notice that my analysis of Bush's MTP interview was pretty close to that of . . . The Corner!?!? John Derbyshire, for instance says:

Just got through watching the President on Meet the Press. I thought it was a pretty dismal performance. I'll be voting for GWB in November, but let's face it, the Great Communicator he ain't. The tongue-tied blather was coming thick and fast. At times, he looked like Al Sharpton on the Federal Reserve.

Russert: "Why didn't you establish the intelligence commission earlier?"
GWB: "Blather blather blather. No answer."

Russert: "Will you yourself testify before the commission?"
GWB: "Blather blather blather. No answer."

Russert: "Why was Saddam Hussein a threat to the US?"
GWB: "He had the capacity to make weapons... a madman..."

Russert: "There is a sense in the country that the intelligence was ambiguous, that in presenting it to the country, you sexed it up."
GWB: "He had the capacity to make weapons... a madman..."

UPDATE 2: Oh yeah, Russert didn't ask about gay marriage. Wouldn't this have been a nice time to press Bush to say something definitive on the matter?