Going through Slow Period

Stuff at work is picking up and so I'm not here as much as I'd like to be, and after reading 6 articles trying to find one worth commenting on, I can testify that my low post days aren't the worst that can happen. The best article I can find is one by the always good Paul Krugman. He compares President Bush's popularity to Prime Minister Blairs problems, and comes up with three potential reasons that President Bush seems to be faring better.

"One answer, surely, is the kid-gloves treatment Mr. Bush has always received from the news media, a treatment that became downright fawning after Sept. 11. There was a reason Mr. Blair's people made such a furious attack on the ever-skeptical BBC.

Another answer may be that in modern America, style trumps substance. Here's what Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, said in a speech last week: "To gauge just how out of touch the Democrat leadership is on the war on terror, just close your eyes and try to imagine Ted Kennedy landing that Navy jet on the deck of that aircraft carrier." To say the obvious, that remark reveals a powerful contempt for the public: Mr. DeLay apparently believes that the nation will trust a man, independent of the facts, because he looks good dressed up as a pilot. But it's possible that he's right.

What must worry the Bush administration, however, is a third possibility: that the American people gave Mr. Bush their trust because in the aftermath of Sept. 11, they desperately wanted to believe the best about their president. If that's all it was, Mr. Bush will eventually face a terrible reckoning."

Anyway hopefully I'll be back with something cool. Hope you are all having a nice morning.