Good enough for his base

Bush's approval seems to have improved after the recent election in Iraq and his latest public relations blitz. It appears that he speeches and interviews sounded great to his base, but didn't do much for the rest of us.

Bush's pre-Christmas rebound was largely fueled by a sharp increase in support among his core supporters. In the past month, the proportion of Republicans approving of the president's performance increased by nine percentage points to 87 percent. And among conservatives, three in four said Bush was doing a good job, up 12 points from November. Among Democrats, independents and moderates, Bush's support remained unchanged or increased only modestly.

I think Ezra inadvertantly put his finger on it when he said of Von's approval of a speech he recently made -- "Man, Von and I live in different realities." In our reality, a bunch of bromides peppered with references to 9/11 is not all that comforting. But apparently, it's enough to quell the doubt that has been swelling even within the conservative demographic as to whether Bush is turning out to be the right man for the job after all.

By the way, the Prez might be dumb as a box of hammers, but his speechwriters aren't. After pundits started picking up his almost pavlovian use of "victory", he has toned down the number of mentions of "victory" to a mere four in this speech, just as he hurried to take a flurry of press activity, speeches and even, gasp, an unscreened Q+A session right after the Bush-in-a-bubble cover story on Newsweek. Everything else might be falling apart about his administration, but public relations is still on the ball.