The WaPo’s Dan Eggen and Paul Kane make the case today that “the decider has become the compromiser.” Yes, apparently we’re supposed to believe that George W. Bush, arguably the most rigid and obstinate figure in American public life, has suddenly discovered the virtues of concession and conciliation.
President Bush has racked up a series of significant political victories in recent weeks, on surveillance reform, war funding and an international agreement on global warming, but only after engaging in the kind of conciliation with opponents that his administration has often avoided.
With less than seven months left in office, Bush is embracing such compromises in part because he has to. Faced with persistently low public approval ratings, a Democratic Congress and wavering support among Republicans, he and his aides have given ground on key issues to accomplish broader legislative and diplomatic goals, according to administration officials, legislative aides and political experts.
“To get something done or to get what you want or most of what you want, you’ve got to compromise,” said Nicholas E. Calio, who served as Bush’s first legislative affairs director. “The president and the White House are very focused on getting things done, and they don’t abide the notion that he’s a lame duck.”
At first blush, the obvious response might be, “Oh, so now Bush wants to compromise for the sake of getting something done.” Seven-and-a-half years after taking office, the president has suddenly realized the importance of compromise in the practice of governing.
But a closer examination suggests the premise itself is flawed, and in large part, backwards.
On “surveillance reform,” it’s probably not quite right to suggest Bush helped bring a bill to his desk through compromise. He threatened to veto any legislation on intelligence gathering that neglected to include exactly what he wanted. Republicans then sat down with House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) to work on a bill. The result? Sen. Chris Bond (R-Mo.), who negotiated the alleged “compromise” legislation, told the NYT, “I think the White House got a better deal than they even they had hoped to get.”
On war funding, Bush had to swallow hard and accept an expanded GI Bill, but that wasn’t the result of give and take; it was the natural result of Bush losing a fight. Once there was a veto-proof majority backing the Webb-Hagel measure, the president gave up. But it’s not as if White House officials and congressional Dems sat in a room to work out a deal — Dems just picked up enough votes for Bush to back down.
But this example from the WaPo article was especially unhelpful.
Bush’s conciliatory mood extended to the Group of Eight summit last week in Japan, where the United States for the first time joined the other major industrialized countries in agreeing to try to halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Although environmental groups said the deal lacked vital specifics, it marked a long journey for a U.S. president who came to office questioning the science of climate change.
No, no, no. There was no “compromise” here at all. Bush told his colleagues on the global stage, “Goodbye from the world’s biggest polluter.” Soon after, he decided that his administration would “not to take any new steps to regulate greenhouse gas emissions before the president leaves office.”
If anything, we’ve seen some progress on some policies because congressional Republicans have been willing to compromise, afraid that towing the Bush line may be dangerous to their re-election chances. But that’s hardly a reason to say “the decider has become the compromiser.”
To be fair, I should give credit where credit is due. The Bush White House did, after painful and dangerous delays, come to realize that compromise with North Korea better served our national security interests.
But the notion that the president has been “conciliation with opponents” strikes me as wildly off base. Would that it were true.