Bush is a failure when it comes to job performance and governing, but he and his gang of merry political advisors are tremendous campaigners. They’re tireless, savvy, and not afraid to abandon the truth when it means getting ahead.
A couple of weeks ago, U.S. News & World Report said the Bush team would focus on those strengths when it comes to pushing their agenda. In other words, sophisticated public relations campaigns will be integral to the administration’s attempts at governing.
Believing its second-term agenda is bigger, yet tougher to sell, than the first, the White House is planning an unprecedented PR campaign. The objective: to win approval for its plans to reform taxes, education, and Social Security. “The president is a big-game hunter,” said an associate, “and we’ll need everything we can get to help.” Officials say that TV and radio ads promoting President Bush’s plans are being created.
Reuters followed up today with an item indicating that the fight over killing Social Security is going to get pretty ridiculous soon.
President Bush will spearhead an election-style public relations campaign early next year to try to convince Americans that Social Security is in urgent need of change but will keep dollar and cent details deliberately vague, analysts and officials say.
With Bush’s political capital riding on a successful overhaul of the popular retirement program, the White House and its allies plan to bombard the public with presidential speeches, television and radio ads, newspaper op-ed articles and grass-roots rallies between now and early 2005.
“It’s going to be a battle royal, very much like an election campaign but over an issue rather than a candidate,” said Stephen Moore, executive director of Club for Growth, a Republican group that hopes to spend $15 million on a media campaign backing the White House.
“This is about winning, and Bush can’t afford to lose.”
What a coincidence; the rest of us can’t afford for him to win.