{"id":9248,"date":"2006-12-05T13:10:23","date_gmt":"2006-12-05T18:10:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/9248.html"},"modified":"2006-12-05T13:10:23","modified_gmt":"2006-12-05T18:10:23","slug":"webb-v-bush-the-context","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/webb-v-bush-the-context\/","title":{"rendered":"Webb v. Bush — the context"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s been a week since we learned about the president and Sen.-elect Jim Webb (D-Va.) having a little dust-up<\/a> over the war in Iraq. If you’re just joining us, Bush approached Webb at a White House reception and asked, “How’s your boy?” (Webb’s son is a Marine serving in Iraq.) Webb said, “I’d like to get them out of Iraq, Mr. President,” to which Bush responded, “That’s not what I asked you.” Webb ended the conversation with, “That’s between me and my boy, Mr. President.”<\/p>\n

I’m a little surprised by the attention this continues to receive, including multiple pieces from prominent columnists (some less honest<\/a> than others), and feature stories about “what it all means<\/a>.” Apparently, DC just isn’t used to these kinds of personal confrontations.<\/p>\n

Regardless of whether you think Bush was wrong (picked the fight, said, “That’s not what I asked you”) or Webb was wrong (he was brusque and shouldn’t have gone to the WH event), additional context<\/a> sheds some helpful light on the subject.<\/p>\n

[A]ccording to Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA), Bush was told that Webb’s son had a recent brush with death<\/a> in Iraq and was warned to be “extra sensitive”<\/a> when talking to the Sen.-elect. ThinkProgress yesterday spoke with Moran’s office and confirmed the congressman’s statement, first reported by hcc in VA<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Not only did Bush know about it, he was specifically briefed on the incident before meeting with Webb, and was cautioned to be extra sensitive<\/b> in speaking with Webb about his son.<\/p>\n

After such a briefing, Bush perhaps shouldn’t have been so surprised about Webb’s unwillingness to chit-chat about his son.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That does make some difference, doesn’t it?
\n
\nWebb had steered clear of the president — Webb skipped the presidential receiving line and declined to have his picture taken with the president — but Bush sought him out. After having been briefed and warned about being “extra sensitive,” the president nevertheless asked, “How’s your boy?” and unhappy with the response, said, “That’s not what I asked you.”<\/p>\n

In this context, the president looks even worse. Bush picked at an open wound, on purpose, after being cautioned not to.<\/p>\n

Some have characterized this as one father talking to another. I don’t think so. This was Bush’s boorish charm on full display.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s been a week since we learned about the president and Sen.-elect Jim Webb (D-Va.) having a little dust-up over the war in Iraq. If you’re just joining us, Bush approached Webb at a White House reception and asked, “How’s your boy?” (Webb’s son is a Marine serving in Iraq.) Webb said, “I’d like to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9248\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}