George W. Bush made it largely a personal story last night: of a mischievous kid who’d given his mother white hair growing up in Texas wildcatter country, the story of a late-blooming provincial who’d suffered by his own mistakes, been redeemed by grace and learned in his heart about Americans who struggle.
So when he said: “My fellow citizens, we can begin again,” he was seeing himself in the country and the country in his story… which any biographer of Bush money and dynastic politics would have told somewhat differently.
The political content in George W.’s acceptance speech was another page rewritten: the conservative who killed the McCain reform challenge in the spring went heavy on compassion last night, with a “no way” reassurance to seniors against compromising social security and with a pledge to “tear down the wall” of social isolation by race and class. Have we got it straight yet?
(Hosted by Christopher Lydon)
Guests:
Kevin Phillips, political commentator and author of The Cousins War
Lou Dubose, co-author (with Molly Ivins) of Shrub: The Short But Happy Political Life of George W. Bush
Elizabeth Mitchell author of W: Revenge of the Bush Dynasty.