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October 18, 2001
The Televised Greatness of George W. Bush
By Norman Solomon
President Bush's upward spike of popularity owes a lot to his
presence on television -- a medium that has not always been so kind.
At times, under pressure, he has earned many comparisons to a deer in
headlights. But after a wobbly performance on Sept. 11, Bush got into
a groove of seizing the TV opportunity and making the most of it.
Today's television environment is, more than ever, warmly hospitable
to simple -- and simplistic -- declarative statements. That's just as
well for Bush, who has shown a distinct tendency to get entangled in
a morass of fragmentary linguistic riffs. Last year, on many
occasions, he seemed painfully anxious to make his way to the end of
sentences without further embarrassment. But now, for the most part,
it's a very different story.
For insights about recent shifts of George W. Bush's persona on
television, I contacted media critic Mark Crispin Miller, whose 1988
book "Boxed In: The Culture of TV" was a groundbreaking analysis of
the tube. In the book, he disputed the customary image of the U.S.
president as a "mighty individual" -- and identified that image as "a
corporate fiction, the careful work of committees and think tanks,
repeatedly reprocessed by the television industry for daily
distribution to a mass audience."
Boosted by family ties and powerful corporate backers, Bush won the
presidency (though not the popular vote) while projecting an affable
personality that some have found endearing. But even while carrying
out weighty duties of the presidency with all its trappings, he
struck many Americans as a lightweight, ill-suited for the job. A
turning point came with his dramatic speech to a joint session of
Congress in mid-September.
The rave media reaction "was understandable," Miller told me,
"because it actually reflected less on Bush's speech per se than on
the moment's strange and terrifying context. The speech was deemed
'Churchillian' because the audience (the American people, the
Congress, the media) was so desperate for a proper leader at that
fearful moment. At that moment of catastrophe, there was so fierce a
hunger for a national father-figure that the audience saw one in the
president, who therefore came across like Churchill, or like FDR,
despite his lack of stature -- which, prior to the shock, had been
quite clear to most observers."
Miller's book "The Bush Dyslexicon: Observations on a National
Disorder," published a few months ago, warns against assuming too
much about the significance of Bush's habitual tongue-tangles. It's a
cautionary note that now rings especially true. The man in the White
House is shrewd and capable of high-impact rhetorical feats.
Since Sept. 11, Miller says, President Bush "has continued, by and
large, to speak with more authority than usual." While acknowledging
that Bush "has at times reverted to his usual gaffery" (as in his
announcement that "ticket counters and airplanes will be flying out
of National Airport"), Miller observes that "on the subject of
'America's new war' -- 'the focus of this administration' -- Bush has
managed to ad lib with an overall coherence that is, for him,
extraordinary."
Miller adds that "the president has lately spoken relatively well for
the same reason that he's always broken into sudden fits of lucid
English -- because, in speaking of our national mission of revenge,
he's speaking from the heart." In fact, George W. Bush "has always
spoken clearly on those subjects that genuinely matter to him. Thus
it is that, when he talks about baseball, say, or about his property
in Crawford, he has no problems with his syntax, grammar or
vocabulary."
Professor Miller, who specializes in media studies at New York
University, contends that Bush also "is most articulate when speaking
cruelly -- on the value of the death penalty, or when cracking jokes,
or when saying no. It's when he tries to sound a higher note --
idealistically, or out of magnanimity, or on his trademark theme of
'compassion' -- that Bush starts speaking broken English, because,
like most of us, his tongue will not cooperate when he is being
insincere."
These days, President Bush is evidently sincere about wanting the
missiles to keep flying and the bombs to keep falling on Afghanistan -
- circumstances that notably enhance his verbal skills. The fact that
large numbers of Afghan people are now facing imminent starvation due
to the ongoing attacks does not seem to bother our nation's leading
compassionate conservative. "The president," says Miller, "has lately
spoken with unusual coherence in his off-the-cuff remarks -- because
his subject nowadays is war."
Norman Solomon's latest book is "The Habits of Highly Deceptive
Media."
*** Note to readers of "Media Beat": If you'd like to see Norman
Solomon's syndicated column appear in a local daily newspaper, you
can help-- by contacting the opinion-page editors of papers in your
area and urging that they give the column a try. Editors can make
arrangements by phoning Creators Syndicate in Los Angeles or by
sending an email note to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
End<{{{
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Believe only after careful observation and analysis, when you find that it
agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all.
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The Buddha on Belief, from the Kalama Sutta
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A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled
one is truly vanquished. -Johann Christoph Schiller,
German Writer (1759-1805)
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It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that
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"Everyone has the right...to seek, receive and impart
information and ideas through any media and regardless
of frontiers."
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
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"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will
teach you to keep your mouth shut."
--- Ernest Hemingway
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