Bush, the Ports, the Polls, the Patriot Act and The West Wing

I meant to comment on these related topics this week but travel and work were pretty hectic.

Politically George W Bush had a pretty good week but you would never know it. The media is beating him up over the deal that would have the United Arab Emirates run 9 major ports in the US and his poll numbers are pretty much in the toilet. How is this good news you ask? Well let me explain.

The defining issue for Bush and his legacy will be the war on terror. Prior to the issue of the UAE and the ports – one of the most pressing issues for the administration was getting the Patriot Act renewed. Now the Democrats are trying to use the port deal to color themselves as strong on national defense but you can’t say you are working to increase the security of the US and come out against the Patriot Act at the same time. Not even John Kerry would try that kind of flip-flopping position wrangling.

The President was able to put off finalizing the port deal till conveniently the Patriot Act was voted on. This week the Senate voted overwhelmingly in favor of renewing the Patriot Act by an 89-10 vote. That’s a huge win for Bush but not much has been said about it. Make no mistake – without the UAE port deal – the vote on the Patriot Act is much closer and possibly in peril as Democrats could have made some of the more controversial aspects of the Act election issues. Big win for the President.

Of course wins for the President don’t make news but bad polling numbers do. Every time I heard or read about those polling numbers in the low 30’s in my head I would say “those are the lowest I remember since Harry Truman.” I don’t recall many people mentioning Bush and Truman in the same breath but Truman’s poll numbers dipped all the way down to 24%. Yet today Truman is recalled as one of the better presidents of this century. Some would say that Truman was effective because he didn’t care about poll numbers and since Bush has no more elections to run in – I don’t see how poll numbers could be important to him either.

One final thing to mention about all this is The West Wing connection (and yes – I do mean the TV show). You may recall that when Zoe Bartlett was kidnapped on the show – one of the areas of concern was a missing container from a cargo ship in the Port of Portland. If fictional paragon of Democratic ideals President Josiah Bartlett was concerned about port security then shouldn’t all real-life Democrats be concerned too? This to me is one of the unspoken reasons why the UAE deal has garnered such importance among the Democrats but again – nobody but me seems to have brought it up.

EDIT: TheBHC had similar thoughts on the ports deal and the Patriot Act yesterday.