With George W. Bush's approval rating dangerously close to bottoming out, the White House has been making transparent attempts to look like its actually accomplishing something. (Unless you count dismantling the Constitution and pissing on the middle class--in those cases, Mission Accomplished!)
Most of these changes are cosmetic, at best (Karl Rove has been switched from one shadowy position of power to another) and at worst, offensive (Condi and Rummy visit Baghdad).
But to any being capable of sentient thought, the most ludicrous change would be the bouncing of Scott McClellan as press secretary. Apparently, even the Bushinistas realized the best public face to present to the press was anyone other than McClellan, whose demeanor could charitably be described as twerpish. (You could also use whiny, petulant or sweaty--or hell, use 'em all.)
Unlike McClellan, a virtual non-entity to the public before his high-profiloe White House gig, his replacement, Tony Snow, is all too known. A right-wing gasbag of long standing, who has served time at both The Washington Times AND Fox News, Snow would seem to be the new poster boy for this administration's blatantly far right agenda. Surely that "liberal press" we hear so much about would be poised to tear this guy a new one.
Yeah. You'd think that, alright. Instead, on my way home from work, I heard NPR broadcast a profile of snow--Tony, as he was repeatedly called--that was so fawning it could make Dick Cheney cry. This wasn't a testimonial from some of Snow's fellow travellers--these were NPR reporters giving the Great Man a free suck.
I have this horrible feeling the press is going to collectively decide to start easing up on Bush. Hey, he's on the ropes--cut the man some slack. It's a period of transition in the White House, let's let them get settled before we ask any more tough questions.
And by the time the bombs start falling in Iran, we'll all wonder why we didn't know more ahead of time.
