Posted 4:09 AM by Paul
News Management

So George Bush visited Iraq to share Thanksgiving Dinner with around 200 US troops. For a moment I won't be cynical. It must have been an emotional moment for him and for the troops. Whatever, they might think of him getting a visit from your Commander- in-Chief must be a very special moment.

Bush got to hang out for two hours with the men and women who are taking the brunt of the invasion her ordered. He also gave a neat speech part of which was indentical to the one he had given in London a week earlier..." we didn't charge hundreds of miles into Iraq and liberate 25 million people to..... " You get the picture.

For the record, I have never thought that Bush was stupid, a charge frequently laid at his door by the Liberal Left. I don't think you become President by being a complete dork. Even if he is not the sharpest chisel in the tool box, it is his very ordinariness appeals to millions of voters across the USA. So - he gets tongue tied. But doesn't everybody? The message is clear. Bush is one of then them. Loves his country, loves his family and knows right from wrong. Insulting Bush's intelligence is the same as insulting a large body of the American electorate. Not a good strategy if you want to get elected. Whoever wins the Democratic nomination will have to avoid coming over like a Smart Alec.

Not only is Bush smartrer than he looks but he is backed up by a brilliant team. They have carried off two major coups in terms of political presentation.

The first was to have created Compassionate Conservatism as a mask for the most reactionary economic programme since Hoover and the most militaristic plan since Goldwater.

The second was to present the multi-millionaire priviledged older son of a former President who spent much of his youth drinking at the family compound in New England as an ordinary guy.

This is pure political genius.

BUt watching Bush handing out the turkey and rallying the troops in Iraq made two impressions on me.

Unlike most political leaders Bush rarely looks like he is enjoying himself. He is rarely "in the zone" as the Americans say and often looks as though his mind is elsewhere. Once the cheering has stopped he looks arkward.

He reminds of of the kind of kid at school (like me) who was useless at sports but loved hanging around with the tougher bigger kids. He is like the class mascot. You get the impression that given the choice between being quarter back of the Dallas Cowboys and Chief Executive of the most powerful political force ever assembled in human history George would have chosen the former. But sadly for George and for the World it was not to be.

As a post script to the visit the BBC has just revaled that Hilary Clinton arrives in Baghdad tomorrow. The thought of being upstaged by her must have sent shivers down the spine of Karl Rove and his team of spinners. Above all they had to expunge the memory of two PR gaffes.

2001 - The scurrying around in Airforce One after September 11th, which gave rise to the wisecrack from New Yorkers that it took Bush longer to reach the Manhattan from Florida that it toook Bill Clinton to reach it from Australia. The Presdient was being protected from the boos of Americans not from the bombs of Al Qaida.

2003 - The victory ceremony on the aircraft carrier when a smiling George dressed in a Top Gun outfit pronounced major hositlities over under a banner which proclaimed "Mission Accomplished."

Now the visit is over his team must be congratulating themselves on a brilliant piece of news management. But was the visit in Iraq at all? All we saw was the inside of a tent in a place which was obviously somewhere hot. They could have staged the whole thing in New Mexico. Probably a silly theory but a good one to spread on the Internet and see who believes it.