A key responsibility of the White House press secretary is to be keeper and protector of the president’s legacy — not an easy job when your boss has an approval rating of about 25 percent.
Asked whether history will be kind to President Bush, press secretary Dana Perino said, “Eventually.”
“We are not one to really talk about approval ratings, right? We don’t have much to write home about when it comes to popularity,” Perino said.
Much hangs on Iraq and the details of a still-pending status of forces agreement that will set a timetable for U.S. troop withdrawal. An eventual flowering of democracy in Iraq could do much for Bush’s legacy — as Perino said, eventually.
“I think that he has established for the next president coming on board an infrastructure to help protect the country from another terrorist attack,” Perino said. “That doesn’t mean we are always going to be successful, because terrorists are very patient.”
Increasingly, Perino’s rhetoric includes pre-emptive acknowledgment that Bush’s policies have proved unpopular. She prefaces remarks with “regardless of whether you supported the decision to invade Iraq” and “I don’t expect everyone to agree.”
It’s a marked departure from the Bush administration’s swagger after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, when the president boasted an 89 percent approval rating and relied on the easy capitulation of Congress to approve his initiatives.
“People are really looking with a jaundiced eye at what she is selling,” said Joe Tuman, a political scientist at San Francisco State University. “A big part of her job is thinking about his legacy and, more recently, how he will be remembered in this economic crisis — and he has been irrelevant.”
Perino touted Bush’s No Child Left Behind education reform as a legacy centerpiece, saying “regardless of whether you agree with all the details,” the program has closed the achievement gap between white and minority students.
Passed during Bush’s first term by a bipartisan majority in Congress, the program has more recently come under intense criticism for being too test-focused, and it is likely to be significantly altered.
Bush leaves incomplete his efforts to reform immigration and Social Security, both issues the next president will likely have to contend with.
“I do think on a range of issues we have a lot to be proud of, but it’s going to take some time,” Perino said. “He will be seen as a president who did big things. There is no small ball when it comes to President Bush.”
