Griper Blade: Breaking All the Rules

There are a few rules that politicians (make that skilled politicians) tend to follow. For instance, there are words you never say. At least, not in reference to yourself. You never say, "We're trying" to do something. As Homer Simpson said so well, "Trying is just the first step in failing." Instead, you're "aggressively working toward" a goal or "moving forward" with your idea. "Trying" suggests the possibility of failure and speaking about failure at the outset doesn't inspire confidence. A good politician only uses words like "try" and "attempt" when talking about the opposition -- speaking of their failure from the git-go does inspire confidence.

Another rule can best be put this way -- "Never pull crap out of your butt." Don't make promises for other people, don't make up "facts," and, for that matter, don't say things that you aren't sure are true. This rule was broken the other day by a man Molly Ivins once described by saying, "He's the most skilled politician I've ever watched work."

David Session put it this way at Slate:

Bill and George's not so likely adventure: Bill Clinton said Monday that the "first thing" Hillary would do as president would be to send him on a world tour with fellow former President George H.W. Bush to fix the bad reputation the United States has garnered under the current President Bush. Predicting that Bush 41 would quickly shoot down the idea (he did), bloggers of all political stripes questioned Clinton's commitment to his wife's campaign.

Bill was slinging bullshit here and it came back to bite him. I'm sure he was thinking of his and 41's world tour to drum up support for tsunami aid, but he really should've considered who's daddy 41 was. Clinton was just shooting from the hip and wound up pulling something out of his butt. It doesn't seem to have stuck to his wife's campaign, but it was a surprisingly bad move from someone who's been referred to as the best political mind of his generation.

Another bad political move is to answer bullshit with bullshit. When faced with pure BS, the best possible move is to answer with the truth. President Bush was asked about this comment at a press conference and his answer was pretty much perfect -- then he went on and blew it...

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