In writing a memoir and going on a publicity tour, George W. Bush isn’t doing anything that all his recent predecessors haven’t done. The main difference is Bush has a lot worse reputation to try to spin us into forgetting.
But part of the Bush rehabilitation spin is to pretend/deny that there’s any spinning going on. “I have zero desire to try to battle for reputation,” Bush told USA Today in an interview splashed across the front page and billed as his “first newspaper interview since leaving the presidency.” His denial that he’s battling for his reputation made it into the caption under the front-page photo (.pdf) of Bush looking wistful and repentant — even though Bush, the paper, and anyone with a pulse knows it to be false.
What are we to make of the leaked memoir excerpts, the TV appearance blitz, the multiple media interviews if not a battle for his reputation? He’s not looking to juice sales of his book. The guy doesn’t need the money. He needs his rep back. But he can’t look craven about it or needy. He has to mirror the very things he wants his rep to be: strong, resolute, invincible.
And so we’re right back where we were during his presidency: being spun wildly by a man desperate to prove to us his manhood and almost as desperate to conceal that fact from us.
