nation into two wars, one of which was short and devastating and the other of which has
been dismally protracted? Where did this George Bush come from and what does it
mean to the nation that he has arrived on the scene? How can we best characterize the
Emergent Bush and thereby explain his popularity among many of his fellow citizens as
well as the antipathy he generates in many other Americans (and non-Americans)? More
specifically, are reactions to George W. Bush ontological in nature–inspired by the man
himself–or are they methodological, reactions to how he conducts himself in public?
This paper makes the latter case.
Our argument is this: The George Bush who ran for president in 2000 bears little
resemblance to the man who ran for reelection four years later. In his place emerged a
George Bush who did two things brilliantly: He told a simple story about the nation he
loved and he did so with unquestioning authority. The fact that he ran against a man–
John Kerry–who never met an idea he could not make more complex or a distinction he
could not further distinguish–only added to Bush’s appeal. How Mr. Bush did all this is
the tale we tell here.
Background
Explanations for the results of the 2004 election range from the scientific to the
anecdotal. Demographers now argue that growth in the nation’s “exurbs” heavily
favored Republicans and that inner-city voting strength was declining, thereby hurting the
Democrats. Campaign practitioners explain that Republicans’ ability to turn out church-
goers (many of whom sat on their hands in 2000) overrode Democrats’ abilities to turn
out young people. For their part, political scientists focus on the issues, noting that gay
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Convention