What the Meaning of Mean Is

While Jane Fonda was waking up the echoes of Vietnam and her own relevancy the other day at the Peace Rally in DC, she included this gratuitous slap at the President:

"Thank you so much for the courage to stand up to this mean-spirited and vengeful administration."

And the crowd hooted and hollered and applauded their approval. (Video here). A positive reaction to a performance is probably something Jane Fonda hasn't received since she got the North Vietnamese version of the wave after stepping off of that anti-aircraft cannon.

Mean-spirited and vengeful? That's a part of what they're PO'd about? Let's go over the list of grievances. Bush Lied. People Died. And he was mean about it too (sniff).

Truth be told, I'm not an beltway insider. I don't know if that's a true characterization of the Bush administration or not. And neither do 99.95% of those at the peace rally who are applauding their own courage for standing up to it. (BTW, let the record show the courageous people standing up to the vindictive administration were not mowed down with a machine gun barrage from the circling Blackhawk helicopters).

But I would imagine any modern administration, after clawing to power and battling it out daily for their political lives against people committed to their personal destruction in the cesspool of DC, gets a little testy. I suppose that is a side effect of power. We invest as much of it as we do in the federal government, and people are going to fight like rabid dogs to acquire and maintain it.

But can these peace protestors, the people holding signs like these, really accuse the President of being mean?

My impression is the exact opposite. He is polite and courteous, to a fault, towards his political rivals. No matter what they say or do to him, he constantly praises them in public, assures us that their motives are honorable, he even supports their massive entitlement programs, in a vain attempt to improve the working relationship.

A perfect example of his gracious treatment of the opposition came just today. Molly Ivins died. She's a newspaper journalist, revered in some circles, who had written scores of vicious columns mocking GWB's actions and denigrating his character. She's made a second career out of bashing him, attaching her name to no less than four books on the subject. And the President of the United States, who could have justifiably let her death pass withouth official notice, went out of his way to say this:

Molly Ivins was a Texas original. She was loved by her readers and by her many friends, particularly in Central Texas. I respected her convictions, her passionate belief in the power of words, and her ability to turn a phrase. She fought her illness with that same passion. Her quick wit and commitment to her beliefs will be missed. Laura and I send our condolences to Molly Ivins' family and friends.

A measure of forgiveness, tolerance, and class that we can all aspire too. George Bush took office saying he wanted to improve the tone in DC. Unfortunately, you can't do that dance with an unwilling partner.