Bush and shove.

• Position: Letters - Letter to the Editor

Joshua Micah Marshall ("The Post-Modern President," September) explains President Bush's repeated lies as the result of trying to fit the world into a preconceived ideological mold, an effort that requires discarding or negating inconvenient facts. Yet Bush is not himself the author of most of the policies that his administration pursues. If he were in fact able to fashion a consistent ideological worldview, that would be a considerable intellectual achievement, something that no one else has yet accomplished.

While recognizing that not everything done in the name of the Bush administration is part of its program (the huge bureaucracy continues of its own momentum), I think that essentially all of Bush's decisions and actions can be explained by the following rules:

1. Bush seeks to advance and protect the immediate economic interests of a few thousand wealthy, powerful families, whom he regards as the elect of society, regardless of the impact on everyone else.

2. Most voters don't care about federal policies, as long as their personal interests--taxes, social security, Medicare--don't change for the worse. While the actual impact of Bush's policies can be cushioned or deferred, often by hapless Democratic politicians who may then be blamed as well (i.e., Gray Davis), the great apathetic majority won't react.

3. Bush needs voters who can be mobilized by the threat of terrorism and war, his personal charm, the money of his supporters, and a judicious mix of rhetoric and high-visibility social initiatives.

Keith Roberts

New York, N.Y.

An excellent piece in a series of excellent analyses by Josh Marshall. But there is a piece...