Playing the Laura Card on Bush

Jim VanderHei co-wrote an interesting
WaPo article on how a combination of humility and the Democrat’s Murtha-blurt changed the arc of plummeting Bush poll numbers from the mid-30% range back to around 50%.

As did a blog of mine yesterday, VanderHei gives much of the credit for Bush’s turnaround to the ultra-left leadership of the Democratic Party:

Better yet, from the White House perspective, Democrats helped frame the choice when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) endorsed Murtha's withdrawal plan and party Chairman Howard Dean declared it impossible to win in Iraq. "For most of the year we were debating events," the senior official said. "Now we're debating Democrats."
The president received the results he wanted. His approval ratings rose eight percentage points in the latest Washington Post-ABC News poll, to 47 percent. [50% in a Rasmussen poll]

The Post article continues that after the Dems switched the narrative:

The White House employed every bully pulpit the president has -- speeches to military, diplomatic and political audiences; interviews with key television anchors; Cheney's surprise trip to Iraq; private briefings for congressional centrists; a prime-time Oval Office address on Dec. 18 that reached 37 million people; and an East Room news conference.

The stubborn, many say pig-headed and worse, President also finally began to admit past errors:

The humility theme was woven into speeches, often in the first two minutes to keep viewers from turning away. Aides had noticed that anger at Bush after Hurricane Katrina subsided somewhat after he took responsibility for the response. The idea, one senior official said, was like fighting with a spouse: "You need to give voice to their concern. That doesn't necessarily solve the division and the difference, but it drains the disagreement of some of its animosity if you feel you've been heard."

Fighting between GWB and the First Lady might not be frequent, but the domestic argument finally may have swayed this homebody, in-bed-by-10PM Moonchild. George W. may be a bit thick and accustomed to habit, but his close advisors employed his homeboy domesticity to persuade him to come clean on occasionally goofing up.