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An Interview With New White House Press Secretary, Tony Snow
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INTERVIEW WITH TONY SNOW

Fox News anchor/pundit Tony Snow has been named the new White House Press Secretary. Snow has been a rather outspoken conservative/Libertarian/critic of the president - a trait that is likely to disappear soon as he takes his new job. Our columnist, Bill Steigerwald recently did an interview with Snow, before he was approached about the Press Secretary job; the interview suddenly makes much more interesting reading. E-mail us with your comments.


When Tony Snow Was a Pundit
By Cagle Cartoons Columnist, Bill Steigerwald

When President Bush named Fox News Radio talk host Tony Snow as his new press secretary on Wednesday, the president noted that the now former radio/TV pundit and commentator "has sometimes disagreed with me." Examples of that disagreement ­ as well as Snow's disappointment with incumbency-worshipping, big-spending Republican congressmen -- can be found in a freshly edited version of a December 2005 phone interview with Snow, 50, who is replacing the always loyal Scott McClellan.

Q: A few years ago when I talked to you, you called yourself more libertarian than Republican. Is that still true?
A: Yeah, I think so. I learned a long time ago that if you sit around and pledge your fealty to politicians, you're going to get burnt. So what I like to do is maintain my independence. I'm clearly conservative. But this week I've been bashing conservatives on various forms of corruption, including spending money on stuff that's completely idiotic, like, oh, the fact that they are now going to have subsidies for people to have digital signals on their TVs. It's unbelievable. They are actually setting up a subsidy for people who still have analog televisions as of 2009 or something. They'll give them $40 or $60 per TV to digitize them. Give me a break!

Q: You recently wrote that Republicans are cowards because they have forsaken their core beliefs and betrayed the Republican Revolution of 1994. How so?
A: What happened is when Republicans came in 1994, what did they say? They said we're going to make government smaller and we're going to make it more responsive. Instead, what has happened -- and it's typical, it's natural, it's something that happens all the time -- is that they decided, "You know what, I'd rather just stay in office." So they decided to worship incumbency rather than principle. Well, what happens over time is that you end up with a government that spends like crazy on stuff that is not of vital national importance. You find members of Congress suddenly fudging on things that they had promised to do. And over time, what happens is that they lose their credibility with voters. It's exactly the same thing that happened to Democrats in the run-up to the 1994 congressional elections.

Q: Is there anything that President Bush has done that you are completely jazzed about -- happy about?
A: Completely jazzed about? I get jazzed when my son brings home a report card full of A's. I don't get jazzed when presidents do their jobs, so the answer would be "no."

Q: What's the worst or most egregious mistake the president has made?
A: The lack of spending discipline on the part of Republicans has been disappointing and frankly so has George W. Bush's inability to understand the importance of using a veto. Washington is like a dog pound. You have to have an alpha male. You've got a scent, mark your territory -- and the way you do that is using the veto. I know the war is important, but being the lead dog in Washington is also important and I don't think the president has quite figured that out yet and I don't think the people closest to him have either.

Q: Did you have any qualms about going to Iraq?
A: Of course I did. And I said on "Fox News Sunday," when I was still hosting there, and I said it in print elsewhere, that I wished before he'd gone to war that we'd have seen some pictures of sites with weapons of mass destruction. Having said that, I don't have any qualms about it because frankly what you do have, contrary to the way it is reported in many places, is a nation that was not only a haven for terrorists but was an active participant in it. Saddam Hussein was somebody who was paying bounties on Israeli citizens, was setting up meetings with al-Qaida, and was trying to do whatever he could to foment terror around the world. Why? Because it was good for him.


(Click here to read the rest of the column.)

 

Cartoons above by Daryl Cagle and Sandy Huffaker.


Politicalcartoons.comMike Lester, Rome News-Tribune, Rome, GA
E-mail Mike. Visit an archive of the artist's most recent cartoons in the drop menu at the right. Click on the cartoon to e-mail it to a friend.
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