Zero Based Compliments

Some of the oddest responses to presidential speeches always come from Tom Shales, maybe because he has no background in presidential rhetoric, and so reads the whole thing exclusively through the lens of how it played as a TV-event.

But it is always entertaining.

But I had to chuckle at his opening paragraph this morning:

Whether George W. Bush is, at best, the worst president since Herbert Hoover -- as a seemingly sizable number of Americans appear to believe -- he acquitted himself fairly well and came off as basically competent when he delivered his fifth State of the Union speech last night.

Don't you usually use the word "whether" in order to construct sentences around a contrast? You know, like, "whether George Bush is the worst president since Hoover, or the best since so and so," or at least like, "whether George Bush is the worst president blah blah blah -- or not?"

Comments

[Enoch]

The "at best" means the contrast is between being the worst President since Hoover or being worse than Hoover, I suppose.

Manifestly, there is nothing Bush can do to change the minds of people who are determined to revile him. I thought it was a very good speech, myself!