"William Galston" holds the Ezra K. Zilkha Chair in Governance Studies and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He joined the Brookings Institution on January 1, 2006. Formerly the Saul Stern Professor and Dean at the University of Maryland School of Public Policy/School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland, Dr. Galston specializes in issues of American public philosophy and political institutions.

He was deputy assistant for domestic policy to U.S. President Bill Clinton (January 1993-May 1995). He has also been employed by the presidential campaigns of Al Gore (1988, 2000) and Walter Mondale. Since 1995, Galston has served as a founding member of the Board of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy and as chair of the Campaign's Task Force on Religion and Public Values.

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While White House aides can provide familiar talking points on gestures of cooperation across party lines, the fact of the matter is on all three occasions, the principal thrust of Bush's policies was toward polarization rather than conciliation. We are now living in the shadow of nearly five years in which that has been the dominant political message coming out of the White House.

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This is a shot to the solar plexus of George Bush's agenda. The ripples go out in so many different directions, to so many different areas of policy, domestic and foreign. It's second only to 9/11 in its impact on the course of the presidency.

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There are things you don't learn in a classroom, and if your circumstances aren't rich in the sort of input you need, you may not learn them at all. Unless you have a home where these things are specifically talked about and reinforced, or a mentor or guide of some sort, you may not be able to figure out where the road is, let alone how to take it, or what direction.

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They went with their head over their heart. I would predict that trend will continue in 2008, ... That's what we're asking voters to do.

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Bush is the most partisan president in modern American history. As a result, voters in both parties are focusing on him, rather than on the specifics of the policies.

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The poor don't need their consciousness raised as to what a good life looks like.

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And this is significant because after the November 2006 congressional elections all political energy will turn towards the presidential contest [in 2008], which will be wide open in both parties.

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The one thing the republican coalition could agree on was lowering taxes. This president and the Republican leadership both remember the cataclysm of the early 1990s, when they broke with that consensus. Spending cuts are painful. Tax cuts aren't. Supply side economists thought tax cuts spelt the end of 'root-canal Republicanism'.

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