Article - James P. Pinkerton's 8/15 column in the LA Times
One Line Summary - Dubya’s detachment on the economy is a good thing
Primary Weakness - Misuses terms and doesn’t discuss any facts
Detail Summary - "The overall gist of the reportage [on the Waco economic forum] is that Bush is so detached from ordinary Americans that his reelection-minded advisors felt they needed to stage a show to fool people into thinking he really does care. But maybe detachment is not so bad. Maybe it's what we need." "once upon a time, this style of leadership was much admired. The French call it sang-froid--literally 'cold blood,' as in, don't get too hot about things." "in any case that froid-y style of leadership is out of fashion. Instead of the stiff upper lip of a Winston Churchill, we seem to want the bitten lip of a Bill Clinton." "The success of the economy depends on the noninterference of politicians. That was the great insight of 18th century French economists". "So they came up with the economic equivalent of sang-froid, which is laissez faire, or 'let people do as they choose.' And two centuries of economic history proves that the cool detachment of the state--leaving people the space to figure things out for themselves--is superior to warm-and-fuzzy intervening." Bush "is correct to think that the economy grows most when the government does least. That means holding the line on taxes and spending, as he has tried to do, in spite of the critics."
Critique - First, Pinkerton mistakenly defines cold-blooded as detached. Cold-blooded is staying calm in a crisis. Detached is being not physically or emotionally involved in a crisis. On 9/11, Giuliani showed cold-bloodness by braving the dangers of being physically present at the WTC .Bush showed detachment by flying in a secure plane from secure site to secure site.
Second, Pinkerton wrongly confuses laissez faire with lower government taxes and spending. Laissez faire is about the government regulation of and intervention in the marketplace. If Dubya stopped military spending and reduced personal taxes by a corresponding amount, taxes and spending would drop but that wouldn’t be a laissez faire action because the amount of government regulation or intervention wouldn’t change.
Third, he makes a huge, unsupported generalization - "two centuries of economic history proves that the cool detachment of the state--leaving people the space to figure things out for themselves--is superior to warm-and-fuzzy intervening." What about the Depression? What about Keynesian economics? How about Japan’s economic miracle?
Dubya’s economic forum must have been a real disaster if the best thing a Dubya supporter can come up with about it was that Dubya’s detachment from ordinary Americans may be a good thing.
Note: posted on 8/16 and on 8/18, corrected misspell of Giuliani
7:00:39 AM 
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