Tony mostly snows.

While Think Progress' Tony Snow Quoables is fun and good fodder for a kick-off press conference, I think the apparent tendency to give the White House credit, however backhanded, because, as Michael Crowley put it, "the choice of a man who has often bashed--even mocked--him in public him makes Bush look freshly open-minded (even if that itself is a kind of strategic pose)" is just all wrong.

Worse, it confuses the basic issue. Snow's assention is far less a sign that the White House still feels the need to address criticism from across the Republican coalition (even if only the watered-down Fox News variety) than the exact opposite: a sign of just how easy it is for a Washington conservative player to move between punditry (where he's required to offer token criticisms of power) and politics (where he repeats the powerline straight). When the Clintonites brought on David Gergen way back when, it might have been "savvy" in the way Crowley means: a candid admission that the Admin needed wider, less partisan, less insular appeal. When Bush brings on Snow, it's a sign of how easy and tempting it is to do and admit absolutely nothing -- and to mollify the mainstream press with the chance to ask Snow what he meant that time he took a break from all the gushing to call Bush and "embarrassment". (I expect if you examine James Carville's whole oeuvre, he's said things just as bad about Clinton.)

The Anonyous Liberal has what I think is the better take: all the bad "snow job" puns are perfectly appropriate. They're how Tony got the job in the first place. They're how conservative Washington works.