oracle
04-19-2001, 11:03 AM
Reagan as Role Model (http://www.msnbc.com/news/561302.asp)
George W. takes his cues from the Gipper
Martha Bryant
George W. Bush took another extended weekend on his Texas ranch over Easter, his third trip to Crawford in as many months. The press, camped out an hour away in Waco, hardly saw him for three days. “What does he do out there?” one former Clinton aide asked me recently. He rests, exercises, reads (at the moment he’s reading a mystery) and usually clears away the cedar thicket around his property.
REMEMBERING RONALD REAGAN’S wood chopping days at his beloved ranch north of Santa Barbara— and the image of an affable but hands-off president that came with it—the aide marveled: “My God, he’s just like Reagan.”
When George W. first took office there were inevitable comparisons to Bush I. Not only does Bush the Younger have his father’s looks and his gift for garble, but many of the Elder’s team—Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice—re-enlisted for Bush II. Cheney, for one, balked at the comparison. “You could just as easily say we are bringing back the Ford administration,” the vice president has said. True, he, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul O’Neill were all prominent in the Ford administration.
But now it seems that if Bush II has a political mentor it is the Gipper. Not only does George W. strike the same Western pose as Reagan, but his administration’s approach to policy and public relations are out of Reagan’s play book—literally. Karl Rove, Bush’s chief strategist, is a voracious student of the Reagan era; he’s quizzed Reagan media guru Michael Deaver both during the campaign and in recent months about how they pulled off the so-called Reagan Revolution. Deaver has been an occasional adviser to the Bushies, as has Martin Anderson, Reagan’s domestic and economic policy adviser. Rove’s plan for Bush’s first 100 days is a mirror of Reagan’s: choose a few things and stay focused on them.
“From a communications standpoint, this administration is taking more lessons from the Reagan White House than any other,” says Deaver, whose book “A Different Drummer,” a personal account of his 30-year relationship with Reagan, comes out Friday. Both presidents have similar pet policies: tax cuts, trimming the budget, even missile defense, though star wars is a lower priority for Bush, whose dearest issue is education. “Like Reagan, Bush has a few clear priorities. If you ask Americans today what George Bush believes in, they’d say a tax cut,” Deaver says.
Their governing styles are even more alike: they both delegate. That has translated into a popular media image of W and the Gipper as dumb and out-to-lunch. Reagan’s napping and Bush’s early to bed routine don’t help matters. Early reports that Bush was working out mid-morning when a man with a gun was shot outside the White House only made the president seem more like a slacker.
Anderson says that both men have been misunderstood because they don’t micromanage and they share credit. Reagan had a famous plaque on his desk that read: “There’s no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.” In the book he co-edited, “Reagan In His Own Hand,” Anderson compiled a revealing collection of Reagan’s writing. The book has done more to counter the image of Reagan as a manipulated dolt than probably any other publication. The most famous anecdote is Reagan’s decision to keep the immortal line “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” in his Berlin Wall speech—despite the urging of his aides not to use it. As Anderson remembers it, Reagan asked aide Ken Duberstein, who had been sent to convince him to leave it out, “Am I the president?” “Yes sir,” Duberstein replied. “Then I guess it stays,” the Gipper said.
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Click here to read more (http://www.msnbc.com/news/561302.asp)
George W. takes his cues from the Gipper
Martha Bryant
George W. Bush took another extended weekend on his Texas ranch over Easter, his third trip to Crawford in as many months. The press, camped out an hour away in Waco, hardly saw him for three days. “What does he do out there?” one former Clinton aide asked me recently. He rests, exercises, reads (at the moment he’s reading a mystery) and usually clears away the cedar thicket around his property.
REMEMBERING RONALD REAGAN’S wood chopping days at his beloved ranch north of Santa Barbara— and the image of an affable but hands-off president that came with it—the aide marveled: “My God, he’s just like Reagan.”
When George W. first took office there were inevitable comparisons to Bush I. Not only does Bush the Younger have his father’s looks and his gift for garble, but many of the Elder’s team—Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice—re-enlisted for Bush II. Cheney, for one, balked at the comparison. “You could just as easily say we are bringing back the Ford administration,” the vice president has said. True, he, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul O’Neill were all prominent in the Ford administration.
But now it seems that if Bush II has a political mentor it is the Gipper. Not only does George W. strike the same Western pose as Reagan, but his administration’s approach to policy and public relations are out of Reagan’s play book—literally. Karl Rove, Bush’s chief strategist, is a voracious student of the Reagan era; he’s quizzed Reagan media guru Michael Deaver both during the campaign and in recent months about how they pulled off the so-called Reagan Revolution. Deaver has been an occasional adviser to the Bushies, as has Martin Anderson, Reagan’s domestic and economic policy adviser. Rove’s plan for Bush’s first 100 days is a mirror of Reagan’s: choose a few things and stay focused on them.
“From a communications standpoint, this administration is taking more lessons from the Reagan White House than any other,” says Deaver, whose book “A Different Drummer,” a personal account of his 30-year relationship with Reagan, comes out Friday. Both presidents have similar pet policies: tax cuts, trimming the budget, even missile defense, though star wars is a lower priority for Bush, whose dearest issue is education. “Like Reagan, Bush has a few clear priorities. If you ask Americans today what George Bush believes in, they’d say a tax cut,” Deaver says.
Their governing styles are even more alike: they both delegate. That has translated into a popular media image of W and the Gipper as dumb and out-to-lunch. Reagan’s napping and Bush’s early to bed routine don’t help matters. Early reports that Bush was working out mid-morning when a man with a gun was shot outside the White House only made the president seem more like a slacker.
Anderson says that both men have been misunderstood because they don’t micromanage and they share credit. Reagan had a famous plaque on his desk that read: “There’s no limit to what a man can do or where he can go if he doesn’t mind who gets the credit.” In the book he co-edited, “Reagan In His Own Hand,” Anderson compiled a revealing collection of Reagan’s writing. The book has done more to counter the image of Reagan as a manipulated dolt than probably any other publication. The most famous anecdote is Reagan’s decision to keep the immortal line “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” in his Berlin Wall speech—despite the urging of his aides not to use it. As Anderson remembers it, Reagan asked aide Ken Duberstein, who had been sent to convince him to leave it out, “Am I the president?” “Yes sir,” Duberstein replied. “Then I guess it stays,” the Gipper said.
...
Click here to read more (http://www.msnbc.com/news/561302.asp)