What It Takes

by Richard Ben Cramer

  Close to eleven o’clock, and the chucklehead with the van didn’t know where he was going!

  Be nice ...

  So they got to Lenoir and there’s a crowd, maybe hundred and fifty, that’d been “warmed up” for about four hours ... they looked like the people who kill time in those pay-TV chairs in airports: they’re watching, but they don’t want to be there. The Doles walked in and everybody sat up, waiting, but Broyhill hadn’t shown yet. Elizabeth got up and delivered her remarks, and then Dole scratched out a few lines. But Broyhill didn’t get there. Broyhill was lost, somewhere in the rain. So what could they do? The Doles stayed and “warmed up” the crowd for another half-hour.

  It was after midnight when they got back to the plane. Dole just wanted to know the flight time. Then he sat, quiet, awfully quiet. Elizabeth was worried because Bob was so tired. Really, she had no idea it was so far ... and on a night like this, whah, she never. ... But no one else felt like chatting. Some North Carolina folks had sent along some barbecued pork for the flight, so once they were up, they set to their sandwiches, and after a while, in the darkened cabin, there was just the smell of the smoky pork, the hum from the engines, the hiss of the air vents. Elizabeth was still nervous, but she could always eat barbecue.

  It’d be near 2:00 A.M. when they got to Kansas City, maybe a half-hour later when they got into the hotel. Dole would be up in a few hours to do Face the Nation. He’d be nice, Presidential. ... He’d make a few jokes in the studio. On the air, he’d suavely predict victory.

  But really, he wasn’t so sure anymore. Somehow, it didn’t feel the same. Maybe he was just tired ... hard to tell. No one would see it on TV. He’d look fine. He always did. But somehow, when it got like this, everything seemed harder. He’d try to shrug it off, like he always did, if it came to that. If the news was bad, he wasn’t going to whine.

  Still, it didn’t help, later that day, when Riker found out the papers were going with a story from George Bush, about all the miles he’d flown, the candidates he’d helped, the money he raised. Riker said the totals weren’t as big as Dole’s, but no one was going to do a second-day story on the same thing from Dole. Bush’s press release had gotten to the papers in plenty of time.

  Dole just made a face, and issued a mournful haiku, a meditation on the struggle against an incumbent VP:

  “Agh, Air Force Two ... lotta people, typin’ ... flyin’ around.”

  The thing that was neat about Air Force Two was the way it helped him make friends. He’d be doing a state, so he’d get the Congressmen, State Party Chairman, or State Treasurer, even a County Chairman or two, and ferry them along to the next event. They loved it. They’d talk about it for the next year. That was one beautiful plane!

  Actually, it wasn’t just one: any plane he rode was called Air Force Two. In the bad old seventies, when Mondale was Veep, and the government still worried about things like fuel and noise, the Vice President flew on small, efficient DC-9S. But now, in the age of Reagan, Bush mostly flew a big old 707, the Stratoliner, a Cadillac-with-tailfins kind of plane, so heavy, noisy, and greedy for fuel that no commercial airline would be permitted to land one at an American airport. The Air Force had enough of the behemoths to keep two on call for Reagan, maybe send another overseas with a Cabinet Secretary, and still give one (or one and a backup) to Bush, to ease his travels. On most trips, he got Number 86-6970, which was the first jet a President ever flew. It was delivered for Ike, at the end of his term, and it was JFK’s number-one plane. Sometimes Bush got Number 26000, the plane that flew LBJ back to Washington after Kennedy’s assassination, on which he took the oath of office in the nation’s darkest hour. Of course, by the time a guest learned any of that, he felt like he was riding a shrine.

  And the way George Bush was, he’d never leave guests stuck in the back, even in the fine first-class seats that lined the rear cabin. No, someone from the staff would lead them up through the staff seating section, and through the office cabin, with its tables, word processors, Xerox, fax ... and forward still, to the Power Cabin, where the Vice President would receive them in his big swivel chair. That was the grandest part of all.

  Lyndon Johnson had the chair built in, along with the table and an L-shaped bench along the wall, so guests or staff could sit at the table, while Johnson held court in his swivel-throne. Johnson had them build in a button he could press to raise and lower the table. There was a TV, of course, and the highest level of Bush-friend-perk was to sit with the Veep in the Power Cabin, transcontinentally munching the public popcorn, while the latest (though, alas, not always the best) movie transpired on the VCR.

  Bush used the plane as a five-hundred-thirty-mile-an-hour living room, and he dressed accordingly. Whenever he’d get on, even for a twenty-minute hop, he’d slip off his suit coat and don his AFII jacket, a short blue windbreaker made by London Fog, with “Air Force II” embroidered across the back, a Vice Presidential seal on his left breast, and on the right, in embroidered script: “The Vice President.” Bar had a jacket, too, with the same decoration, and on the right breast, an embroidered “Mrs. Bush.” Whenever they got on the plane, stewards had the jackets ready, his draped over the back of the swivel-throne, and hers on the table, or laid out in the very foremost cabin, the private Vice Presidential stateroom. For longer trips, the VP would strip off his work clothes and get into slippers, baggy sweatpants, a golf shirt, and, of course, the jacket.

  If he was leaving an event, the first thing he’d grab was the thank-you list, which the Lead Advance handed aboard as he said goodbye to the Veep on the tarmac. These were the names, addresses, and salutations (Mr., Mrs., Miss, Ms., Dr., etc.) written out in a grid, along with the nature of each person’s gift or work in aid of the event. Bush always did the thank-you notes first. Oftentimes, he’d have a dozen done before the plane got off the ground. Then he’d call his briefers in, usually the Chief of Advance, followed by the staff who arranged the next event, or the State Department briefers if he were headed overseas. Sometimes, on a long trip, he’d keep the briefers up there for hours, peppering them with questions, until he found one they really couldn’t answer. Then, for some reason, he seemed satisfied. That was a note he could quit on.

  But after the briefing, invariably, it was time for friends. That’s when the staff would lead the pols up front for popcorn and shoot-the-shit, and maybe, if the hour was right, a martini that would fell a horse, prepared by the practiced stewards to Vice Presidential specs, in a water glass, size of a tumbler. See, the Veep allowed himself only one. (Of course, a guest could have as many as he liked: once, upon deplaning, the aged and befuddled Richard Lyng, Secretary of Agriculture, took a dramatic stuntman tumble down the back steps of the plane to cement; but he lived to buy further surplus.) Whatever the hour or the circumstance, this was the part the Veep liked best. He’d bring them up, order them drinks, and talk politics: he loved to talk politics, as some men love to talk sports. Or if he knew them better, it might be anything, as long as it was common ground: fishing, boats, children, tennis. ... (You play? Y’gotta come to the house, got a court there. Why’n’cha come next weekend? C’mon! Your son play? Doubles! It’ll be fun! ...)

  What a Great and Good God it was who gave George Bush work he so enjoyed! And work that contributed so surely to his progress on this earth below!

  So, when Bush went to speak for George Wortley, Congressman from Syracuse, and then to a dinner in Manhattan, he picked up a couple of County Chairmen from the New York Conservative Party.

  “Hey! Wanna ride down on Air Force Two?”

  “Yeah ... uh, yes, sir!”

  So they got on the plane, and within ten minutes they were up in the Power Cabin, posing for a photo with The Man himself. Of course, next month, the pic showed up on the front of the party newsletter. And Bush used the photo a thousand times. (Who says conservatives don’t like Bush?)

  Of course, all the Governors flew with Bush, too. That’s what he was working on in ’86: Governors, al
l over the country. See, that was the White House plan: the Reagan guys, the A-Team, palmed off the grunt work on George Bush—what the hell, he’d do it. ...

  But what a Great and Good Godly stroke! Governors were just what he’d need for next time, for ’88, when at last he’d turn from toil for others and, finally, do something for himself. Governors were the ones who had the contacts all over their states—and not just people who’d help in campaigns. Those were the people a Senator knew: a Senator came back just to run every six years. But Governors had to work every day with people in the towns and counties, handing out contracts, putting folks in jobs. A Governor met the local press, knew all the small papers, and the local reporters—not just the one overworked schlub who covered Capitol Hill in the Washington bureau. A Governor could make all the difference in a state:

  KEAN: BUSH VISIT MEANS N.J.

  HAS A FRIEND IN WHITE HOUSE

  That would be the headline from Trenton, if the Governor, like Tom Kean, was a friend who’d billboard Bush’s day in the Garden State—his visit to that toxic-waste cleanup site, all the help he’d offered on that Superfund. ...

  Of course, if the Governor wasn’t a friend, then his appointed State Police Chief might find time to take a couple of press calls. ...

  That would be a different headline:

  BUSH VISIT WILL COST

  $200,000 IN OVERTIME

  So Bush was focused on Governors, and not just on their campaigns: he was working on them, one by one, making friends, finding common ground. Tom Kean wasn’t even running in ’86, but Bush made a point of seeking him out, asking his views on two issues that interested Kean the most: education and welfare reform. Of course, Kean was a friend from way back. Same with Dick Thornburgh in Pennsylvania. But big Jim Thompson, in Illinois, he was looking for a horse to ride: had to be a good horse, to carry him all the way to a Cabinet job in Washington. So Bush had long talks with Thompson—revenue generation, what it’s like to run a big state, that kind of thing. Bush let Thompson do the talking—and signed him up to be a cochair of the PAC, the Fund for America’s Future. Of course, that also froze Big Jim for the whole ’88 cycle, put an end to any budding plan to run as Illinois’s favorite son. But it wasn’t just the fellows in the biggest states. Kay Orr in Nebraska—got to know her when she was State Treasurer; Bob Martinez in Florida—friend of Jeb, Bush’s son who lived down there; Henry Bellmon in Oklahoma—he was with Bush back in ’80; even Mike Castle, in Delaware, who had to be with Pete du Pont, and Mike Hayden in Kansas, who’d have to be with Dole: Bush wanted to know them. He wanted to be friends.

  If there was something they wanted to know about Bush, well, that was fine, too. John Sununu in New Hampshire: Bush got onto him the minute Sununu won in ’82. Talked with him during the ’84 reelection, and went back, over and over, during the midterms in ’86. Had a real meeting of the minds there, on domestic issues, the limits on government. And Bush convinced him, worked at convincing him, that he really had flipped over on abortion: solidly against it now—except the life of the mother, or rape, incest, that kind of thing. ... John Ashcroft in Missouri, got elected in ’84, completely different background: evangelical, a gospel singer, father was a minister. He had to be convinced, too, that Bush was “right” on abortion now. So Bush convinced him, or rather Ashcroft became convinced that Bush and he had common ground.

  Fact was, there was common ground with everyone, when George Bush wanted to be friends. It wasn’t so much the public stuff, the speech, though that was charming, in its way. “Don’t worry,” he’d say on stage, in front of the flags, at the funder. He’d toss both hands up over his shoulders, palms out, a quick gesture of accommodation, half reassurance, half surrender. “Not gonna give you the full load ...” Like they didn’t really want to hear from him. He wasn’t gonna take up their time, just talking. “Just happy,” Bush would say, “... here with my friend, and I mean friend ...” Then he’d name the guy he was with: Tommy Thompson in Wisconsin, Carroll Campbell in South Carolina, Garrey Carruthers in New Mexico, “... be a GREAT Governor ...”

  And he meant it, at least the friend part: even if he didn’t know them well, even if they knew he’d want their help next year, they could feel how much it mattered to him. It was an animal thing, like a tail wagging, wagging his whole ass back and forth. He wanted to be their friend. And by the time they banked the gate from that fund-raiser, and they got the handwritten note he did on the plane going home, when they got another check from his Fund for America’s Future, when they got the signed photo from his office, and the follow-up invitation to come to breakfast at the White House, or stay at the Residence, or burgers and bloodies in the backyard on Sunday, or troll for bluefish on the boat in Maine, when they heard from a fellow Governor, or someone they knew at the White House, that Bush was mentioning how much he liked them ... well then, damn right he’s a friend!

  Meanwhile, he’d get them up in Air Force Two, or have them into the hotel suite after the big fund-raiser, and he was just terrific! Able, funny, confidential ... and smart: he knew a few things about their states. Or, more likely, he knew people. One of the Governors would mention he was up in a certain county last week, and heard nice things about Bush there. “Oh, d’ya see Will Simmons?” Bush would ask. “He was County Chairman in ’73 ...” Bush had the name at instant command from thirteen years before, when he headed the Republican National Committee. (As a matter of fact, it wasn’t Will, it was Will, Jr., whom Bush had phoned, just to say hello, when he flew in to his college town to give a speech in 1979.) And Bush knew what the issues were, what the Governor had been doing: that fight about the nuclear plant, the problem with the State Court of Appeals. ... As a matter of fact, he’d heard about them yesterday, from Andy Card, who was the Bush State Chairman in Massachusetts in 1980. And what was Andy Card doing now? Well, he went to work in the White House—Deputy-Under-Something for Intergovernmental Relations—and when the A-Team started to focus on the Senate, Andy suggested that he could help out ... take the Governors off their hands. In fact, knowing everything about the Governors (and the State Comptrollers, Attorneys General, the Speakers of the House, and other Governors-to-be) became Andy’s specialty, and his work for the taxpayers of this nation. What a Great and Good stroke of fortune for Bush! ... What a Blessed Confluence of happenstance!

  It seemed always to happen for Bush—the Blessed Confluence. He just tried to be a friend, and it worked out. Even he couldn’t understand why. But that’s the way it worked in the five-minute devotions, homilies on how the good life is lived, which Dottie Bush read to her children, every day at breakfast.

  Good things happen to good people. It was one of those truths he’d just always known.

  Much later, when he was grown up, a millionaire man of the world, Bush heard the same lesson from his own minister. The Reverend James T. (Tom) Bagby, Rector of St. Martin’s Episcopal, in Houston, had a homily he’d tell in church, a lesson from his own life. ... When Tom was going to seminary, the Bishop awarded him one-third of a scholarship, the gift of a wealthy and gracious lady. That year, Tom wrote her a letter every month. The next year, the lady instructed the Bishop that Tom was to get the whole scholarship. Why, the Bishop asked her, did she want to give the full amount to a student so undistinguished? Reverend Tom always concluded:

  “Perhaps it’s because I did what my mother taught me. Expressing my gratitude was the very least I could have done. ... Large rewards come from planting small seeds of gratitude.”

  Lord knows, George Bush had strewn the ground with seeds.

  He’d see Tom this Sunday at church. He had a day off scheduled for Sunday, in Houston. Just heaven! A day with no speeches, no press. Just church in the morning and a golf game with his old friend Fred Chambers in the afternoon. Then, maybe a rubdown in the Houstonian’s private health club. Then, more friends for dinner—Molina’s, his favorite Tex-Mex place. It’d be a great day, a great weekend in Houston. Friday, he’d do one event for Tommy Thompson
, in Wisconsin, and then he’d get into Houston about three-thirty in the afternoon. (There’d be no midnight, down-to-the-wire flights for George Bush.) Then he’d spend four nights in a row there, until Tuesday morning, when he and Bar would jump in the limo and ride five minutes to vote at their precinct, just down the road from the hotel.

  It was perfect, the way it worked out. There was a tough race for Governor in Texas, too. So Bush could spend his last day, Monday, hopping his home state with his friend Bill Clements: Mesquite, El Paso, College Station ... lots of friends in those places. Then back to Houston for one last event, the big one, at the Galleria. That would be the best of all.

  In the Power Cabin, Bush had his bible out and was looking over the schedule. He could see the finish line coming. He ripped out the Wisconsin pages, wadded them up. “That’s done,” he said. It wasn’t a gesture of annoyance, or even impatience. There was an air of satisfaction in the front of Air Force Two. Bush was up—everybody noticed.

  The plane was packed with staff—thirty rooms reserved at the Houstonian, and that wasn’t even counting the Service—and everyone telling him things were going well. Not that he had to ask. He knew he was getting a good reception. He could read a poll, too. And he knew he’d done a job: covered a lot of miles, lot of races, made a lot of friends. Anyone who stuck with him for a day saw it wasn’t like ’84, with the press always on him, comparing him to their darling, Ferraro, picking him over like some mysterious creature that crawled out from under a rock:

  Wouldn’t you call that a preppy watchband?

  When did you stop wearing button-down shirts?

  Why do you wear those short socks?

  That was the worst, ’84, when it got so nasty and personal. It got to him, he had to admit. It was “rasping.” That was his word for it. Running around like he did that year—like they all did in ’84—he didn’t even feel like he was helping the government. No one got anything done. As for him, he was cutting ribbons. Made him wonder what the hell it was all for.