What It Takes

by Richard Ben Cramer

  More and more, if they showed up together, Bob would want Elizabeth to introduce him. He never gave her warning ... drove her nuts. She’d just find herself at the microphone—a bit breathless—“Whah, that husband a-mine!” ... But then she’d do the Bob Dole story, including the parts that he still couldn’t talk about ... and by the time he said word one, that crowd was locked on.

  More and more, he gambled his political star-power on the lessons he took from that story ... a message Republicans hadn’t heard for years:

  There was a deficit—real money!

  And debts come due—all Americans would have to pay.

  Dole was the only Republican with the guts to point out this dirt under Reagan’s carpet ... something a poor boy from Russell couldn’t ignore.

  But he’d also insist that he wasn’t about to go Reagan one better and get the money from the poor, the helpless ...

  People had real problems!

  Government had to respond.

  That was the other half of the message—apostasy in the Temple of the Gip!

  “I think we also have to be sensitive to the needs of a lot of people out there—some in this area—who may be white, some may be black, some may be brown, some may be poor and old, or poor and young, or disabled. ... What we call vulnerable groups in America sometimes need a helping hand—sometimes, they can’t find help. So what’re you gonna do? I hope you’d agree, there’s a responsibility for the federal government to step in.”

  The pinker and more prosperous the crowd, the more Dole insisted that “conservative” didn’t have to mean “callous.” He told a convention of Young Republicans in Seattle: “I’d like to see fifty wheelchairs in this audience. I’d like to see fifty black faces, fifty Hispanics, fifty Asian Americans. ... The bottom line is how you treat others. We have a responsibility to open up the doors of this Party!”

  The amazing fact was, the YRs started cheering.

  Maybe Dole didn’t have a vision. (He said that’s why Sears wouldn’t take over the campaign: “Agh, I guess I wouldn’t go to the mountaintop, come back with a vision, you know ...”)

  Dole didn’t trust visions, or visionaries. Seen too many: they screwed up everything.

  What he had was a stubborn recognition of facts. He’d long since seen through the hole in Reagan’s silkscreen: Morning in America ... the Shining City on the Hill ...

  Dole understood what the people understood: If we’re all, for Christ’s sake, Standing So Tall ... why am I getting screwed? Dole knew what it was to make a mortgage, tuition for the kids ... he knew voters saw the bankers getting richer, collecting interest on their debt—a hundred ways. The car loan, the mortgage, the credit card, the national debt ... bleeding them all.

  “We were in the basement apartment ...” Dole would tell his crowds. “Had to rent out the top of the house. We didn’t know where the next mortgage payment was coming from ...”

  Those were facts.

  In Dole’s hands that August, facts were message ... and a link to the common millions that George Bush would never have.

  Even schedule was message.

  There was, first, the existence of a schedule, published in advance for the next six weeks. That was a big message on the capital tom-toms. Dole was being managed like the big boys. He wasn’t going to sit in his plane with a map on his knees ... and land anywhere he saw a crowd.

  This was the first time anyone could recall that Dole checked off on weeks of a schedule, hit his marks—showed up where they told him to go—and never said a word about it. (At one point, he did call his Scheduler, a Russell, Kansan, Judy Harbaugh, who went back with him twenty-five years, but just to tell her: “This is the best week of campaigning I’ve ever had in my life.”)

  Then, too, there was the content of the schedule: nine states in the South, which Bush was claiming as his fire wall, his fortress. And then, straight into Texas—Dole didn’t have to spell out that message. On one level, the contest between him and Bush came down to (as the Texans say) ... who had the cojones.

  Dole went into Houston, did a businessmen’s breakfast, did both papers, one-on-one ... then, an energy meeting with oilmen, twenty-five top guys. After that, an open lunch. They’d done some mailing and calling—figured seventy-five folks, at the Hyatt. They fed three hundred and five people.

  Then he blew into Dallas, did both papers, all three channels’ live-at-fives. He did a presale meeting with twenty-two couples who’d be holding a funder in November. And then the big one: the Dole campaign was planning a free reception for three hundred and fifty people at the Anatole Hotel. He drew fourteen hundred.

  He spent the night in San Antonio. Van Archer, who was Reagan’s guy in south Texas, had a breakfast for Dole the next day. Archer was a total right-winger. He was shocked: “In all the years I did these things for Reagan, I never had a crowd like this.”

  Dole was shocked, too: the acceptance of him, all that room to move ... in the state Bush called home! Even this was not locked down for Bush! There was no state in the country where Dole could not compete.

  “Agh! Let’s goooo!” Dole was cooing that morning, with obvious goodwill toward the world. “Nnggh, car ready? ...”

  He had a big speech after breakfast—American Legion, the national convention. For the first time, Dole would follow George Bush on the same stage.

  “Yuuoooh, yut-dut-dut-dut-dah ...”

  Dole was rasping out snatches of his march. The Legion! His crowd. Dole was winning Legion Halls when Truman was President.

  “Bip-bip-bup-bah! Yut-dut-dut-dah!”

  Mike Pettit, one of Dole’s staff on that trip, would recall: it was like riding to the heavyweight fight—with Muhammad Ali in the car.

  50

  The Badge of the Big Gee

  THAT MONTH, AND STRETCHING into September, George Bush spent twenty-five straight nights in his own bed, in his favorite bedroom, the big room with the windows looking out to sea off Walker’s Point, at Kennebunkport, Maine. Twenty-five straight mornings, he woke as he liked—5:15, maybe a few minutes later—and after a while, he’d throw on a robe, hair still standing straight up on his head, he’d go past the utility room to the kitchen, grab a coffee. He had the coffee thing set for 5:30. Then, it was back to the king-size bed with coffee and papers, which he and Bar would read while propped up on pillows against the white headboard with its built-in shelves, and the dog, Millie, would hop up on the bed, too, and, after a while, the grandchildren (the Grands, as Bush called them) would tumble on with Ganny and Gampy while their parents (George and Bar’s kids) sat in the armchairs for coffee and chat, as the fresh sun climbed above the trees and knocked the chill off the Maine morning, after which, Bush would stretch and throw on some sweats—6:30, maybe close to 7:00—to run.

  Bush ran not by distance but by time, at a pace of nine or ten minutes a mile, with one Secret Service man running ahead, and one Secret Service man running behind, one big black car leading the way, and another, or two, big black cars purring behind, and more Secret Service struggling alongside, through the woods, over lawns, keeping up as best they could. Every so often, Bush would call out: “How long?” One of the Service men would call back: “Nine and a half minutes, Mr. Vice President!” Or, the next time Bush asked: “Sixteen minutes, Mr. Vice President!” When they’d call out, “Twenty minutes, Mr. Vice President!” ... Bang. Bush would stop and walk the rest of the way home.

  After the run, it was shower, breakfast, out to the boat. Then a briefing. Then, maybe tennis—he’d be ready for some doubles. Or golf, if he could face it. (He just couldn’t understand—what’d happened to his putting?) Maybe shower up again, for lunch. Then, perhaps, he’d head for the office, do some reading, take some calls. Unless Bar’d had the court for her doubles that morning; in that case, it was his turn—maybe him and son Marvin, or Jeb, or whichever son was available to make a side for the match, a good match, competitive ... but likely to put the old man over the top, make him a winner. (Just befor
e Labor Day, he ran a round-robin tournament for the Secret Service, to make match selection easier for the Ranking Committee.)

  Late afternoon, it was back to the boat. Bush could be on that boat for hours, and never feel unease. He’d bring a friend, or a son, or a grandchild, but he wouldn’t say much. He’d run in open, featureless water, trolling, trolling, trolling for bluefish. He’d tell about days when he’d bring home a half-dozen bluefish, but there was, on that score, a suspicious lack of confirmation. Anyway, fishing wasn’t the point. Sometimes he’d hand over the wheel, busy himself with a screwdriver and a rag, fiddling, tightening, rubbing down that boat till it gleamed like a violin. And he’d be glowing, too. No one had a bigger, sleeker cigarette boat ... except the Secret Service—took one off a drug dealer, and it was faster than the Veep’s, which did sort of piss him off ... but they had to run theirs wherever he wanted. The Service boat had a helmsman and two guys in frog suits, and then, a half-mile away, there were two Coast Guard cutters, and on the hill overlooking his bay, a chopper ... not to mention the Secret Service man with a phone in the prow of Bush’s boat. That’s how he got away from it all.

  He’d be back before sundown, for the cookout. Then, by 8:00 P.M., he’d be tired. “Let’s see who’s first into bed!” he’d tell the Grands. And that was the close of another big day.

  It wasn’t like he didn’t get anything done. His two New England operatives, Andy Card and Ron Kaufman, bused in Republican officials from New Hampshire. John Sununu got the full treatment—the puffy Gov wasn’t much for tennis, but there were rides on the boat, cookouts, lunches on the terrace. Of course, it didn’t stop with Sununu ... heavens, no! There were Republican members of the State Senate, and the world’s largest State House of Reps (400 members—263 Republicans). They’d come up in gaggles and stay in hotels, and get, uh ... Important Briefings, and invitations to cocktail things at the Point ... the Vice President wanted to see them. And it did not stop with legislators. There were members of Party committees, Mayors, Police Chiefs, Town Selectmen, tree wardens, library trustees ...

  “This is ridiculous!” Bush would mutter. “I’m s’posed to be on vacation!”

  Bush was always serious about “recreating,” a verb that would occur to him, usually, in mid-protest (“Jeez, c’mon! I thought we were try’na recreate here!”) and which he’d pronounce with stress on the “reck.” He wasn’t interested in his re-creation.

  But that was the other interruption of his days and nights at Walker’s Point: the white men of his campaign—the “G-6,” they liked to call themselves—were always flying back and forth, scheduling meetings, bringing political pooh-bahs, setting up briefings, hauling experts from Washington, to re-create the Vice President as a thinker on education in the nineties, or on international economics, trade and tariff negotiation, or Third World development in the year 2000.

  They’d set up director’s chairs on the terrace, into one of which Bush would toss himself, with his long legs canted out over nearly four feet of stones, the laces of his Top-Siders jiggling while he tried to listen. He was always grateful for their effort ... but he didn’t say much. He’d sit next to the guy who was leading the talk, and he’d ask a question every once in a while—he’d ask the person who hadn’t said anything. It was hard to tell if Bush wanted the answer, or just wanted that man to have a chance to talk. Bigger briefings were held in the living room, a grand and spacious chamber jutting out to sea, windows on three sides, pale green walls, chintz-covered couches and chairs in profusion, amid which the experts would set up easels, with charts that Bush would regard with polite attention, for maybe ten seconds apiece. Sometimes, his left wrist would cock and jiggle over his legal pad—and that was great psychic reward, when the Vice President would note an idea. Mostly his gaze moved from face to face—it was the people who interested him.

  They’d show up overdressed, with black shoes and shirts that were meant to bear ties, and after a day, their noses would be burnt red, or their eyes would peer out from pale raccoon-masks, where their new sunglasses kept the skin Washington-white. They’d sit on the couches with their knees together, and they wouldn’t interrupt. They’d scowl at their agendas, or their notes—pages of typed stuff that could take days to get through ... plans on who would carry the ball on which portions of the discussion ... the Top Ten matters they had to take up with the Veep. They’d be lucky if they got to Two.

  See, it was over when Bush said it was over, and that was when he got to thinking what the Grands were doing out on the rocks past the pool, or whether the bluefish were biting, or that he hadn’t stopped by his mother’s house that day. He’d never embarrass them by cutting them off, or walking out—but it wasn’t gonna go on all day, either.

  He sure as hell wasn’t going to memorize briefing books—fat tomes of policy-speak—no matter how many the pointy-heads compiled for him. Jim Pinkerton, the campaign’s Director of Research, had fifteen guys up till five in the morning—for a week—before he showed up in Maine, bearing a briefing book as thick as his thigh. Pinkerton was a pale six-foot-nine tower supporting a brain strangely clarified by altitude. He looked like a guy who’d invent brilliant gizmos to defraud the phone company. But instead he was the chief pointy-head for the Bush campaign. Needless to say, Bush considered Pinkerton somewhat weird—and clearly, too brainy to be listened to. As for the briefing book, well, maybe he’d look at it.

  See, a lot of guys had the wrong idea about Kennebunkport: they thought this was the place where Bush would sit in wave-washed stillness, to do some serious thinking ... you know, study. They didn’t understand Walker’s Point at all.

  Anyway, Pinkerton’s book was designed for debate-prep: positions of all the Republicans on all contestable matters of state. Dole and Kemp, Haig, du Pont, Robertson—everything they’d said about everything. Pinkerton went so far as to analyze Paul Laxalt’s Senate votes. In sum, this book held everything that Bush would need to joust with his opponents on the high-policy plateau. Therefore, it was useless:

  Bush’s white men did not want him to debate.

  The question at hand was the first Republican TV debate, another special edition of William F. Buckley’s Firing Line. The Bush campaign had been diddling Buckley for months with “scheduling problems.” In the view of the white men, there was no acceptable schedule for the Veep to begin bleeding on stage. What if they could not stanch the flow?

  Tell the truth, there were so many things Bush’s white men did not want him to do, they were collegially, collectively content that he wasn’t doing anything—except reck-reating. That’s how the white men were, or how they wanted to be seen: collective, competent, controlling—in a collegial way, of course, so you couldn’t really tell who said what, or who was culpable of knowing anything. No divisions among them, no individual opinions—just a blank white wall, the board of Bush, Inc. That was the first corporate decision, and the overriding ethic of the Gee-Six.

  The name was the tip-off: it was a play on G-7, the Group of Seven—Prime Ministers and Presidents who’d meet, from time to time, for photos, and to decide what the dollar should be worth, what to do about oil, how the civilized world should fight terrorism, that kind of thing. It was the U.S., Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy, maybe Canada was in there ... pretty much everybody who could make a decent car. The meetings, the group photos, were meant to convey to the world’s unwashed that the Free World big boys, the guys with the twelve-inch GNPs bulging in their pants, were all agreed how the game should be played—stick to the rules, or do without friends.

  That was the subtext of the Gee-Six in the world of Republican politics. These were supposed to be the big boys, titans all and each, allied on the bridge of the flagship, SS Bush, to steer the great white fleet through the roil of public waters, back to safe harbor in the White House.

  “... A formidable high command,” said Germond and Witcover.

  “... An able leadership team,” said the Newsweeks.

  What it
was, was a committee, playing defense.

  Craig Fuller, of course, was a Gee-Six, and a natural at this. He must have been California state champ at fending. In the OVP, in the OEOB (that’s how they talked at Bush, Inc.), Fuller fended off the public. He fended off the Veep’s own campaign. He fended off the Veep’s own friends. The press he fended with such efficacy, they couldn’t get in the damn building! (Bush didn’t have a Press Secretary after Iran-contra, when Marlin Fitzwater moved up to help the Gipper. No spokesman at all—went on for months. Of course, Bush didn’t mean to say anything. Then again, he was kinda, you know, running for President. ...) Anyway, Fuller was so busy fending off potential fender-benders, people who might tell Bush anything unplanned or unpleasant, that no one could get a call through to Fuller. He was “in a meeting,” usually with his staff of fellow fenders, all working overtime, protecting the Veep, bumping memos back and forth, piling up pink message slips, having their secretaries check with Fuller’s secretaries to make sure the paper flow didn’t back up.

  Actually, the OVP was set up as a wall of secretaries, and secretaries to secretaries, who were all young and presentable Republican women in suits, or dresses, and pearls, or fake pearls—one strand, not too large, like they never took them off after their graduation pictures—who were so awfully busy picking up the chiming phones and telling callers that their bosses were “in a meeting,” which would be followed by “a three-o’clock,” “a three-thirty,” and “a four-o’clock” ... that they barely had time to chime up the photo office to double-check the addresses to which smiling photos of George Bush and his newest friends should be sent (the photos were the major physical product of the OVP) ... and if they had to be “away from their desks,” you could see how they had to march double time in their no-wrinkle skirts, with their security badges swaying under their pearls, and hear the clipclop-clipclop of their high heels on the hard stone hallways (two or more sounded like arrhythmic flamenco), with the crish-crish-crish of their panty-hosed thighs rubbing desperate maraca beat ... and you could understand why these well-made-up and well-spoken young women could get so hard-eyed, icy-voiced, if a caller (not to mention the occasional citizen who actually penetrated the echoing EOB and gummed up everything by presenting himself) suggested that their bosses had been in meetings, unable to call back, for months, and maybe the best thing would be a meeting—for him ... well, you could imagine how disruptive it was to have to stop, to explain, that they did not “handle the calendar,” and the woman who took care of that was “in a meeting” or “away from her desk,” and the caller ought to send a letter ... oh, the paper flow!