Posted on 08/26/2003 10:10:41 PM PDT by Utah Girl
Ask reporters here what they think of Scott McClellan, the soft-spoken Texan named last month to fill Ari Fleischer's job as White House press secretary, and one hears descriptions like "teddy bear" and "sweetie."
The warm reaction contrasts sharply from their opinions of Fleischer, the combative New Yorker who seemed to revel in his regularly televised jousting with reporters - some of whom to this day cannot speak civilly about him.
McClellan, building on the store of good will he amassed as Fleischer's more accommodating deputy, has emerged in his first few weeks as a compassionate conservative answer to Fleischer.
"Ari had a certain sense of, not vindictiveness, but more a sense of letting you know that you had run afoul of the White House and you may suffer for it," said John Roberts, the senior White House correspondent of CBS News, a characterization that Fleischer disputes. "I've never gotten that from Scott."
But working for a White House that disseminates no news before its time, McClellan's friendlier, more understated approach appears unlikely to improve his employer's testy relations with the news media.
In his first four weeks on the job, McClellan has already had to navigate what amounts to four of the most treacherous weeks the Bush administration has faced from a public-relations perspective.
He began his new job on July 15 beating back questions about how unsubstantiated claims that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Africa made their way into the president's State of the Union address. The following weeks have been no less challenging. He has had to deal with a wide array of issues, from the politically sensitive subject of the president's views on homosexuality to disputed reports that Secretary of State Colin Powell and his deputy, Richard Armitage, have decided not to serve in a second Bush term.
And for all of their warm regards, reporters have not gone easy on him. Campbell Brown, an NBC News White House correspondent, was so frustrated by what she thought was McClellan's obfuscation that she repeatedly interrupted his answers and raised her voice at him during one session. And so relentless was the questioning during one early briefing that even Fleischer said he felt sorry for him. "My reaction was I wouldn't want to be in that guy's shoes for anything," said Fleischer.
But McClellan said in an interview in his Washington office that the turbulent beginning had served only to help him find his footing faster. "Jump right in and start swimming," he said. "This is a little bit of a roller coaster. There will be ups and downs along the way; you recognize that going in."
The gyrations have just come more abruptly than expected. McClellan has been so busy with stamping out public relations brush fires that he has had little time to decorate his White House office, where the freshly repainted walls are still mostly bare. The few personal touches McClellan has added highlight his main connection to the president: Texas.
A Texas Longhorns baseball cap and ashtray have replaced Fleischer's autographed New York Yankees baseball and nesting dolls of Yankee players. On a credenza next to his desk, McClellan has placed bookends emblazoned with the words "Texas Capitol," a gift from the Texas comptroller, his mother, Carole Keeton Strayhorn. McClellan was her campaign manager in 1998, the last of three races he managed for her before he was recruited in 1999 to work in then-Governor George W. Bush's press office. (His brother, Mark McClellan, is the commissioner of food and drugs.)
Administration officials said that McClellan's Texas roots underscored a major difference between him and his predecessor.
Fleischer, a former spokesman for the House Ways and Means Committee, was a Washington insider. But he was an outsider when it came to the president's inner circle. McClellan, who spent relatively little time in Washington before 2001, came of political age in that circle. And White House officials say he is very well liked by the president.
"One advantage that Ari brought to the White House was his knowledge of Capitol Hill because he worked on Capitol Hill for some pretty significant players," said Andrew Card, the White House chief of staff. "Scott brings a different skill set to the job. He has an innate understanding of how the president thinks about personalities and rhetoric. He has a great appreciation for the president's voice."
McClellan's Texas connections have given reporters who work in the White House press room plenty of fodder for speculation. Some said they believed that by being closer to Bush's team he could be in a better position to know more and then share it.
Dan Bartlett, the White House communications director, said McClellan would have all of the access to top officials that he wanted. But, he added, this White House does not let the news media dictate when it releases information. "His job is to inform press about decisions and the president's thinking," he said. "It is not his job to pre-empt the president on his thinking."
McClellan said he felt more comfortable in the job than reporters might give him credit for. "I recognize that people are going to judge my performance," he said. "I just want to continue to build upon my style and develop that style to the best of my abilities."
Their Daddy made some news on FR last week. Seems he was once a partner at a law firm headed by LBJ's "fixer" in Texas politics, and he's now fixing to spill the beans on Johnson's invisible hand in the Kennedy assassination.
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