Posted on 12/21/2002 11:11:29 AM PST by Pokey78
As President Bush wraps up his second year in the White House, he finds himself juggling an armful of new crises and old problems. In recent weeks, he fired his two chief economic advisers and replaced them with a supposedly more telegenic and persuasive team led by Treasury Secretary-designate John Snow. He ordered the construction of a rudimentary and controversial antimissile system to be based in Alaska and California. He tried to balance his calls for "compassionate conservatism" with tepid support for the besieged Mississippi conservative Trent Lott, who finally withdrew from his post as Senate Republican leader five days before Christmas. Most important, the president took another step toward war by citing omissions and deceptions in Saddam Hussein's new United Nations-required report on the status of Iraq's weapons programs.
Yet, in a revealing year-end interview with U.S. News, Bush was optimistic about the future even as he acknowledged the daunting tasks ahead. He showed none of the cowboy swagger and Lone Ranger impulses for which he has been caricatured. "I hope the American people trust me," Bush said, sitting in front of an Oval Office fireplace bordered with pine cones, apples, and holiday greenery. "I hope they trust me when it comes to fighting this war on terror, and I hope they trust me when it comes to leading toward a more compassionate tomorrow, because I'm a compassionate person. The only thing I know to do is to speak my mind, show my heart as best I can, and to lead."
What came across most vividly was his desire not to settle for small victories in 2003 but to think big. In a separate interview, White House counselor Karl Rove told U.S. News: "You've got to stick with trying to achieve what you set out to do in the first place. But leadership is creating political capital and then expending it on behalf of big things, new big things that are in keeping with your philosophical approach. Once you pass a big idea that's part of your platform–tax cut, education reform, trade promotion authority, and so forth–you have to go back and refresh the agenda and keep expanding it."
No bigotry. Lott's withdrawal as Senate leader gives the president the opportunity to renew his campaign to prove he is a different kind of Republican, without the complication of working with a man tainted as a sometime defender of segregation. In the interview, Bush was eager, for the first time, to detail his views on America's continuing racial divide. But just 48 hours before Lott stepped down, Bush said Lott "shouldn't leave his position." The president did not want to give Lott the final public shove, even while his allies were working behind the scenes to force Lott out. "My attitude about race is that we ought to confront bigotry, all forms of bigotry," Bush said, "and I believe the American–I know the American people are good, honorable, decent people. And occasionally the bigot has his day. I don't think Trent Lott is a bigot. I find him to be a, you know, he's a friend. . . . My job is to continue to work for an America that welcomes all and that is nondiscriminatory, and I will do that."
The controversy over whether Lott was fit to lead Senate Republicans ensures that Bush will feel compelled to address the racial issue in his State of the Union speech in late January. U.S. News has learned that White House aides were drafting what they called a "healing speech" for the mid-January Africa trip that Bush canceled the day Lott withdrew.
A visibly tired Bush–who was nursing a cold–volunteered that he was shaking hands with 1,500 people a night at the seemingly endless series of White House holiday parties. He emphasized that he didn't really mind the chore, but aides said he was looking forward to a brief vacation at his ranch in Texas.
Weighing war. When he returns from that getaway, he may face the most critical decision of his presidency: whether to go to war against Iraq. It is clear that this possibility is never far from Bush's mind. He argued that his foreign policy "has got to be bold, but it's also got to be understanding in that the nature of the new wars we face, in the nature of the problems we face, understanding the sense that we've got to work with others to achieve common objectives, and we're doing that."
"The biggest issues facing us in '03 will be continuing the war on terror," Bush said. "The al Qaeda is in 40, 50, 60 countries; they're scattered around. We will have to continue to pursue them, which means that we must continue to work hard to keep this coalition together. The war on terror will require a constant evaluation of progress. . . .
"A second phase of the war on terror, and an important part of the peace platform, will be Iraq. And we have worked closely with friends and allies in convincing them to join us and insisting that Saddam Hussein disarm. As you know, I have made it clear that if he won't disarm that we will lead a coalition of the willing to disarm him. My hope is that he will disarm."
If Saddam does not, the men and women of the armed forces may be called to do the job. "You know, when you've got kids off in Afghanistan, the remote regions of Afghanistan, hunting in caves for al Qaeda killers, you're asking a lot of people. And we'll continue asking them to make that sacrifice." As Bush knows all too well, ordering Americans into combat is a burden that only the commander in chief can fully understand–and it is a decision he may face in Iraq all too soon.
I'm sorry that you feel that the Party does not represent you, and that's about all I can say.
We need those ships back, ASAP.
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What the hell are you talking about. Reagan was responsible for the ascendency of Powell. Rumsfeld was a Reagan man. Pearle was a Reagan man. Bush has retreaded Reagan people.
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Are you at all aware of how many archleftist senators were thrown out of office on Reagan's coattails in 1980?
Granted, this is "bush league" stuff compared to what would come later with Bill Clinton, but the fact is, one of Ronald Reagan's major flaws was that he was loyal to a fault and thus did a poor job of rooting out people in his Administration that did him harm. Even his wife Nancy will gladly point that out. After all, she would take matters into her own hands to get some of these people fired, Donald Regan being the most well-known example.
I like Ronald Reagan a lot. But I'm not saying he was without faults.
Yes I am, though sadly Ted Kennedy wasn't one of them. And sadly again, control of the senate was lost two years later. Fact is that Reagan never once had control of the Congress. Tip O'Neil was always there to keep the Reagan Revolution from being fully realized.
You criticize people here for viewing GWB through rose-colored glasses but you appear to have the same fault with Reagan. As great a man as President Reagan was, his presidency failed to live up to its potential due in large part to the people he had around him.
The jury is still out but I think it is becoming clear that while GWB is certainly no Ronald Reagan, he does have a much better group of people around him than did Reagan. And with a GOP-controlled congress (both houses), he may well end up doing far more for the conservative agenda than did Reagan. While I am not one of those putting GWB up on a pedestal just yet, I am certainly not underestimating him.
I can see that you are not. You want to criticize GWB and condemn those who support him as starry-eyed teen-age groupies. But you want to be Ronald Reagan's starry-eyed teen-age groupie and you are not in the mood to discuss it. Okay then. I get the picture.
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