The President's Call: Executive Leadership From FDR to George Bush (16 page)

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Authors: Judith E. Michaels

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BOOK: The President's Call: Executive Leadership From FDR to George Bush
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predecessor's popularity and to Bush's clear promise not to deviate from Reagan's path. His lack of independence was based on his trouble with "the vision thing" and his modest rhetorical skills. Lacking the actor's gift of infusing what message he had with urgent sincerity, he stuck with the tried and true and promised basically a third term of the Reagan-Bush era, more than a first term of the B a. Further, he was not able and he did not even try to claim a clear popular mandate since the Congress was firmly in the hands of the Democrats and his party had lost seats in both houses with him at the helm. In fact, although he had won forty states, he had actually run behind the winners in 379 of the 435 congressional districts. The incoming Republicans felt they owed him little, the veterans had nothing to fear from him-his coattails were neither wide nor long (Edwards 1991, 130).
The huge budget deficit that was Reagan's legacy to Bush and the country further constrained Bush's ability to implement a vision, had he had one. Even if he had been so inclined, there would have been no great policy initiatives because there was no great source of funds to execute them. Bush was able to show some of his "kinder and gentler" side, however, in his appointments. While Reagan used his appointments to attack the federal government, often appointing bureau chiefs who were opposed to their bureau's mission, Bush changed symbols and opted for "the politics of social harmony," in Rockman's phrase, appointing "firefighters rather than flamethrowers," establishment types, not revolutionaries. For example, EPA chief William Reilly, well respected in the environmental communities, was appointed to show that the president cared about the environment (regardless of the little power actually given Reilly in the administration-this was, after all, the politics of symbolism). Early judicial appointments, though partisan, did not see the severe ideological trial that they faced in the Reagan administration (or would later in Bush's) (Rockman 1991, 11-12).
George Bush's personality bears some analysis, given his difference from his predecessor and how personal style influences public action. In contrast to the very popular president whose gift for verbal persuasion was world renowned ("The Great Communicator," as Reagan was called), George Bush suffered public problems with syntax, simple sentence construction, and a frequent inability to carry a consistent thought through a complete sentence, let alone an entire paragraph. Further, Bush did not carry the personal conviction of Reagan's radicalism. He was, in Bert Rockman's estimation, an old-fashioned Tory, one for whom great, moving rhetoric is unnatural, even a bit unseemly, one for whom compromise is a modus vivendi, not a four-letter word, one whose best work is done
 
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behind closed doors with other members of one's circle of peers, whether allies or foes, and one for whom the term
loyal opposition
is not an oxymoron. As was often noted, "Bush does not stir hearts. Nor does he stir sentiment of virtually any sort. As an individual, he contrasted markedly with Reagan in presenting self. Reagan stirred partisan hearts, but opposition fears. Bush does neither. Reagan could express radical ideas in dulcet tones. By contrast, Bush sounds flat and, when excited, even a bit tinny" (ibid., 6).
The election of 1988 saw no sweeping new ideas from the Bush camp. In fact, the campaign Bush waged was marked by the absence of energy and focus and by the disquieting appearance of a blatantly racist television ad that raised white fears of black crime (Lee Atwater's infamous Willie Horton ad) and cost Bush considerable credibility. Although victorious, he was in a politically weak position, facing a Democratic majority in the Congress that was battle-hardened and used to confrontation with the White House. Bush's personal style of compromise and conciliation was well suited to the situation he faced. Because he had no agenda to sell, there was little he needed from the Congress. With a minority of one-third plus one he had enough votes to sustain his vetoes. That is all he needed to maintain the status quo, which seemed to be
his
mandate (ibid., 10).
The "politics of social harmony is not driven by strong ideas, indeed, it is a politics that is virtually antithetical to powerful ideas." Thus, while Bush did not reverse any of Reagan's major policies, he usually did not pursue them with the fervor of the latter. As Rockman notes, "Like a well-honed bureaucrat, Bush has a high regard for the virtues of 'not doing'. . .. If Bush is a man of few ideas, correspondingly few are disastrously bad." He was a president who did well in good times but when situations called for mobilizing others, as in the budget deal of 1990, he was far less adept (ibid., 12-14).
While Reagan could glide quietly into his huge tax increase, for Bush it meant having to go back on his snarl of "read-my-lips-no-new-taxes" in order to cut a budget deal with the Congress. While he won the battle (the budget
was
passed), he lost the war (his reelection campaign). His success hurt him with Republicans far and wide who, rather than considering him a pragmatic statesman who did what he had to do, felt deeply and personally betrayed by his decision to raise taxes. It seriously alienated him from the Reaganites who still controlled the party and, increasingly, the Congress (e.g., House Minority Leader, self-proclaimed revolutionary, and Speaker-in-Waiting Newt Gingrich, never one to be mistaken for a Tory). The charge that Bush "tacked to the slightest breezes of political oppor-
 
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tunism, rather than clinging to a clear and steadfast course," lingered with him throughout his administration. (In other instances, he won plaudits for bringing others along, as in the Persian Gulf War, but even there he was criticized for ending the war before it was won (i.e., before Saddam Hussein was destroyed) (ibid., 15).
Although there were some setbacks (e.g., the failed nomination of John Tower for Defense, a less-than-robust nominee, William Lucas, for assistant attorney general for civil rights, and the Exxon oil spill in Alaska that raised questions about Bush's claims to be the "environmental president"), he managed to put off dealing with the deficit, and events in the larger world conspired to make him look good in his early administration (ibid., 14-15).
The breakup of the Soviet empire, the cozy relationship with Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, arms and troop cutbacks, the end of the cold war and the triumph of democracy and capitalism, the end of civil strife in Nicaragua and the surprising election of the U.S.-backed opposition thereall these played to what Bush saw as his great strength and his image as a judicious and prudent policymaker. "Bush's temperament as an old-fashioned Tory (adjusted to American conditions) and the favorable-events stream were conjoined. As Bush read it, the obvious prescription was to 'do nothing, but do it well.' Old-fashioned Tories are, by definition, not in the vanguard for or against anything, but they are not necessarily in the rearguard either. When the nature of change becomes virtually self-revelatory is the time when conservatives of Bush's stripe find it useful to change course. The obvious eventually concentrates the mind of even the most skeptical, and Bush's beliefs, such as they are, are generally organized around whatever conventional wisdom is prevalent. But old-fashioned Tories are mainly empiricists, less likely to lead fashion than follow it. When fashion changed, Bush's posture also changed. Being more addicted to cold-war orthodoxies when he began his administration than Ronald Reagan was when he ended his, Bush's reaction to the powerful events around him was slow and cautious until it became clear that the old orthodoxy was crumbling. Once the obvious became obvious, the Bush administration moved accordingly, if unradically." (Ibid., 15)
In mid-1990 Bush abandoned his "read my lips" posture and as mentioned negotiated a budget deal cum tax increase with the Democrats in hopes of avoiding a recession that could hurt his reelection chances. Rather than proclaim that as a statesman he had to act for the good of the
 
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party and beyond narrow ideology and thus he went for the budget deal, he laid low and seemed to be hiding from the responsibility, which, of course landed squarely on his shoulders. After all his schoolyard braggadocio ("read my hips" in his jogging shorts), he looked as though he had caved in, rather than as though he had made a difficult but courageous decision, the kind citizens elect their leaders to make. He lost all around with Republicans in the Congress, with the Reaganite true believers, and with the populace at large, whether it supported a tax increase or not, because he had gone back on the pledge he had so often and adamantly made, and on the strength of which many had voted for him.
In both the budget episode and the Persian Gulf crisis, it is apparent that Bush works best as a low-key version of Lyndon Johnson-cutting deals with other leaders. His is the insider game. His weakness is in sensing outside perspectives and in extending the ambit of discussion and debate. This is not because, like Reagan, Bush has strong passions about the substance, but because his style of operation is fundamentally boardroom politics and brokerage among "proper gentlemen," as traditional Tories conceive it. "Proper gentlemen" do not include Saddam Hussein, and certainly not Newt Gingrich. Boardrooms, as well, are notorious for erring on the side of exclusivity. (Ibid., 18)
Bush's manners seem to be those of the manner to which he was born: be modest about yourself and considerate to others (ibid., 27). Only occasionally did hot flashes of testosterone break through his gentility, as when he boasted that he had "kicked ass" in a debate with vice presidential candidate Geraldine Ferraro in 1984. In that same season the wealthy and patrician Barbara Bush, with a carefully cultivated image of grandmotherly warmth with her faux pearls and mismatched tennis shoes, slipped and let it be known that she considered the working-class Ferraro "that rich rhymes-with-witch."
In terms of his decision-making style, Rockman finds Bush to be of two irreconcilable minds, one characterized by risk aversion, caution, and prudence, the other by an impulsiveness in which he is "occasionally given to barroom language in lieu of the gentility in which he was raised. From time to time, he seems to feel the necessity to proclaim his manhood by 'kicking ass"' (ibid., 29).
And so, on the one side, he carefully chose a David Souter, a gray suit without a paper trail whose nomination to the Supreme Court would not cause controversy, and on the other he ran racist campaign advertisements (Willie Horton), attacked Geraldine Ferraro, invaded Panama, and

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