The Presidency

By Hugh Sidey

Notes and remembrance, Week 1, Bush presidency:

-- Overheard in a gaggle of White House reporters waiting for a sighting of the peripatetic George Bush: "Such a good guy. Such a normal, wonderful family . . . It's disgusting." Beltway political maxim: the only thing worse than persistent corruption is unrelenting wholesomeness.

-- Word from the Hill to the White House that a former wife of John Tower, Secretary of Defense-designate, wants to testify about Tower's alleged indiscretions. Question to a White House aide: "Can the Bush Administration stand a sex story so soon?" Thoughtful pause from White House aide, then, "Maybe it will help."

-- Feisty House Democratic Whip Tony Coelho tells newspeople after the first congressional leadership meeting with Bush, "Very harmonious. No dissent. This is the first day of the honeymoon, and it was very hopeful and exciting, just like a honeymoon." Question from the edge: "Come on, Congressman, when do you get tough?" Slow smile over the little scrapper's face and a glint in his bright, crafty eyes. "When he gets specific, we'll get tough. About budget time." Interpretation: if Coelho couldn't fight, he'd go back to California.

-- Liberal lady commentator from the Washington Post walks up the White House drive carrying bright red tote bag, a souvenir from last summer's Democratic Convention. Big braying donkey is stamped on the bag's side. Reminder of late Speaker Sam Rayburn's caution: "Any jackass can kick a barn down, but it takes a carpenter to build it." Footnote to the above: on any given day there are three times as many jackasses in Washington as there are Democrats.

-- Gentleman from the New York Times calling out to House Speaker Jim Wright and Majority Leader Tom Foley, who have just visited President Bush at the White House: "Come on over here and dump on them." Recall Lyndon Johnson's characterization of this singular capital: "A lot of people just love to feel bad in this city, everybody attacking everybody else, always telling you why you can't or shouldn't do something you ought to. The way up seems to be to chop somebody else down."

-- Muttering among camera operators, early morning on the South Lawn, waiting for some sign of life in the Bush White House: "Where are all those kids and dogs? Get 'em out here. We gotta have some action." Warning: if kids are used to get a President elected, he'd better keep them around for slow news days. Suggestion: an "urchin mobile," first discovered in China by Richard Nixon in 1972, a van that carries cute kids from camera position to camera position with changes of sweaters, hair ribbons and jump ropes inside.

-- Louis Sullivan, nominee for Secretary of Health and Human Services, is called to White House woodshed because he whispered around Capitol Hill that perhaps he might not want the Roe v. Wade abortion decision to be rescinded. This is leaked instantly, contradicting Bush's pro-life stand. Note to newcomers to heed John F. Kennedy's rule: "If there is more than one person (yourself) in a room, consider anything said to be on the record and a probable headline in the morning paper."