TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/020689/02068900.043

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 8.0 KB | 153 lines

                                                                                NATION, Page 30

Hitting the Ground Running


Bush dashes around Washington, but his first-week stumbles on
abortion and taxes point to a rougher road ahead

By Michael Duffy


    Barely two weeks in office, George Bush is already a victim
of his own success. As President-elect, he seemed to do no
wrong: he ad-libbed long speeches and looked good on television.
His Cabinet appointments, if not dazzling, were largely
reassuring. His humor was winning, and his informality a relief.
Freed of his campaign handlers, he seemed spontaneous, working
without a net and keeping his balance.

    Nothing that good is forever. Last week Bush opened in the
Big Top and turned in a more mixed performance.  The Capitol
crowd that liked his warm-up act took a dim view of some of his
proposals. The President briefly took control of his agenda, but
then other events -- abortion, taxes -- seized control of him.
Bush hit the ground running, but ran into trouble.

    A President's first weeks in office are remembered more for
symbolism than for lasting achievements. Jimmy Carter turned
the White House thermostat down to 65 degrees F. Ronald Reagan
slapped a freeze on federal hiring. For Bush, the goal was to
let Americans know that the new President, unlike his
predecessor, is active and engaged. He phoned nearly two dozen
foreign leaders, including Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev, to
thank them for their congratulatory notes.  He gave Government
employees two lectures about ethics -- something hardly anyone
opposes -- implying that the store is now under stricter
management. Bush also reversed Reagan's deaf-ear strategy for
handling the press, inviting several reporters to dinner and
asking others to the Oval Office on short notice for impromptu
question-and-answer sessions. Just in case anyone missed the
point about a fast start, the President even went jogging.

    To reassure financial markets that he is serious about
attacking the deficit, Bush held two hour-long sessions with
congressional leaders. His aides knew lawmakers would decline
their offer of a full-fledged budget summit with the White
House, but the feint did nothing to hurt the mood on Wall
Street: the New York Stock Exchange surged all week, closing
Friday 87.5 points higher than the week before. Moreover, after
years of sleepy meetings with Ronald Reagan, the Congressmen
could barely contain their enthusiasm for the more engaged Bush.
Many seemed astonished that a President could think and talk
extemporaneously. "He didn't need a prepared text," marveled
Philadelphia Democrat Bill Gray.

    But the Administration might have begun better if Bush or
his chief of staff, John Sununu, had written a tighter script.
A series of small but telling snafus sent the White House
scrambling. The day after Bush telephoned a cheer to
right-to-life advocates massed nearby on the Ellipse, the New
York Times reported that Louis Sullivan, the nominee for
Secretary of Health and Human Services, had privately told some
Congressmen that he still believes in a woman's right to an
abortion. Sullivan, who had sent mixed signals on abortion prior
to his nomination in December, was summoned to Sununu's West
Wing office, then hurriedly dispatched to reassure conservative
Senators. The President, whose changing views on abortion have
been hard to parse, tried to clear up the controversy by
explaining, "He has supported my position 100%."

    Events slipped further from Bush's control the next day,
when his old friend Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady proposed
paying for a $90 billion bailout of bankrupt savings and loan
institutions by slapping bank depositors with a 25 cents
surcharge for every $100 invested. It did not help matters that
Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan had told lawmakers
the day before that the country needed policies to encourage
Americans to save. Fearing the wrath of passbook holders, most
of Capitol Hill immediately lined up behind Republican Senator
John Heinz's characterization of Brady's idea as "boneheaded."
So did bankers and thrift operators, who predicted that new fees
would drive depositors away.

    Rather than jettisoning the plan, the White House curiously
decided to defend it. Chief of Staff Sununu said the surcharge
should be thought of as an insurance premium, not a tax. He
refused to yield to suggestions that the Brady plan passed
Budget Director Richard Darman's "duck" test for taxes. (Darman
had told Congress that if a revenue plan "looks"  or "quacks"
like a tax, it is a tax.) Spokesman Marlin Fitzwater tried to
calm things down by saying the surcharge was only a trial
balloon. But Bush would not let the matter drop.  Asked if the
surcharge would be a tax, the President replied, "Is it a tax
when the person pays a fee to go to Yosemite Park?"

    By week's end, with few outside the White House in favor of
the idea, even Bush backed off, telling  a Friday-morning press
conference that "it's a little absurd to be commenting on a
facet, a possible facet, of solving a problem when it hasn't
even come to me." But one senior Administration official was
less defensive about the flap.  "Any fool could plainly see the
general public wouldn't stand for it," he said.

    Some Bush aides criticized Brady for not knowing when to
keep quiet. The Washington Post reported that Brady had
suggested the surcharge to the Reagan Administration last month,
and was told then that it was a bad idea. Others tagged Sununu
for putting Bush on a light, no-substance schedule in the
crucial first week of his presidency -- creating a news vacuum
that Sullivan and Brady blundered into.

    At times, it did appear that Bush lacked a coherent plan
for governing beyond crusading for gauzy themes. The turmoil
over Brady's proposal quickly overwhelmed the sketchy "theme"
agenda worked up for the President by outgoing political
operative Robert Teeter. Said a senior Administration official
on Day 5: "If we have a 100-day plan, I haven't seen it." Added
another: "This is what happens when you don't have a strategic
thinker in the White House."

    But it is also what happens when a new President takes
office without an escape route from the fiscal cul-de-sac he has
backed himself into. Candidate Bush's no-new-taxes vow means he
will not be able to keep promises to propose spending for new
programs in education, child care and the war on drugs unless
he breaks other promises to protect the defense budget and farm
subsidies. Asked last week if his read-my-lips pledge would
expire after one year, Bush replied meekly, "I'd like it to be
a four-year pledge." But even he acknowledged that the kind of
flap that followed the savings and loan mess may be repeated
when he tells a joint session of Congress on Feb. 9 which
promises he will keep and which ones he will abandon. "Look, I
don't expect it's all going to be sweetness and harmony and
light," the President said. "The minute we get those proposals
up there on Feb. 9, I expect we're going to have other
firestorms swirling around."

    Bush's plan for the first weeks of his presidency is
essentially a holding action. He has invited Prime Minister
Noboru Takeshita to Washington this week for the first meeting
with a foreign leader. Bush will visit Korea and the People's
Republic of China after attending the Feb. 24 funeral of Japan's
Emperor Hirohito. Before then, the President will pop up to
Canada on Feb. 10, the day after he delivers his budget speech
on Capitol Hill. Explained a senior official: "We're getting out
of town."

    If that skimpy agenda lacks a certain grit, it has plenty
of room built in for Bush to wrestle with budget proposals --
as well as time to telephone friends, schedule last-minute
lunches and swear in new staff members. If most of Bush's
specific plans will not be unveiled for a few weeks, it is
because Bush's aides have not yet figured them out.