TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/070191/0701103.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 5.8 KB | 127 lines

                                                                                NATION, Page 26

THE WHITE HOUSE

A Bad Case of the Perks


Why does Sununu keep embarrassing his boss? Because he thinks he
shouldn't pay for anything.

By MICHAEL DUFFY/WASHINGTON -- With reporting by Barbara Burke/
New York and Dan Goodgame/Washington


    George Bush assumed that John Sununu had learned his
lesson. After revelations about the White House chief of staff's
misuse of Air Force jets embarrassed the Administration, the
President ordered Sununu to obtain a lawyer's O.K. before taking
any more government-paid flights. Bush was trying to reinforce
an ethical standard he had long stood behind: senior aides must
avoid even the appearance of improper behavior.

    If Sununu hadn't exactly been grounded, he had certainly
been sent to his room. But Bush underestimated the depth of
Sununu's ethical obtuseness and his zeal at finding a way around
the rules. Like a rebellious adolescent, Sununu sneaked down
the stairs, grabbed the car keys and slipped out of the White
House. After all, the old man had only said, "Don't take the
plane." He didn't say anything about the car.

    Overcome by a sudden urge two weeks ago to buy rare
stamps, Sununu ordered the driver of his government-paid
limousine to drive him 225 miles to New York City. He spent the
day -- and nearly $5,000 -- at an auction room at Christie's.
Then he dismissed the driver, who motored back to Washington
with no passengers. Sununu returned on a private jet owned by
Beneficial Corp.

    Bush was again forced to choose between two values he
holds dear: loyalty to his staff and the pursuit of ethical
purity. He tried to split the difference, defending Sununu's
joyride as "appropriate." Bush even backtracked on his own
ethical standards for the first time, saying, "You shouldn't be
judged by appearance. You ought to be judged by the fact." This
reversal steamed White House aides. Asked what Su nunu would
have to do to really anger Bush, a bemused White House official
cracked, "He'd have to knock over a bank, I guess."

    Bush, however, did order Sununu to clear all future
corporate flights in advance with both White House lawyers and
bookkeepers. The President acted shortly before the Washington
Post printed a story claiming that Su nunu, his wife Nancy and
an aide had personally solicited rides on jets owned by
companies that do business with Washington. White House counsel
C. Boyden Gray had blocked three such requests, but sources told
the Post that an aide to Sununu had misinformed Gray about the
identity of a fourth benefactor. In a statement on Saturday,
Sununu admitted that "some mistakes were made."

    Delusions of grandeur are Sununu's biggest problem. He
craves the challenge of public life but demands the perks of the
corporate suite. His need for the trappings of power is so great
that he chose to spend five hours enthroned in the back of a
dark-windowed sedan rather than 45 minutes in steerage on the
shuttle flight to New York.

    Some associates say, however, it wasn't really a love of
perks that sent Sununu by ground but fear of getting snickers
from fellow passengers. Silly man: the unspoken code of the New
York shuttle dictates that no one pays the famous -- or the
infamous -- any attention.

    Nor is it money that keeps Sununu from flying commercial.
Though he often complained about being underpaid as Governor,
he and his wife, who works for the Republican Governors
Association, earned combined salaries of more than $150,000 last
year. Moreover, Sununu has access to $250,000 in leftover New
Hampshire campaign funds.

    Already this year, he has dipped into the fund to pay for
catering, printing and taxes. Now that two more of his eight
children have finished college, he finally has, an aide
remarked, "some discretionary income." What ails Sununu is a bad
case of a strange complex that overcomes people who are enamored
of perks: once they become used to expense-account living, they
don't want to pay for anything, no matter how deep their
pockets.

    Sununu's addiction to perks is proved by his insistence
that he needs to get out of Washington in order to talk with
what he calls real people. As he said in Des Moines last week,
"There are some folks who keep asking why I have to travel. The
fact is that the Bush Administration really does love to spend
time with folks who make up the heart and soul of the nation .
. . Frankly, we'd rather listen to you than the self-styled
experts in Washington." However, his definition of real people
is curious: beyond the weekly Republican fund raisers -- or the
session at Christie's -- Sununu rarely leaves his splendid
cocoon.

    It is easy to mistake Sununu's value to Bush as merely
that of an unshakable link to the G.O.P.'s right wing. In fact,
Sununu's real value is the role he plays as the President's
enforcer, the "abominable no man," who acts as a lightning rod
for the well-liked Commander in Chief. But Sununu's ethical
lapses are now backfiring on Bush, causing the President such
embarrassment that Sununu's future is in doubt. Some officials
who never liked Sununu but balked at criticizing him feel less
restrained now that he is under fire. Several of them suggested
last week that Sununu does not realize how much damage he is
doing to his relationship with his boss. Says one: "Sununu is
self-destructing, but not out of his job. He's just
self-destructing out of being influential with Bush."

    Those who know the President best suspect that he has
probably decided to jettison his deputy -- but not anytime soon.
That would be too humiliating for both men. "He'll dump
Sununu," says an official, "when there's a natural transition."
But that might not arise until after the 1992 election.