GEORGE BUSH'S RITE OF PASSAGE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580028-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 25, 2012
• Sequence Number: 28
• Publication Date: October 2, 1988
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/05/25: CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580028-1
rut UNiT
Bush's
RITE Of PASSAGE
BY DAVID NYHAN
rnaud's Restaurant occu-
pies a position in New Or-
leans' French Quarter like
that of Locke-Ober in Bos-
ton: It boasts the undeni-
able patina of age, the de-
termined dignity of an ex-
pensive restaurant in less-
than-dignified surround-
ings, the steady-as-she-
goes endurance of an eatery forced to put up
with unsalubrious trippers from nearby (Bour-
bon Street on the one hand, the Combat Zone
on the other), and the comforting air of a
building in which for generations, rites of pas-
sage have been marked with good food, good
drink, good company, and devout wishes for
good fortune.
The night he was nominated for president
by the Republican National Convention,
George Bush took to Arnaud's a party of 63,
all connected, one way or another, to his vast,
extended family. It was the WASP equivalent
of the Kennedy clan out for a graze. Fifteen
thousand journalists trooped the sidewalks of
the French Quarter that week, but neither
notebook nor minicam intruded upon this fam-
ily celebration, sealed off in an upstairs room,
the victuals shuttled in near-record time (70
minutes) by 13 waiters. The 64-year-old head
of the Bush ensemble, known variously to the
family as "The Big Guy" or "Gee Bee," chose
the menu: seafood gumbo, shrimp Arnaud,
pompano en croute, asparagus with hollan-
DAVID NYHAN IS A GLOBE COLUMNIST. HE IS THE AUTHOR OF
THE DUBS THE INSIDE STORY OF A POLITICAL PHENOMENON,
WHICH WAS PUBLISHED RECENTLY BY WARNER BOOKS.
CONTINUED
Page
The Washington Post
The New York Times
The Washington Times
The Wall Street Journal
The Christian Science Monitor
New York Daily News
USA Today
The Chicago Tribune
Date 2 0C.4. 8
daim strawberries, ice cream, and cafe brulot
- a festive concoction of coffee, liqueurs,
and orange peel, served flambe.
It is not unusual for the Bush clan to break
bread en masse. In Washington, Sunday lunch
at George and Barbara's has been virtually a
standing weekly invitation to any relative
within hailing distance. But this was not a
night like any other. One of the toasts
squeezed in between the gumbo and the cof-
fee cited Henry V's stirring speech to his
doubting cousin, Westmoreland, who wished
for more men on the eve of battle. The King
would hear none of that; not a day will pass,
.. From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be rrmembty'd,
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers,
For he to-day that shads his Mood with me
Shall be my brotker, be he ne'er so vile
This day shall gentle his condition.
And gentlemen in England now a-lied
Shall think themselves accurs'd they we,,
not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap ulkiks
any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's
day.
That choice of toasts hints at the mood of the
meal and speaks volumes about the none.
It says: To hell with those who aren't with us.
It says: We may lose, but we go down fight-
in& And it bespeaks a tossing off of shackles.
The shackles, actually, had left town the day
before. On Air Force One. With Ronald Rea-
gan.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/05/25: CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580028-1
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/05/25: CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580028-1
EXCERPTED
But Ellis says of Bush, "He
went off to fight in the war and
moved from the East to
Mid-
land. Texas. It was not exactly
Brookline down there. Here's a
guy whose formative years
were spent in a rough-and-tum-
ble existence. Then, he was so
qualified for different kinds of
jobs, that presidents like Ford
and Nixon said, 'Let's get
George to do it.' You know
what the Senate is hire; when
the a-contrdled Sen-
ate says
Bush did a great job straighten-
M9 out the CIA, tlat's a great
tribute. ?
In 1977 Bush concluded 11
months as Gerald Ford's CIA
chief, after incoming president
Jimmy Carter refused to grant
Bush's private plea that he be
allowed to canoe on. Sen.
Duel Imaye O)-Hawes), then
chairman of the Senate Intelli-
gence Committee, said at the
time: "You might say Bush was
one of the best [CIA directors]
we had.... The morale of the
intelligence community has
been inspired by Bush's leader-
ship." Other Democrats have
been considerably less compli-
mentary about Bush's role as
chief spy.
Not just relatives think
Bush is a great guy. Bill Salton-
stall, one of the most popular
and principled of Republicans
when he served as a state sena-
tor from the North Shore, was
just starting at Andover when
Bush left to go to war. Their
fathers were associates, Repub-
lican senators from neighboring
states. "Ever since George and
Ishared acab to the aiport
Doming down from an Andover
nit thing," Sakonstaf said
at the GOP national convention
in New Orleans, 'Tve been a
believer in this fdkrw. He's jolt
a very solid guy." Andy Card,
David Sparks, Ann Kramer, the
late Jack Flannery and his wid-
ow, Jill Fallon, were just some
of the Bay State Republicans
who worked hard for Bush.
George Bash's resume is
one that some call the
best in politics. (Bob
Dole called him "the former
Mr. Everything.") Bush got
into politics the same year Rea-
gan did - 1964. Barry Gold-
water was the doomed GOP
presidential candidate that year,
and Bush ran for the US Senate
from Texas, taking the conser-
vative route: He said maybe we
should use nuclear weapons
against the Vietnamese. He
called Medicare "socialised
medicine." He came out against
the 1964 Civil Rights Act and
open housing laws.
He has since repudiated all
those positions. In 1964 the
voters repudiated him, and
Goldwater was crushed by Lyn-
don Baines Johnson. By 1966,
less vehement in his right-wing
beliefs, Bush was elected to the
US House from Texas' Harris
County, the first of two terms,
the only office he has won on
his own. In 1970 Richard Ni
inoasked him to run for the senate
again. He did, and lost to Sen.
Lloyd Bentsen, who had ticked
in a primary Ralph
Yarborough, the man who
de-
feated Bush for the Senate six
years earlier. But Nixon made
Bush ambassador to the United
Nations, where he received
generally good reviews.
After a year in New York, Bush again heeded
Nixon's can and swapped the UN job for rimming
the Repub&an National Committee, where his
role was to try to lass up the joint after Water-
gate. Bush was considered for the vice presiden-
cy twice, first when Spiro Agnew was forced to
resign amid bribery allegations, and then when
President Gerald Ford had to replace hiamm
Ford sent Bush to China instead and then asked
him to come home in 1975 to take over the de-
moralized CIA.
Bush liked the CIA job. Some people familiar
with the hocus-pocus aspects of life in the Yale
secret society, Skull and Bones, felt life in the
CIA cobrres white mate dreams of a
small guiding the desti-
ny of nations. Bush liked the CIA so much he
offered to renounce politics for good, if only Jim-
my Carter would let him stay on, according to
retired CIA No. 2 man Adm. Bobby Inman But
Carter wanted his own man at Spy Central, Nixon s Republican N tral, n
chairman. Committee
Bush has since gone out of his way to deride
Carter in countless speeches. In his book, Bush
calls the Georgian "a loner, suspicious of strang-
ers and their motives ... who always seemed to
have his guard up." In any event, Carter did Bush
a favor. Ejected from the CIA, Bush decided to
the 1d80~ and the rest of a large
field for Ronald
Republican presidential nomi-
nation. Bush managed a major-league upset of
the Gipper in the Iowa caucuses, but stumbled in
New Hampshire. Bush became resigned to hop-
ing for the vice presidential nomination,
But there was yet one mare indigurity to swal-
low. It was the fiasco of the Detroit convention.
Reagan dangled the vice presidential nomination
for a 24-hour period in front of Jerry Ford. Ulti-
mately, cooler heads prevailed, and the cockeyed
notion of a "co-presidency" was throttled in its
cratBe. Reagan was persuaded such a scheme
would never wok, and he turned to the next
name an his list: Bush.
Twice before Bush had sought the consola-
tion prize, from Nixon, and from Ford; now it was
his. Let others scoff. For Bush, it was another
rung on the ladder, and there was only one rung
higher. America's preppiest poo was near
the top. And for the fast time in his life, Bush had
achieved a rank higher than his father's.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/05/25: CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580028-1