NHPrimary.com: Bush learns the joys of retail politicsBy KEVIN LANDRIGAN
The Telegraph of Nashua
January 19, 2000
Web posted at: 12:04 p.m. EST (1704 GMT)
LONDONDERRY, New Hampshire -- On a recent snowy day, Texas Gov. George W. Bush saw the good and the bad that comes with retail politicking in the first-in-the-nation primary state.
Walking into the Londonderry High School cafeteria, the Republican presidential front-runner looked a little stunned, but pleased, to see a crowd of more than 150 - even if many of them were supporters, there by invitation from the campaign.
After all, the state was in the midst of its first snowstorm of the year; by 5:15 p.m., a biting breeze had dropped the wind chill to 15 below zero.
"If this had happened in my state, nobody would be here," Bush quipped.
But not all the spectators were friendly, or even from New Hampshire. One member of the audience, Sanho Tree, a pro-drug legalization activist from Washington, D.C., criticized Bush for refusing to say whether he has had any past drug use.
"How do you derive any legitimacy to declare a war on drugs based on your own past?" Tree asked.
Bush shot back, "You are making an assumption about me. You really don't know what you're talking about."
The pro-Bush crowd applauded the candidate's scolding.
Later Bush added, "You shouldn't fall prey to rumor and gossip."
The exchange came at the end of a full day of old-fashioned, face-to-face New Hampshire politics, something Bush admits he's not really used to.
"In Texas, we have 22 million people so retail politics is just impossible to get the same effect as you can get in New Hampshire," said Bush, noting that this primary campaign is worlds apart from his two gubernatorial races in 1994 and 1998.
"I'm able to see enough voters to make a difference, I think."
Earlier in the day, about eight hours before the Londonderry event, Bush had a chance to make a difference with Leslie Jones, a single mother of two from Laconia troubled that her 11-year-old son was getting beaten up and bullied by public school classmates.
"My child comes home from school telling me he got spit on in the hallways, knocked into lockers and hit," Jones told Bush, her voice choked with emotion.
Jones had stayed a few hours past her late-night shift as an assembler at Aavid Thermal Technology to see Bush and ask him what he would do to control school violence.
"I can understand why you're so upset," Bush said.
He proposed a federal law that would give teachers and counselors protection from civil lawsuits unless they are negligent in how they disciplined children and also said he supported keeping troubled children out of regular classrooms until the teacher agrees to let them return.
"We must say to our children, 'There will be a consequence,'" Bush said.
Jones, a Republican, said she would have liked a longer answer from Bush, but heard enough to be convinced.
"He's got my vote," said Jones, an Army veteran who had been stationed at Fort Hood in Texas before coming to New Hampshire.
Bush said he's amazed how many residents of the state have Texas connections.
"I'm meeting every day with someone who has relatives now in Texas or lived there during an earlier time," Bush said.
By plane, by bus
Bush's day began aboard his chartered plane, "Great Expectations," which took him from Manchester to Laconia for an 8 a.m. interview at the Laconia Evening Citizen.
Then by motorcade it's off to Aavid, a worldwide maker of heat sinks used to cool off heating units on appliances.
Aavid, which employs 450 people in Laconia, also has plants in Dallas and Terrell, Texas, as well as Monterey, Mexico, making it a good fit for Bush, who is an unapologetic free trader.
"I think it's the fearful who build walls to America; itÕs the confident who bring them down," Bush said.
With a folksy style, Bush tries to disarm people who pause before approaching the son of a former president and governor of the second-largest state.
"C'mon down here," Bush waves over to two women standing on top of a balcony, so that he can shake their hand.
After every event, there's a small throng of people waiting to ask one more question, get an autograph or have their picture taken with the leading GOP candidate.
"Everybody spells my name wrong, either the first or the last," shrugged Wanita Maxham of Laconia, who says she'll register to vote for the first time and is still shopping in both parties.
"It still is great meeting someone who could be the next president."
Bush's plane flies through snow flurries to speak to a jam-packed meeting of the Portsmouth Rotary and Sunshine Clubs at Yoken's Restaurant.
After the event, the campaign is met by Jack LaBombard of Grantham, who has driven Bush throughout the state in a custom-outfitted bus over the past two months.
"I designed it so my wife and I could enjoy our retirement together and travel throughout the country, but she died of cancer," LaBombard said. "I've always loved the Bush family, all of them and couldn't wait to help him out any way I could."
Seeing to Bush's political needs is Communications Director Karen Hughes, a strong-willed personal friend of the candidate who won't hesitate to correct a reporter's question asked of Bush, even in midsentence.
Bush also can be both playful and firm with reporters, as he showed with WHDH-TV's Andy Hiller, the Boston reporter who stumped him with a pop quiz on foreign leaders two months ago.
When Bush holds a media availability outside the Comfort Inn in Portsmouth, Hiller bounces up, gets in the first question - about BushÕs chances of winning the primary - and later wants to follow it up.
"Governor, governor, governor," Hiller said.
"Back, Andy, back," Bush said with a chuckle. "You only get one question. Heel!"
Attending to Bush's personal needs on the campaign trail is Logan Walters, who started out as an intern in the governor's office three years ago and now serves as an advance man/scheduler/jack-of-all-trades.
"You've got to like someone to spend this much time with him. I could have worked on the campaign, but I like this a lot better. The guy has an incredible amount of energy," Walters said.
But Bush also likes to relax, as he told a Webster Elementary School student Daniel Hannah-Dubois of Manchester, one of two students who interviewed him on LaBombard's bus during a campaign swing last month.
"What would you do on your favorite day?" the boy asked.
"I love to fish. On my favorite day, I'll go fish in the morning, I like to take a lunch and then come home, have a nap, sleep, read and eat, but fishing is my favorite thing," Bush said.
Another thing the candidate really enjoys is talking baseball.
Bush sold his ownership piece of the Texas Rangers for a $14.4 million profit in 1998, but continues to follow the ups and downs of the team, including the latest off-season moves.
And Bush, the team's former managing partner, defended the Rangers' recent decision to let former Red Sox starting pitcher Aaron Sele sign with the Seattle Mariners, a division rival.
"Sele is a keeper, but you can only offer so much before it no longer makes sense from a market standpoint," Bush said.
Family ties
While the national press files its stories from the Portsmouth Sheraton Hotel, Bush catches a nap upstairs before the motorcade braves the snowstorm on its trip to Londonderry.
Bush's staff watches CNN's coverage of ex-President George Bush, who went to Iowa to stump for his son.
"I'm proud of him and I'm glad he's out on my behalf. I think the people of Iowa will appreciate him coming out, I hope so," the younger Bush said when asked later about the trip.
Bush's mother, Barbara, is scheduled to visit New Hampshire on Thursday, but there are no plans as yet for the former president to campaign here.
Although President Bush won the New Hampshire primary in 1988 and 1992, Granite Staters also rebuffed him in 1980 - after the Ronald Reagan microphone incident - and in 1992, when they embarrassed him by giving 37 percent of the vote to upstart Pat Buchanan. BuchananÕs strong showing against Bush came primarily as a result of the president breaking his 1988 campaign pledge not to raise taxes.
Candidate Bush defended his father's legacy: "He's an extraordinary man and I know people may disagree with his politics and stuff, but you can never disagree with the fact that he set priorities: his faith, his family and his country."
Family members who definitely won't be campaigning here are twin daughters Jenna and Barbara, both 18.
"They weren't real thrilled" with their father running for president, Bush said during an interview. "They kind of like privacy."
Bush recalled last summer attending an Austin High School baseball game where a boyfriend of Jenna's was pitching.
"I did an interview on television and mentioned that the two were friends," Bush said.
"Boy, did I hear about that the next morning. It's the last personal story I told about them, I'll tell you that."
Looking ahead
Bush is guarded about his chances in New Hampshire. Several polls have shown Arizona Sen. John McCain holding a small lead heading to the Feb. 1 vote.
And inside the campaign there's frustration that while Bush must spend plenty of time in Iowa - home of the first caucus next Monday - McCain isn't contending there and only visited last weekend to appear for a debate in Des Moines.
"I'm going to campaign hard in Iowa. I think the people of New Hampshire realize I need to do that," Bush said.
The candidate and campaign play good cop-bad cop when it comes to rating McCain's chances of winning the nomination.
Bush scoffs at one reporter's question asking about the possibility of a Bush-McCain ticket in the fall.
"I believe it's unfair for me to answer that question because John McCain is a viable presidential candidate. It is insulting to John McCain for me to be touting him as a vice presidential running mate because he's very much alive in this race," Bush said.
Meanwhile, Bush's lead person in the state, U.S. Sen. Judd Gregg, and his media adviser, Pat Griffin, insist McCain can't possibly be the nominee even if he wins the primary.
"I love New Hampshire and think it's the best place in the world. But as great a guy as he (McCain) is, he's not running for president of New Hampshire, he's running for president of the country," Gregg said.
"Unless you've got a national organization and a capability to run nationally, you aren't going to be a viable candidate of our party."
Griffin predicts Bush will solidly win next Monday's Iowa caucus, which will encourage undecided voters here to pick Bush over McCain.
"I think we do win here, but if we don't, then we end it soon after that. A win in Iowa creates that inevitability sandwich," Griffin said.
On message
The campaign's theme for the day is to blast McCain's five-year, $240 billion tax cut as too small and to insist a spendthrift Congress would reject McCain's proposal to spend 62 percent of the budget surplus on Social Security and 20 percent of it to reduce the debt.
"You know what's going to decide the race in New Hampshire? Two things: The people of this state are going to make up their mind if they want someone with executive experience or they want someone with Washington legislative experience," Bush said.
"And they are going to decide they want to leave money in Washington left to spend on new programs or they want money passed back to the taxpayers. I believe those are the deciding issues in the campaign."
Hours later, Bush is no longer just reciting those lines at Londonderry High School, but performing them before a campaign camera crew filming a 30-second, "crash" ad that will run on New Hampshire television the next day.
"You mark my words, you leave money sitting around the table in Washington - Washington politicians will spend it. Now I stand on the side of the taxpayers in this debate," Bush said.
Yet even some supporters needed convincing, like Dave and Gisela Hemshaw of Londonderry, who wanted to know what Bush would do to reduce the debt.
"Senator Gregg just pointed out that if all the Social Security surplus is locked up and spent for Social Security as Governor Bush has called for, this will lower the debt," Dave Hemshaw said.
"I'm going to vote for him but reducing the deficit is a very important issue to me."
Once the Londonderry event ended, Bush headed to Manchester Airport for an evening flight to Iowa.
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