SCRAPBOOK

...Oh, yes...

...Jesse, with his wheels cranking even slower than usual, tried to score rhetorical points for the Reform party while talking with Wolf Blitzer: "It's interesting that when Abraham Lincoln was elected president 150 years ago or more, there were three parties back then, and the Repulican party was the new party on the block...

...ABE, WE HARDLY KNEW YE Both Jesse "The Body" Ventura and Bob "The Comb-over" Smith demonstrated last week that despite their feisty independence and enervating candor, neither is in danger of being mistaken for Arthur "The Historian" Schlesinger...

...They offered him no alternative, no other job in the campaign he might take...

...We await his exegesis of Al Gore's "pragmatic idealism...

...It means that [Yes?], it's a slogan [Of course!], you know, in the way, in American English it means, 'I am very excited about the prospect of the rejuvenation of the peace process,' [It does?] and that's all it means...

...But sometimes, of course, the president gets it just right...

...And I'm going to keep right on doing so until the end.'" And Abe did it to the end, too...

...Immediately the president took a deep breath and embarked on one of those self-exculpatory soliloquies for which he's famous...

...Much as THE SCRAPBOOK hates to admit it, this sounds about right...

...Except the end came in 1865, which would have made it somewhat difficult to talk about in 1866...

...Which is fine, except there's no way around dealing with Washington reporters...

...Point taken, Jesse, except for one problem—150 years ago would have been 1849...

...On July 12, Bush campaign manager Joe Allbaugh and press secretary Karen Hughes informed Beckwith he should clear out of Bush headquarters by the end of the day...

...Hughes had never wanted Beckwith to be hired in the first place...

...I do...

...Ever!] For example, if I were taking a trip to Hawaii, I might say 'I am excited as a kid with a new toy.' It doesn't mean I think Hawaii is a toy [Of course not!], if you see what I mean [We do...

...Ever...

...But Rove, who had worked with Beckwith on the successful—and tough—1993 Senate primary campaign of Kay Bailey Hutchison, insisted that he be brought on board...

...But Hughes was unhappy with him and last week got her way...

...Beckwith's loyalty to Bush was never in doubt...

...Why the bum's rush...

...And near as I can tell, here's what it means...

...Normally, such experience might be regarded as an asset...

...He was a longtime correspondent in D.C...

...Speaking to a meeting of the Democratic Leadership Council in Baltimore last Wednesday, the president assayed the governing philosophy of the Republican front-runner...

...N^'ws story that suggested Bush is thickheaded ("Is It Wrong to Call Him George Dumbya Bush...

...I'd like to do these things...

...mocked the Iowa GOP straw poll on August 14, and generally been "off-message...

...He'd quit his job at EDS in Washington, arranged for his two daughters to attend schools in Texas this fall, packed up his family, and moved to Austin earlier this summer...

...In English, what that means is that you are very excited...

...We do...

...On the other hand, he has concern that the minimum wage, for example here in inner-city Baltimore, where there are young teenage children who want to get summer jobs, where there might be trouble—where they might have trouble finding jobs if the minimum wage were increased...

...She is part of Bush's "iron triangle" along with Allbaugh and chief strategist Karl Rove, and she had ruled the Bush press operation, keeping a tight hold on what information is put out...

...In 1866," Smith said on the Senate floor, "Abraham Lincoln said this—it's a very famous quote: 'If I were to try to read, much less answer all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business...

...PAPA'S GOT A BRAND NEW TOY A fellow who talks non-stop is liable to get lost in the hickets of his own verbiage once in a while, and sure enough it happened to President Clinton again last week...

...As presidential candidate Bob Smith cast adrift from the Republican party last week, he, like Jesse, let fly with the Lincoln scholarship...

...Scrapbook CALL HIM GEORGE FIRED'YA BUSH It wasn't a Clintonesque whopper, but when George W. Bush declared last week that spokesman David Beckwith hadn't been fired—well, it wasn't the truth either...

...I'd like to raise the minimum wage...

...And I feel terrible about it...

...The president seemed not to understand the implication, and it took the intercession of ever-helpful CNN White House correspondent Wolf Blitzer to explain what the reporter meant...

...But I just can't...

...I do the very best I know how—the very best I can...

...And Beckwith did that better than anyone else at the Bush campaign...

...There's one Bush campaign person who at least pretends to be chummier with Washington reporters then even Beckwith...

...So he's certainly willing to look at that proposal, but I think there are some concerns that need to be addressed about it...

...Coincidentally, as if to confirm the president's suspicions, the same night George W. Bush's spokeswoman Karen Hughes was asked, on MSNBC's Equal Time, whether the compassionate conservative supported raising the minimum wage...

...Never!] So thank you, Wolf...

...I'm as eager as a kid with a new toy," the president exulted...

...Compassionate conservatism remains a work in progress...

...At a fund-raising dinner in Coral Gables on Tuesday, our leader expressed his delight at the impending visit of Israeli Prime Minister Barak...

...Barak...

...She's been known to complain that Rove himself talks too much to reporters...

...Nonetheless, Bush operatives trashed him on background after he departed...

...Beckwith was canned chiefly because he has a friendly relationship with political reporters in Washington...

...Having a press spokesman who is taken seriously by reporters, and not automatically dismissed as a spinner, can come in handy in politics...

...President...

...It has no reference to the prime minister...

...They told Beckwith he'd put out misinformation, cooperated on a U.S...

...I mean, I made an honest effort...

...These charges, basically trivial or untrue, weren't the real reason...

...That's Bush himself...

...Lincoln was elected in 1860...

...This compassionate conservatism has a great ring to it, you know...

...I would never say such a patronizing thing...

...At a joint press conference with Barak two days later, the president was asked by an indignant Israeli reporter: "What kind of game do you want to play with Mr...

...Some Bush aides talk boastfully about their refusal to play "Washington games...

...WHAT'S A COMP-CON...

...Beckwith came on in a subordinate position to Hughes, and always deferred to her in explaining his role to reporters...

...I would never do that...

...As near as this can be translated, it means, apparently, that George W. Bush supports raising the minimum wage for everyone but black kids in the ghetto...

...And thank you, Mr...

...Some Israelis took offense...

...It means, 'I like you...

...And I would like to be for the patient's bill of rights and I'd like to be for closing the gun show loophole, and I'd like not to squander the surplus, and you know, save Social Security and Medicare for the next generation...

...for Time, then served as Vice President Dan Quayle's press secretary...

...But you can't fire him...

...Behold comp-con in practice: "Governor Bush said today that he thinks in some parts of the country there may be an argument for raising the minimum wage...

...Perhaps the president understands "compassionate conservatism" so well because the phrase is so Clintonian...

...It sounds so good, and I've really worked hard to try to figure out what it means...

...But not at Bush campaign headquarters, where paranoia about Beltway mores and sinister national (as opposed to Texas) reporters runs rampant...