Vacation? What vacation? That's the White House message

 

One way or another, every presidential administration must face it once a year: August.

Washington quiets down. Congress leaves town. The president goes on vacation. He just can't quite let it look that way.

August, after all, is the month of Saddam Hussein's assault on Kuwait in 1990, Katrina's assault on the Gulf Coast in 2005, and, now, depending on whether you are in Sochi or Crawford, Georgia's assault on South Ossetia or Russia's assault on Georgia.

It was in August from a Kennebunkport, Maine, golf course that President Bush memorably delivered --after a suicide bomb attack in Israel--a nearly-one-breath-no-nonsense message:

"I call upon all nations to do everything they can to stop these terrorist killers thank you now watch this drive."

That  gaffe was one of the few slip-ups in a concerted White House effort to make the point that the president is never fully on vacation. Never mind what Mike Allen, writing in the Washington Post in 2002, called "golf-cart diplomacy."

Now, with Bush's ratings hovering around 30% month after month, it certainly wouldn't do to suggest that the president was just  "on vacation," as reasonable as it might seem for any president to need to take some time off, specially in his eighth war-torn year in office.

Regardless of popularity, the staffs of all recent presidents have gone to some length to present him as hard at work--even as he clears brush and rides his bike (President Bush); clears brush and rides his horse (President Reagan); plays aerobic golf and rides on his speedboat (the first President Bush); plays slow golf and schmoozes aerobically with friends (President Clinton); or plays softball and swats gnats (President Carter).

So, along comes ...

... the steady flow of photos of the current president--OK, in denim or other informal garb--phone to ear or meeting with advisers, and briefings by earnest younger aides. (Senior-most officials have often scattered to their own vacation haunts come August).

"We were cognizant of it from the very beginning, including his first extended August stay in Crawford back in 2001," Scott McClellan, who was himself a deputy White House press secretary at the time, wrote in an e-mail to Countdown to Crawford.

So, he defined that first long Crawford visit as a "working vacation" and from time-to-time "made sure the press corps knew the president was tending to official business...." (We'll have more on McClellan's e-mail in a future posting).

To be sure, the business of the presidency follows the president; so, too, the accoutrements and trappings.

Last week, Bush put off his extended summer visit to Crawford by one day to track the crisis in Georgia, and then headed there Thursday. Already there, as always: A senior staff office and trailer to house the on-duty assistants who accompanied the president home, a helipad for Marine One, and secure voice and video communications. In short, everything he needs to do his job.

And on Saturday, there was the president in tie and jacket--all business--as he spoke with reporters, with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at his side. The topic was Georgia and the crisis with Russia. The overt message: We're being tough on Russia. The subliminal message: The president is at work.

Were it a normal Saturday at the White House and the president was getting a briefing from Rice, you can bet he'd not have been likely to have invited reporters into the Oval Office for a summary. And if it were a Saturday at Camp David? No way.

Today, a deputy White House press secretary, Gordon Johndroe, in respectable dark blazer, red tie and white shirt (the TV shot only showed his less-than-formal khakis as he walked away from the lectern), went on camera to conduct an on-the-record White House press briefing at the school gymnasium in Crawford that serves as the workspace for the dwindling press corps still traveling with Bush.

He stood in front of the ubiquitous oval plaque, white on blue, that set the scene as  The Western White House.

As was the case on Saturday, and back in 2001, the goal was this: To signal to the American public--regardless of whether folks are paying attention--that the president and his staff are, themselves, paying attention.

-- James Gerstenzang

Photos: J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press

Comments

[John B Sheffield]

I find it believable that Gordon Johndroe in his briefing today (Tuesday) seemed to question the death figures from Gaza, even though the UN have issued their own figures and then stated that he did not want to get into numbers, and pointing out that he heard 3 Israelis has now died, is it a matter of "See No Evil"

Is it not time to say to Israel STOP! and we will not continue to supply you with a blank cheque any longer, lets Hope we see some action from President Elect Obama and not just sit back and watch like Bush.