A Workbook for

The President-Elect

Stephen Hess
 A Workbook for
The President-Elect

Stephen Hess

Brookings Institution Press

Washington, D.C.
ABOUT BROOKINGS
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Copyright © 2008
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data

Hess, Stephen.
 What do we do now? : a workbook for the president-elect / by Stephen Hess.
 p.  cm.
 Includes bibliographical references and index.
 Summary: “A workbook to guide future chief executives, decision by decision, through the
minefield of transition. Based on experiences of a White House staffer and presidential adviser,
shows what can be done to make presidential transitions go smoothly”—Provided by publisher.
 ISBN 978-0-8157-3655-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
 1. Presidents—United States. 2. Presidents—United States—Transition periods. 3. Presidents—
United States—Staff. I. Title.
 JK516.H45 2008
 352.230973—dc22 2008033786

987654321

The paper used in this publication meets minimum requirements of the American National
Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials: ANSI
Z39.48-1992.

Design and composition by Naylor Design, Inc., Washington, D.C.

Printed by Versa Press, East Peoria, Illinois
Contents

My Life in Transitions vi

Chapter 1. Getting Started 1

Chapter 2. The White House 13

Chapter 3. The Cabinet 59

Chapter 4. Activities 95

Chapter 5. The Inauguration 125

Chapter 6. The Oval Office 143

Presidential Transitions: A Study Approach 157

For Further Study 160

Thanks 163

Index 165

What Do We Do Now? • iii
 To the newest members
of my family’s Inner Cabinet

Ruthie and Minnie

And Henry, who arrived September 4,

just in the nick of time for this dedication
 My Life in Transitions

This book is about the president-elect. It explains what the person

elected president at the beginning of November has to do to be ready to
be president by Inauguration Day in January. When we start this exer-
cise, as you will see, the book is directed to the president-elect. You are,
of course, welcome to join the conversation.
Presidential transitions have been part of my life for nearly a half-
century. When John Kennedy narrowly defeated Richard Nixon in
1960, I had been on President Dwight Eisenhower’s staff for two years.
For two years before that, I was a draftee in the U.S. Army. Going from
private first class in Germany to the president’s number two speech-
writer at twenty-five was a bit of magic arranged by my favorite Johns
Hopkins professor, Malcolm Moos, who had joined Ike’s staff in 1957.
In the ensuing transition, the Kennedy people asked for very little
help from Ike’s staffers. I remember being asked only one question.
Pierre Salinger, the incoming press secretary, wanted to know whether
Eisenhower’s press secretary, Jim Hagerty, really kept the wire service
teletype in his lavatory. Yes, I answered. (I could have told him this was
not a good idea: Patti Herman once forgot to lock the door when Secre-
tary of State John Foster Dulles had an urgent need for breaking news.)
Their behavior can be explained, at least in part, by Dick Neustadt’s
general theory on the arrogance of all victorious campaign staffs. But I
think there was more to it. Call it snobbery. Kennedy people, often
young and liberal, considered Eisenhower people, often old and con-
servative, to be intellectually irrelevant, as subsequent conversations
with Kennedy historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. have convinced me.
Plus there was a dash of what William Manchester called “generation-
al chauvinism” about the Kennedy people. The Eisenhower staffers

vi  • What Do We Do Now?

may not have been Rhodes scholars, as were fifteen in the Kennedy
administration, but many had been there six or eight years and knew a
great deal about how government works. The Kennedy people might
have gained from listening more.
I returned to work in the White House in 1969, after Nixon unex-
pectedly invited my good friend Daniel Patrick Moynihan to be the
assistant to the president for urban affairs. Pat urged me to join him,
and I became the deputy assistant. Working with Pat would have been
a joy whatever the circumstances, but I also felt that Democrat Moyni-
han needed me to interpret the ways of Republicans who were to be
his colleagues. During the transition, Pat was charged with creating a
new White House unit, the Urban Affairs Council. In contrast to the
gap between Kennedy and Eisenhower people in 1960, Moynihan
knew not only the outgoing president’s staff (he had been an assistant
secretary of labor in the Johnson administration) but also the right
people in the civil service. All accidental, perhaps, but also ideal: as a
result, President Nixon was able to sign an executive order creating
the Urban Affairs Council as his first act.
My next transition experience was more surprising. I had joined
the Brookings Institution in 1972, with occasional short side trips back
into government to help President Gerald Ford. On December 11, 1976,
John Osborne wrote in his New Republic column, “Stephen Hess, a
former Nixon assistant and Brookings Institution Fellow whose new
book, Organizing the Presidency, was favorably mentioned in this space,
learned on Friday, November 19, how personally and directly Carter is
involved [in the transition]. Hess is a member of the U.S. delegation to
the current session of the UN General Assembly. He was in his office at
U.S. delegation headquarters in New York when a secretary told him
that a Governor Carter was on the telephone. ‘Governor Carter?’ Hess
said. ‘I don’t know any Governor Carter.’ The secretary said it was the
Governor Carter.”
This is the sort of response, I later said, that must happen all the
time when a president-elect calls folks who are not expecting to hear
from him. For two months I gladly took Carter’s calls (even when they
were in the middle of Redskins games) and tried to answer his ques-

What Do We Do Now? • vii
 tions. “Should the Office of Special Representative for Trade Negotia-
tions be taken out of the Executive Office of the President and put in
the Treasury Department?” (No, it works well where it is; moving it
would produce a prolonged fight.) Carter and his assistants were un-
failingly polite and appreciative of my advice, and since I had been the
editor-in-chief of the Republican platform I was grateful to have had
their attention and goodwill. (My memos to President-elect Carter are
reproduced in the 2002 edition of Organizing the Presidency.)
In 1980, the year Carter lost his bid for reelection to Ronald Reagan,
planning for a presidency before a candidate gets elected became stan-
dard operating procedure. Carter made a worthy try in 1976, but it
proved counterproductive when it led to an embarrassing conflict
between his transition staff and his campaign staff. This might have
been an object lesson for the out-of-office Republicans. Whatever the
case, the work of Edwin Meese for candidate Reagan, the efforts of Ed
Feulner’s Heritage Foundation in creating a conservative agenda, and
the logistical support of Bill Brock, the most creative Republican na-
tional chairman since Mark Hanna, produced what is now considered
the gold standard for transition planning. My contribution, requested
by Brock, was to outline necessary elements of putting together a tran-
sition. (The memo is reproduced in the 2002 edition of Organizing the
Presidency.)
Transitions benefit greatly from the advice of think tanks, those
not-for-profit centers doing public policy analysis that the government
ought to be doing if it had the time and energy. A testament to their
unique contribution to organizing knowledge is the steady stream of
foreigners who trek to the Brookings Institution and other leading
Washington think tanks for advice on how to start such centers in
their own countries. In the Reagan-to-Bush transition (1988–89), I
was part of a team convened by the National Academy of Public Ad-
ministration, which produced The Executive Presidency: Federal Man-
agement for the 1990s. The panel included William T. Coleman Jr., Stu-
art E. Eizenstat, Fred F. Fielding, Andrew J. Goodpaster, Donald
Rumsfeld, and Brent Scowcroft. Chaired by Elmer B. Staats, a former
comptroller general of the United States, the panel focused on rela-

viii  • What Do We Do Now?

tions between careerists and political appointees and other public ser-
vice concerns that were less likely to be at the top of the president-
elect’s political agenda.
Four years later, during the Bush-to-Clinton transition (1992–93),
I was part of a team convened by the Carnegie Endowment for Inter-
national Peace and the Peterson Institute for International Econom-
ics. The team, chaired by Richard C. Holbrooke, included Morton I.
Abramowitz, Madeleine K. Albright, Frank C. Carlucci, Kenneth M.
Duberstein, William Frenzel, Paul H. O’Neill, Peter G. Peterson, Elliot
L. Richardson, and Theodore C. Sorensen. While our Memorandum to
the President-Elect contained a wide range of suggestions, its primary
one was that the White House establish a “three-council system” con-
sisting of the National Security Council, the Economic Council, and
the Domestic Council. The president accepted our recommendation.
Eight years later, during the Clinton-to-Bush transition (2000–01),
the Presidential Appointee Initiative at Brookings, under the direction
of Paul C. Light, produced the most thorough investigation, with rec-
ommendations, of the failings of the presidential appointments pro-
cess. My contribution can be found in Innocent until Nominated, edited
by G. Calvin Mackenzie (Brookings, 2001).
This slim volume is my attempt at keeping the record of my life in
transitions intact in 2008.

What Do We Do Now? • ix
 x  •  What Do We Do Now?
 Getting Started
“The President needs help!”
These are the four most urgent words ever delivered to a
president of the United States. They were the words of the
President’s Committee on Administrative Management.
The president was Franklin Roosevelt, the year 1937. That
was the year Inauguration Day was advanced from March 4
to January 20—and life for newly elected presidents became
ever more difficult. You could no longer take a leisurely four
months to plan your administration or, like Woodrow Wil-
son, enjoy a month’s vacation in Bermuda.
Instead, following election on November 4, you have sev-
enty-seven-and-a-half days (counting Christmas and New
Year’s Day) to perform the incredibly difficult and complex
job of creating a government before taking office.

1
CHAPTER 1 Getting Started

There is no shadow cabinet to move in with you, as in a parliamentary

system. Your staff—created for campaigning, not governing—lacks
many of the talents you now require. Your political party asks not what
it can do for you. The government’s civil service is either too liberal or
too conservative, according to past presidents. And this is just the start
of your problems.
No political scientist so thoroughly understood the hazards of pres-
idential transitions as Richard E. Neustadt, the Harvard professor who
had also been on President Harry S. Truman’s staff and an adviser to
John F. Kennedy. The two primary hazards, writes Neustadt, are “new-
ness,” which he equates with ignorance, and “hubris,” which he calls “a
kind of early arrogance.” The arrogance radiates from the winning
team luxuriating in its remarkable victory. Counterarrogance can wait
for your first defeat in Congress or your administration’s first front-
page scandal.
But ignorance? Surely we elect presidents of fine education, many
skills, and experience in jobs with titles like “governor” or “senator.”
Yet governors too quickly learn that Washington is not Atlanta, Little
Rock, or Austin writ large. It will take time and attention to unlearn
lessons that had previously worked so well. As a senator, on the other
hand, you have the right to believe that you know Washington. But
what you soon realize is that the Washington you know largely revolves
around Capitol Hill and its legislative ways. There are vast differences
in scope and style between life under Article I and Article II.
As if to make this point brutally, Neustadt cites the experience of
John F. Kennedy, the last senator elected president before the 2008
election. Less than three months after his inauguration, Kennedy blun-
dered into the “misadventure at Cuba’s Bay of Pigs in April 1961.” In
asking the Joint Chiefs of Staff for its assessment of the CIA’s invasion
plan, says Neustadt, Kennedy

2  • What Do We Do Now?
 evidently was too ignorant to under-
stand that when the military is asked
to comment on an operation that is The seal used on page 1 is from the invitation
someone else’s responsibility it will to the inaugural ceremony of President Richard
be loath to open its mind—or its Nixon in 1969. It is the Great Seal of the Unit-
mouth. Nor did Kennedy understand ed States, not the Seal of the President. The
the terms of reference in which mili- Great Seal was approved by the Continental
tary advice was tendered to him. The Congress in 1782. The Seal of the President is
Joint Chiefs told him that they a product of tradition, not statute, and dates
thought the CIA plan had a “fair” back to President Rutherford B. Hayes, 1877.
chance of success. What the colonel The difference between the two seals is
who wrote those words meant by slight. The Great Seal features a circle of clouds
them was “fair” as next to “poor.” encasing thirteen stars above the eagle; the
What Mr. Kennedy took them to Seal of the President has an arced cornea of
mean was “fair” as “pretty good”. . . . thirteen stars with the clouds above. Until 1945,
And so it went. The military chiefs however, there was a more radical difference.
were half a generation older than the The eagle in the Great Seal held an olive branch
President: they had seen him on tele- in its right talon and a bundle of arrows in the
vision during the campaign, champi- left. This was reversed in the president’s seal by
oning vigor and calling for firmness Harry Truman. As explained in a White House
against Cuba. They did not wish to press release: “In the new Coat of arms, Seal
look weak. and Flag, the Eagle not only faces to its right—
the direction of honor—but also toward the ol-
The transitions of the eight presi- ive branches of peace which it holds in its right
dents-elect of the “modern” era have talon. Formerly the eagle faced toward the ar-
rows in its left talon—arrows, symbolic of war.”
been a mixed success at best. The
scholars’ consensus is that two made
multiple mistakes so serious as to cast
doubt on whether they were ready for prime time. By their actions (or
inaction) they dug holes for themselves that they would have to dig
out of. Digging takes time and resources. Two presidents allowed
events to go forward that had lasting adverse international conse-
quences. All made errors—most often in appointments, though some-
times in policy proposals as well—for which they paid a price.
While you were campaigning, some folks—volunteers, interns,
staff—were gathering material for your use after the election. This
probably included job descriptions for positions you will have to fill,
an annotated list of laws that will expire during your first year in office,

What Do We Do Now? • 3
 and documentation on turning campaign promises into draft legisla-
tion or executive orders. Your experts have contributed memos of what
awaits you in the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, and other places,
as well as how to fix the health care system and the economy.
It used to be that pre-election planning was considered bad politics:
you don’t want voters to feel that you’re taking them for granted. But
Jimmy Carter experienced no adverse electoral consequences when
he created a small transition office in Atlanta during the 1976 campaign.
What he faced instead was a hammer-and-tong battle between transi-
tion staff and campaign staff. This happened again after Bill Clinton’s
1992 victory. Ronald Reagan, however, devised a formula that worked
well: leave no room for infighting by giving the ultimate power to a
member of your inner circle whose decisions are understood to have
your full support.

Why this book is called “What Do We Do Now?”

The title of this book—suggested by my friend and former Nixon speechwriter
William Safire—comes from the 1972 movie The Candidate. Written by Jeremy
Larner, himself a former political speechwriter, the movie stars Robert Redford
as Bill McKay, the politically disillusioned son of California’s former governor.
McKay is persuaded to launch a long-shot candidacy for a seat in the U.S. Sen-
ate. In the early months of the campaign, McKay attempts to discuss substan-
tive issues with voters. But as he gains in the polls, McKay drops his focus on
issues for empty slogans such as “For a better way: Bill McKay!” In the movie’s
famous closing scene, McKay—unexpectedly victorious and facing the prospect
of going to Washington—confronts his campaign manager with the question
“What do we do now?” The line has come to symbolize the idea that politicians
often care more about getting elected than about governing.
McKay’s question actually has a shadow in history. According to Arthur M.
Schlesinger Jr., when candidate John F. Kennedy asked adviser Clark Clifford in
August 1960 to write a transition memo, he said, “If I am elected, I don’t want
to wake up on the morning of November 9 and have to ask myself, ‘What in the
world do I do now?’”

4  • What Do We Do Now?
 To supplement the material you may re-
ceive from these and other quarters, this Transition Budget
workbook offers some thoughts on how to
The federal government provides funds
best organize a presidency distilled from for both the incoming and outgoing
accumulated wisdom and experience. It presidents under the Presidential Tran-
contains no flight plans for how to deal sition Act. The funds cover office space,
with Iraq or the economy. Instead it draws staff compensation, communications
on the excellent work of scholars who pro- services, and printing and postage costs
fessionally study presidential transitions relating to the transition. During the
2000–01 transition, the General Servic-
and on my own involvement in all of the
es Administration (GSA, the housekeep-
transitions since 1960–61, when I was a
ing arm of government) was authorized
young man on President Dwight Eisen- to spend $7.1 million—$1.83 million for
hower’s White House staff awaiting the ar- the outgoing Clinton administration,
rival of the incoming Kennedy people. $4.27 million for the incoming George
Presidential experts do not always agree, W. Bush administration, and an addi-
of course. One school of transition scholars tional $1 million for the GSA to provide
advocates that you “hit the ground run- additional assistance. Had there been a
presidential transition in 2004–05, a to-
ning.” They urge you to take advantage of
tal of $7.7 million would have been au-
the honeymoon period that the media and
thorized. Funds for the 2008–09 transi-
the voters usually give a new president. tion will be provided for in the president’s
You’ll never have all the pieces in place fiscal 2009 budget.
when you take office anyway, so go for Source: Congressional Research Service.
quick victories. Good first impressions are
important. Another school of scholars ad-
vises you to be cautious while you’re still
learning the ropes. You’ll never have all the pieces in place when you
take office, and ignorant presidents make unnecessary mistakes. It’s
hard to undo bad first impressions.
Both are right.
After you have assessed your circumstances—the size of your
electoral victory, makeup of Congress, state of the economy, imme-
diate troubles in the world—it is essential to prioritize your long-
term goals and then have a pocketful of doable actions ready for
quick victories.
Now, let us begin.

What Do We Do Now? • 5
 Worksheets

Properly position your presidency—creating a sort of personal politi-

cal gyroscope—by completing these two short exercises. First, list the
five reasons you think people voted for you (not merely what your
pollster told you). Then list the five most important promises you
made during the campaign. Don’t include promises such as President
Jimmy Carter’s “I’ll never lie to you.”
If you think people voted for you because of your personal charac-
teristics and to deny the Oval Office to your opponent or his party, then
you have already accomplished these goals. But the other reasons you
wrote down probably relate to fears and hopes at home and abroad.
Refer to this list every December when you start to write your State of
the Union address.
As for promises you made during the campaign, some will obvi-
ously have to be honored over time, but others should be ready for
submission to Congress (or to be put into effect as executive orders) as
soon as possible after the inauguration. Keep the list short and doable.
You can name on the fingers of one hand the things Ronald Reagan
said he wanted to do in January 1981. While you want to keep your
promises, you may find that circumstances change and you have to
adjust to new situations. Or you may learn things you didn’t know, as
happened with President Kennedy, who had spoken of a “missile
gap”—a Soviet advantage in nuclear weapons capabilities that threat-
ened U.S. security—during the 1960 campaign. Later evidence revealed
the missile gap to be a myth.
If President-elect Bill Clinton had used these exercises in 1992, he
might have avoided the rocky start of his administration when it got
sidetracked by the “gays in the military” issue.

6  • What Do We Do Now?
Why Did the Voters Choose You?

1._ ___________________________________________________________

2.____________________________________________________________

3.____________________________________________________________

4.____________________________________________________________

5.____________________________________________________________

What Promises Did You Make?

1._ ___________________________________________________________

2.____________________________________________________________

3.____________________________________________________________

4.____________________________________________________________

5.____________________________________________________________

What Do We Do Now? • 7
 Case in Point: Gays in the Military

Article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military General Colin Powell, chairman of the Joint
Justice bans homosexual behavior in the Chiefs of Staff, called the president’s proposal
armed forces. Bill Clinton pledged during the “prejudicial to good order and discipline.” Pow-
1992 campaign to lift the ban uncondition- ell was supported by the chief of naval opera-
ally. In response to a question during a press tions, the army chief, and the commandant of
conference on November 16, 1992, the pres- the Marine Corps, who, according to Clinton’s
ident-elect declared, “I intend to press for- memoir, “made it clear that if I ordered them to
ward with that in an expeditious way early in take action they’d do the best they could, al-
the term.” Although Clinton’s campaign had though if called to testify before Congress they
been built on economic recovery, tax policy, would have to state their views frankly.”
budget cuts—“It’s the economy, stupid!”— Senator Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), chairman of
the first weeks of his presidency ended up the Armed Services Committee and the lead-
being dominated by gays in the military. ing expert on the military in the Senate, force-
The emotional nature of the
issue caught the new president
unprepared. Responses were
instantaneous and explosive.
In his memoirs, My Life (Knopf,
2004), Clinton described do-
ing a Cleveland television in-
terview “in which a man said
he no longer supported me
because I was spending all my
time on gays in the military
and Bosnia. . . . When he asked
how much time I’d spent on
gays in the military, and I told
him just a few hours, he simply
replied, ‘I don’t believe you.’”

“All right, men . . . as you were”

Cartoon by Kevin “KAL” Kallaugher, Baltimore Sun (www.kaltoons.com)

8  • What Do We Do Now?
fully challenged Clinton. He was joined, in a Presidential Commissions
moment of rare bipartisanship, by Senate mi-
nority leader Bob Dole (R-Kans.). The House Creating presidential commissions involve
of Representatives opposed Clinton by more schoosing a distinguished chairperson and
than three to one. a representative panel and setting a dead-
A public opinion poll showed that lifting line for future action. These presidents also
the ban was strongly approved by 16 per- used them to cool hot issues.
cent of the electorate and strongly disap- President Kennedy: Commission on
proved by 33 percent. Clinton noted, “It’s the Status of Women, 1961
hard to get politicians in swing districts to Chaired by former First Lady
take a 17 percent deficit on any issue into an Eleanor Roosevelt
election.” Activists confronted each other in
Lafayette Park, across Pennsylvania Avenue President Nixon: Commission on
from the White House, as they did in dem- Campus Unrest, 1970
onstrations and counterdemonstrations in Chaired by William Scranton,
Los Angeles, Seattle, Colorado Springs, and former governor of Pennsylvania
other cities. President Ford: Commission on CIA
Experienced presidents invent techniques Activities within the United States, 1975
to defuse potentially explosive issues— Chaired by Vice President Nelson
appoint a blue-ribbon commission, and set a Rockefeller
deadline for action in the future. This is what
President Reagan: National
General Powell had recommended in Decem-
Commission on Social Security
ber 1992. Six months later, Clinton accepted
Reform, 1983
a defense department proposal to create the
Chaired by Alan Greenspan, former
“don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. But not before,
chairman of President Ford’s Council
in the opinion of transition scholars, he had
of Economic Advisers
hit the ground stumbling.

What Do We Do Now? • 9
 “It’s time we end foreign oil dependence!”
Cartoon by Jimmy Margulies, ©2006, The Record, New Jersey

Extract from a Transition Memorandum

Early in 1980, Republican National Chairman Bill Brock invited me to
serve on a task force he created to prepare material to be presented
to the party’s presidential nominee immediately after the national
convention. My assignment was to help the candidate think about
transition planning.
The next two chapters in this book will help you think about
these questions as you begin assembling your White House staff
and cabinet.

10  • What Do We Do Now?

 MEMO TO: THE PARTY’S NOMINEE
FROM: STEPHEN HESS
SUBJECT: TRANSITION PLANNING
DATE: MAY 22, 1980

. . . In a sense, you are immediately faced with three-dimensional

decision-making: there are people decisions, structure decisions,
and policy decisions. If you decide first on a person, you may
become locked into a structure and/or a policy. Presidents-
elect always make people decisions first, then rue many of
the consequences. . . .

Assuming that you will want to get on with appointments, as have

your predecessors, are there not ways to group together the con-
sideration of certain jobs so as to keep policy and structure in
mind at the same time? For example, by concentrating first on the
triangle of State-Defense-NSC [National Security Council]? This
mode of arranging your decisions can help you think about what
you want of each agency and what qualities you most desire in a
secretary of state, a secretary of defense, and a national se-
curity assistant. The same principle would apply to thinking
about key economics positions.

Other factors enter into the appointing process: Do you want to

give your cabinet officers the authority to choose their own deputy/
under/assistant secretaries? Are there any jobs that can be best
filled by setting up search committees? How much conflict/consensus
do you wish to build into your advisory system? What sort of
commitments do you want to get from your appointees? When you do
not have specific people in mind, what are the most useful ques-
tions to ask candidates for each top job? What positions do you
wish to abolish? What precedents need to be considered, such as a
western governor for secretary of the interior? What part do you
want members of Congress and the National Committee to play in
people decisions? How do you want to go about screening candidates
for conflicts of interest and other disqualifying characteristics?
There needs to be a strategy for the announcement of appointments.

What Do We Do Now? • 11
 12  • What Do We Do Now?
 The White House
The White House is the obvious place to start putting the
pieces in place that will define your administration. How do
you wish to organize your staff? In what order should you
make the appointments? Consider the degree of tension that
you want to build into your system. What are the qualities
you need in your key assistants? You will even have to give
thought to the assignment of offices: who will be located
near you in the West Wing and who will be across the street
in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building? Who will help
you face the press? As you make these and other decisions,
the nation and the world will be assessing the rightness of
your first moves.

What Do We Do Now? • 13
CHAPTER 2 The White House

Staffing the White House

In the days before you become president of the United States (or
POTUS, as we say “inside the Beltway”), the government may look like
rows of empty offices waiting to be filled with your loyal supporters.
This is not quite the case. Of the two million civilian employees in the
U.S. government, you will get to pick about 3,000 of them. Moreover,
the most important appointees will require confirmation by the U.S.
Senate.
Let’s get started at the top.

The White House Office

The nerve center of the Executive Office of the President is the White
House Office (WHO). It is imperative to choose certain White House
officials immediately in order to move forward efficiently with the
staffing process—from selection to confirmation—that shapes your ad-
ministration. Many problems of the Clinton transition arose because
the president-elect—consumed, as he stated in his memoirs, with “mi-
cromanaging the cabinet appointments”—failed to appoint his White
House staff, except for Chief of Staff Thomas F. McLarty, until six days
before taking office.
The key positions that you must quickly fill are
• Chief of staff
• Personnel director
• Counsel
• Press secretary
• Congressional relations chief
• Speechwriters

14  • What Do We Do Now?

 Presidents usually designate one assistant their primus inter pares
(Latin for “first among equals”), the PIP, in our shorthand. The PIP most
often has the title “chief of staff”—but not always. Sherman Adams in the
Eisenhower administration was “the assistant to the president” (with
emphasis on “the”), and President Kennedy’s PIP, Ted Sorensen, was
“special counsel.” Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush have
had what amounted to multi-person PIPs. But titles and numbers matter
much less than the PIP’s dual responsibility to keep the president’s poli-
cies moving forward while trying to keep him out of trouble. The PIP is
the one job you will hopefully have picked—but not announced to the
press—before the election. If you have not settled on your PIP yet, flip
ahead in this chapter to the section “Picking Your PIP.”
Quickly choosing the director of the Office of Presidential Person-
nel is especially important because of the heavy load of initial selec-
tions that must be made in the subcabinet: deputy secretaries, under
secretaries, and assistant secretaries. Presidents once let cabinet mem-
bers choose their own team, but you will undoubtedly agree with pres-
idents since Ronald Reagan that it is best to retain this level of depart-
mental control at the White House.
The White House counsel is “your lawyer.” (The attorneys at the
Justice Department are “the government’s lawyers.”) You are eventu-
ally going to need your lawyer for many questions relating to ethics,
judicial selections, and delicate matters of using presidential powers.
But right now you need the counsel to vet the appointees that are com-
ing from the Personnel Office: by checking FBI full-field investigation
reports, tax returns, searching for conflicts of interest.

The Cabinet
The core of the president’s cabinet comprises the secretaries who
head the fifteen government departments. Listed in the order in which
they would succeed the president, they are the secretaries of State,
Treasury, Defense, and the attorney general, and the secretaries of
Interior, Agriculture, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services
(HHS), Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Transportation,
Energy, Education, Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security.

What Do We Do Now? • 15
 There will be others to whom you award cabinet rank. Most recent
presidents have put their chief of staff and the director of the Office of
Management and Budget in their cabinets. Dwight Eisenhower put the
UN ambassador in his cabinet, Ronald Reagan the director of the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA), Bill Clinton the head of the Small Business
Administration (SBA), and George W. Bush the administrator of the En-
vironmental Protection Agency (EPA). You may make similar decisions
on the basis of how important you view these jobs to be. More often it is
because of what you consider sufficient political reasons, such as to give
a consolation prize to someone who really wants to be secretary of state
or to add another demographic characteristic to your cabinet.
You may also want to keep some officials of the outgoing adminis-
tration, either because they are good at their jobs or because it is too
costly politically to replace them. The young
John Kennedy was particularly skillful in
The line of succession to the Office of this regard, providing instant reassurance
President was established by the Presi- by quickly reappointing J. Edgar Hoover as
dential Succession Act of 1947. The law director of the Federal Bureau of Investiga-
has been revised many times since 1947 tion (FBI) and Allen Dulles as CIA director.
to accommodate the creation of new
departments, most recently in 2006 to
add the Homeland Security secretary. Organizing the
Be sure your cabinet understands that White House Office
the line of succession goes through the
vice president, the Speaker of the The White House Office is the one place in
House, and the president pro tempore the government where you can mold the
of the Senate before arriving at the sec- shape, size, and units to meet your specific
retary of state.
needs. The WHO can take three basic
Also remember this: the line of suc-
shapes: circle, pyramid, or isosceles trape-
cession passed over Henry Kissinger,
President Nixon’s secretary of state, and
zoid (the isosceles trapezoid, as you may
Madeleine Albright, President Clinton’s recall from your high school geometry, is a
secretary of state, because they were pyramid with the top cut off ).
both born outside of the United States The circle with you in the center is usu-
to noncitizens, making them constitu- ally called “the spokes in the wheel” design.
tionally ineligible to become president. It is most closely identified with Franklin
Roosevelt and worked well when the presi-

16  • What Do We Do Now?

 zational struc
gani t ur
t or

e fo
s
pl e

r you
r ? T h e si m

r presidency
dent’s staff wasYou so small that they could all gather
zational struc
cente gani
around his desk in the Oval Office. Presidents Ford and
o r t ur
Carter tried it, but soon realized that without a chief of
th e t

is t

e fo
s
he

pl e
staff the president became his own chief of staff. (It is
in circl

r you
e. Guess who’s

r ? T h e si m
zational struc
said that Carter’s own staff work even included approv-
o rgani t ur

r preesfoidency
ing who could use the White House tennis court.) t You

es
The pyramid is principally identified with Presi-

nt t s i m p l
cente

r you
dent Eisenhower who, after a lifetime in the military,

r presidency
e
h
knew how to make a steeply hierarchical system, with

is t
You

h
T
in he

?
circl
a chief of staff at its top, work for him. If you have not e. Guess who’s

e r
had experience with a large staff (U.S. senators and

ce
ht e
governors of small states fall into this category), this

is t
in he
configuration may take some time getting used to. The
circl
e. Guess who’s
pyramid promotes orderliness, but it may also screen The
out creativity.
With this type
chief
of staff is
Theofisosceles-trapezoid
organizational design permits more than alone at the
structure, which looks
onelike
PIP. When President Reagan took office, his White
an isosceles trapezoid,
top of the pyramid
organization. It will help
House wasof
your chief run bywill
staff thehave
troika of James Baker as chief of if you have had experience
some company at the top. Ideas
staff, Edwin Meese overseeing policy development, in running such a hierarchical
and information may flow more freely
andfrom
to you Michael Deaver
the people in charge of the president’s
at the bottom. organization in the past.
schedule, travel, and public image. President George With this type
of organizational
W. Bush had a triple PIP in Andrew Card as chief of structure, which looks
staff; Karen Hughes in charge of the offices of com- like an isosceles trapezoid,
your chief of staff will have
munications, press secretary, and speechwriting; and With this type
some company at the top. Ideas
of organizational
Karl Rove overseeing political affairs, intergovern- and information may flow more freely
structure, which looks
mental affairs, and public liaison. to you from the people at the bottom.
like an isosceles trapezoid,
Once you have picked the best design to meet your your chief of staff will have
some company at the top. Ideas
management style, you can move on to staff selection. and information may flow more freely
Most presidents arrange their White House Office to you from the people at the bottom.

into fifteen basic units, plus the chief of staff’s office.

But you will find several additional boxes on the
White House organizational chart that you can reserve for special
needs or new initiatives, such as President Clinton’s Office for Wom-
en’s Initiatives and Outreach and President George W. Bush’s Office of
Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.

What Do We Do Now? • 17
 The White House Office Organizational Chart

POTUS

Chief of Staff

National Economic Domestic

Press
Security Policy Policy
Secretary
Assistant Assistant Assistant

Cabinet Secretary1 Staff Secretary2 Management3

Personnel Legal Counsel4 Speechwriters

Intergovernmental Congressional
Affairs5 Relations

Communications6 Public Liaison7 Political Affairs8

For POTUS to add units

In the following boxes, fill in the names of other offices you want to make
part of the White House Office:

1  Coordinates cabinet activities, including meetings, the weekly Cabinet Report, and other events.
2  The ultimate filter before a decision reaches the desk of the president, ensuring that all
appropriate offices have coordinated and condensed the necessary information.
3 Manages all personnel, including the Military Office, and keeps all White House finances within
budget.
4 Represents the president’s legal interests and protects the constitutional prerogatives of the
presidential office for the long term.
5 Facilitates cooperation and policy initiatives between the federal government and state, local,
and tribal governments of the nation.
6 Coordinates the Public Affairs Offices of the executive branch to promote the president’s policies.
7 Facilitates and maintains a working relationship with business and interest groups.
8 Maintains and improves the status of the president’s party and its allies.

18  • What Do We Do Now?

 Case in Point: Where to Find Help

There are people who are loyal to you, who your ass before I’m through.” These were
have spent years trying to get you elected, crude—but prophetic—words.
and who now want jobs in the government As Charles O. Jones, Neustadt’s worthy
you are creating. It would be helpful if these successor among presidential transition
people were already experienced in the ex- scholars, recommends, “If the president-
ecutive branch. But, as you know, this is sel- elect and his aides are not Washington-wise,
dom so. What to do? then they are advised to get help.” Those
There will be some complementarity be- leaving government are usually eager to ex-
tween campaign staff and White House plain the ropes to the newcomers, regardless
staff, but only in spots—and it’s danger- of party, even when “my” president was just
ous to use the White House as a dumping defeated by “your” president. Example: On
ground. There is a history of loyalists getting November 20, 1976, in the month that Carter
the president in trouble. defeated Gerald Ford, I went to the White
All presidents bring with them a group of House, representing President-elect Carter,
loyalists from their home states that come to meet with President Ford’s chief of staff,
to be known by some epithet such as “the Dick Cheney. For two and a half hours on a
Irish Mafia” or “the Texas Rangers.” President quiet Saturday morning, Cheney laid out the
Carter followed this practice in the extreme: White House manning charts, unit by unit,
of the top eight White House positions, he suggesting changes. By the time we finished,
gave seven to fellow Georgians. And of the I was able to send Carter a memo proposing
seven, only one (domestic policy adviser a seventy-seven person staff reduction.
Stuart Eizenstat) had previous experience in Moreover, by the time incomers become
Washington. outgoers they will have learned how much
Transition expert John P. Burke found talent resides in the upper reaches of the
that Carter “quite consciously and deliber- permanent government—those unloved
ately” valued loyalty over Washington ex- bureaucrats. They are there to be useful on
perience. Carter said what he most needed arrival—if asked. Example: When Pat Moyni-
were aides “who were compatible with each han wanted to educate the young staff of
other and who were loyal to me.” Unfortu- the newly created White House Council on
nately, this staff was not well designed for Urban Affairs in 1969, he called in a Bureau
getting the president’s program through of the Budget examiner to give morning
Congress. Even before Carter formally took tutorials. The talented bureaucrat was Paul
office, Tip O’Neill, the new Speaker of the O’Neill, who will later enter this story in an-
House and a fellow Democrat, told Hamil- other capacity.
ton Jordan, Carter’s top assistant, “I’ll ream

What Do We Do Now? • 19
 Lessons to Apply to Your Transition
☞When hiring political loyalists, make sure they have the right skills for the
job. Never forget “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job”—the response of
President George W. Bush to Michael Brown during a September 2, 2005,
briefing on the Hurricane Katrina disaster. Brown was forced out of his job
as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency ten days later.
His job before joining the Bush administration? Judges and stewards com-
missioner for the International Arabian Horse Association.
☞Tell your appointees that you expect them to schedule serious conversa-
tions (not mere courtesy calls) with their departing counterparts.
☞Incoming officials should ask their outgoing counterparts to permit top
civil servants to give them the type of information they would like to have
had when they first got their jobs.

Location, Location, Location

There are more glorious offices for your staff than those in the West Wing.
The TV show of that name did not depict how small and even window-
less some of the latter really are. Just across the gated West Executive
Street stands another building whose rooms have mile-high ceilings, el-
egant moldings, historic door handles. This is the Eisenhower Executive
Office Building, which once housed the State, War, and Navy Depart-
ments. Nevertheless, all of your advisers and staff will want to be crammed
together in the West Wing—because that is where the Oval Office is. Some
of your staff may not accept space elsewhere without a struggle.
The struggle for space in the West Wing is neatly illustrated by a
transition story that Madeleine Albright tells in her book Memo to the
President Elect (HarperCollins, 2008). She was on President Carter’s
National Security Council staff, “which was run by [Zbigniew] Brze-
zinski from a large corner office in the White House West Wing. I had
the duty of personally escorting Reagan’s first national security advi-
sor, Richard Allen, past a warren of cubbyholes and clutter to the tiny
basement office that he had been assigned by the Reagan team. Allen’s
face fell a foot.” Allen lasted only a year, and his successor managed to
get himself back into a first-floor corner office.

20  • What Do We Do Now?

 The West Wing on TV
For those of us who have had offices in the real West Wing (mine
was on the ground floor), the set of the television show that ran
on NBC from 1999 to 2006 was much more accurate than many
other recreations in movies and television—and yet it was still full
of inaccuracies. You could say it was true in spirit but had been
adjusted to make room for the right camera angles. For example,
the large open office area doesn’t exist. The beautiful lobby seen
on television is much smaller in the real West Wing. TV’s Roosevelt
Room is entirely a creation of producer Aaron Sorkin—there are no
burgundy walls and French doors. Strangely, the TV version has no
Cabinet Room, which is replaced by something called the Mural
Room. What I usually tell people who ask for a comparison is that
the real West Wing is a very quiet place—as though the staff were
saying to each other, “Shh! The president is working.” At least in
the presidencies I’ve known there was not a lot of shouting and
running down the halls of the West Wing.
You can find some very good information on the features of the
West Wing in Pete Sharkey’s website, www.whitehousemuseum.
org. This is a private website that is not affiliated with the White
House Historical Association or the U.S. government.

Down the hall from the Oval Office, the other large first-floor cor-
ner office belongs to the chief of staff (see the West Wing Floor Plan on
page 22). The press secretary also rates an excellent first-floor office
because of the necessity of being close to the briefing room and the
nattering nabobs of the media.
The first lady, with her staff, is usually in the East Wing, on the oth-
er side of the Residence (known as the Mansion in earlier days). But
one recent first lady, Hillary Rodham Clinton, had her own office in
the West Wing—although it was not an especially grand one. Another
new development: recent vice presidents have also staked out space in
the West Wing, although their “grand” office is in the Capitol by virtue
of the vice president’s role as presiding officer of the Senate.
Beyond these top-tier officials, there is room for competition.

What Do We Do Now? • 21
 WEST WING Chief of Staff
1st Floor
Kitchen

President’s Reception
Oval Study Area
Office

Elevator
Senior
Door Advisers
to Rose
Garden
Roosevelt VPOTUS
Room

Lobby

Cabinet
Room

Press Office NSA

WEST WING Domestic Reception

2nd Floor LocatedPolicy
on the West Wing’s ground floor (not shown)Area are offices for the presi-
Speechwriting
dent’s schedulers and security staff, staff secretary, the White House photographer,
video-teleconferencing room (the “situation room”), the staff mess, and a small
conference room.

Counsel

Counsel

Reception
Area Elevator

22  • What Do We Do Now?

Economic Presidential
 Press Office NSA

WEST WING Domestic Reception

2nd Floor Policy Speechwriting Area

Counsel

Counsel

Reception
Area Elevator

Economic Presidential
Policy Personnel

Reception
Area
Reception
Area

Communications Legislative Affairs

What Do We Do Now? • 23
 Pick a Presidential Portrait

George Washington by Gilbert Stuart (1775–1828)

Hung in the Oval Office during the presidencies of Lyndon Johnson
and Richard Nixon.

24  • What Do We Do Now?

 The Eisenhower Executive Office Building
The Eisenhower Executive Office Building (EEOB) fills an entire city
block west of the White House. It is home for some of the over-
flow from the West Wing, which is just across a gated street, West
Executive Avenue. Originally built in the late nineteenth cen-
tury to house the entire State Department, War Department,
and Navy Department, the building contained (when I worked
there in 1959 and 1960) a half floor of White House aides plus
the National Security Council staff, the Bureau of the Budget,
the Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization, and the Council
of Economic Advisers.
Architecturally, EEOB is described as French Second Em-
pire in design, but also as “General Grant Renaissance,” an
awkward collection of extended porches, sharp dormers,
mansard roofs, hundreds of small columns, tall chimneys, four-
feet-thick outside walls, and granite stairways so constructed
that should one step give way, five floors of steps would come
tumbling down. Part of my affection for the building is that
it is so ugly. The story goes that Calvin Coolidge was given a
tour and asked only one question: “Is it insured against fire
and earthquake?” “Of course, Mr. President,” answered his guide.
“What a pity,” replied Coolidge. (The story is apocryphal; govern-
ment buildings are not insured.)
But what I love most, of course, was having had an office there.
I was twenty-five years old. In Room 276 I had doorknobs of brass
emblazoned with the seal of the War Department and long iron
pipes fastened high on the walls, which once held the regimen-
tal banners of defeated armies. When I had meetings at my long
conference table, I made sure a White House notepad lay at each
place so that my conferees could steal them. From my windows I
watched important people avoid the press by entering the West
Wing through the side door or the president’s helicopter land on
the orange stripes that had been placed on the South Lawn—the
president holding tight to his fedora as he disembarked under the
windy whirl of the chopper’s blades—or could see the red and white
candy-striped canopies sheltering Mrs. Eisenhower’s lawn party.

What Do We Do Now? • 25
 Lessons to Apply to Your Transition
☞Make sure your PIP reviews office assignments with you before showing
them to anyone else. Adjustments may be necessary.
☞The basic rule for assigning West Wing offices is simple and straightfor-
ward: the more you need to see someone, the closer his or her office should
be to the Oval Office.

Picking Your PIP

What skills make for the perfect primus inter pares, first among equals?
Certainly not those of the campaign manager, although some campaign
managers may have PIP skills. James Carville knew his talents were
in campaigning, not governing, and rightly chose to stay out of the
Clinton White House. President Carter’s campaign manager, Hamilton
Jordan, was never at ease with the ways Washington does business and
should have resisted more strenuously the PIP job in which he was
such a bad fit.
The PIP should be deeply schooled in and sensitive to the arcane
ways of Washington. President Reagan chose insider James Baker as his
chief of staff, a selection that gave the president the luxury of adding
two California associates who lacked Washington experience to com-
plete his three-person PIP. President George W. Bush achieved a similar
arrangement by combining Washington insider Andrew Card with two
Texans, Karen Hughes and Karl Rove, to create his initial PIP.
The PIP is your fail-safe mechanism, the last redoubt between you
and a misstep. If the PIP does not know the location of all the traps that
will be set for you in the capital, you are likely to get ensnared. This
ability should be the key qualification of the PIP; the rest—the public
relations skills or policy development skills—can be brought into the
White House in subordinate positions, if necessary.
Donald Regan described his PIP role in the Reagan White House as
leading the “shovel brigade that follows [the] parade down Main
Street.” But in a job as inherently overbearing as that of the PIP, nuance
as a management tool can go a long way. Heavy-handed managers such
as Regan, Haldeman (Nixon), and John Sununu (George H. W. Bush)—

26  • What Do We Do Now?

The President’s Initial Primus inter Pares
President and PIP/title Age Prior position(s) Circumstances of exit

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953–61)

Sherman Adams, assistant to 54 Governor of New Vicuña scandal*
the president (1953–58) Hampshire (1949–53)
John F. Kennedy (1961–63)
Ted Sorensen, special counsel 33 Aide to Senator John F. Death of President Kennedy
(1961–63) Kennedy (1953–61)
Richard M. Nixon (1969–74)
H. R. Haldeman, chief of staff 43 Campaign manager (1962, 1968) Watergate scandal**
(1969–73)
Jimmy Carter (1977–81)
Hamilton Jordan, chief adviser 33 Campaign manager (1970, 1976) Carter’s defeat in 1980
(1977–79), chief of staff (1979–80)
Ronald Reagan (1981–88)
James A. Baker, chief of staff 50 Campaign manager: Ford (1976), Became secretary of treasury
(1981–85) George H. W. Bush (1980)
Edwin Meese III, counselor to 49 Governor Reagan’s chief of staff Became attorney general
the president (1981–85) (1969–74)
Michael Deaver, deputy chief 43 Governor Reagan’s deputy chief Resigned
of staff (1981–85) of staff (1969–74)
George H. W. Bush (1989–93)
John H. Sununu, chief of staff 49 Governor of New Hampshire Air Sununu scandal***
(1989–91) (1983–89)
Bill Clinton (1993–2001)
Thomas F. “Mack” McLarty III, 47 CEO of Arkla, Inc. (1985–93) Became counselor to President
chief of staff (1993–94) Clinton for trade issues
George W. Bush (2001–09)
Andrew Card, chief of staff 54 Secretary of transportation Resigned
(2001–06) (1992–93)
Karl Rove, senior adviser 50 Campaign consultant for Bush Resigned
(2001–07) (1994, 1998, 2000, 2004)
Karen Hughes, counselor to the 45 Governor Bush’s director of Became under secretary of
president (2001–02) communications (1995–2000) state for public diplomacy
(2005)
* Adams was pressured to resign after reports surfaced that he had accepted an expensive vicuña overcoat and
other favors from a Boston textile manufacturer being investigated for Federal Trade Commission violations.
** On January 1, 1975, Haldeman was convicted of conspiracy and obstruction of justice and sentenced to an
eighteen-month prison sentence for his role in the Watergate scandal.
*** S
 ununu resigned after reports revealed that he had used military aircraft for personal trips costing upward
of $615,000.

What Do We Do Now? • 27
 who interpreted their responsibilities largely in managerial terms—
have tended to serve their presidents least well. They made enemies
faster and said “no” more often. In the case of Regan, he made ene-
mies—he clashed frequently with First Lady Nancy Reagan, who, he
wrote in his memoirs, used her personal astrologer to help schedule
the president’s speaking engagements—but still was not able to keep
President Reagan from being implicated in the arms for hostages swap
with Iran.
So what background offers the greatest possibility for success?
Howard Baker was unique in that he was pressed into service, in 1987,
to add his own prestige as the former Senate majority leader to the bat-
tered Reagan presidency in the wake of the Iran-Contra scandal. Other
PIPs had briefer service as House members, as in the case of Sherman
Adams (Eisenhower), Donald Rumsfeld (Ford), and Leon Panetta
(Clinton), or as congressional staffers, as with Ted Sorensen (Kenne-
dy), Walter Jenkins (Lyndon Johnson), and Kenneth Duberstein
(Reagan).
An understanding of the legislature is helpful—but ignorance of
Congress is fatal.

28  • What Do We Do Now?

Worksheet

Four Questions for Your PIP

Before settling on a PIP, you may wish to ask your top candidates the follow-
ing questions:

1. Are you capable of firing my closest friend because I can’t look him in
the eyes?
❏ Yes  ❏ Not sure

2. When on “Meet the Press,” will you enthusiastically support a policy of

mine that I know you detest?
❏ Yes  ❏ Not sure

3. Can you take the blame for “forgetting” to invite a major contributor to
the state dinner for the Queen of England?
❏ Yes  ❏ Not sure

4. Will you set an example for the White House staff by working longer
hours and seeing less of your family?
❏ Yes  ❏ Not sure

If the answer to each of these questions is yes, you may have found yourself
the perfect PIP.

As you are about to be surrounded by strangers, supplicants, and syco-

phants, you may be tempted to turn to a familiar face, a trusted friend, to
fill the role of your PIP. Try to resist. The record is not promising—as the sad
experience of President Bill Clinton and his best friend, Chief of Staff
Thomas “Mack” McLarty, illustrates vividly.

What Do We Do Now? • 29
 Case in Point: Bill and Mack

They were together in Miss Mary’s kindergar- before the inauguration. Clinton’s party had
ten class in Hope, Arkansas. Mack was two lost the last three presidential elections, so
months older than Bill. Mack’s family stayed in there were few Democrats knowledgeable in
Hope, Bill’s family moved to Hot Springs. They White House management waiting to be hired.
stayed in touch. When Bill successfully ran for And because dark-horse candidates for presi-
governor in 1978, Mack was his treasurer. Mack dential nominations like Clinton do not get the
was successful in his own right: first as a mem- pick of experienced campaign workers, the
ber of the Arkansas legislature and later as staff McLarty was to lead seemed destined to
chairman and chief executive officer of Arkla, be filled with young enthusiasts.
a Fortune 500 natural gas company. Nor do new presidents quickly change
So when Bill Clinton was elected president their ways. Possibly the worst place for presi-
of the United States he asked Mack McLarty, dential job training is a small one-party state
his “loyal friend of more than forty years,” to where it is possible for a smart and energetic
become his chief of staff. As Clinton recalled chief executive to know everyone and every-
in his memoirs, “It was an unusual choice be- thing, be everywhere, and succeed. When
cause . . . he was hardly a Washington insider, transferred to Washington, Clinton continued
a fact that concerned him. He told me he to run late and hold meetings that were seem-
would prefer another job more suited to his ingly unending.
business background. Nevertheless, I pressed McLarty found the pace at the White
Mack to accept the position.” House to be different from what he had mas-
Mack’s problems in running a tight ship at tered in the private sector: many more issues,
the White House might have been obvious many more decisions, coming at him faster, in
from the beginning. His appointment was not a less deliberate process. But the Washington
announced until December 12, and it took more scene and relations with journalists did not
than a month for Clinton to fill the other White rattle him as they had the Georgians who ar-
House positions: the slowest start in transition rived with Carter. His collegial demeanor
history. There would be no staff learning time earned him the nickname “Mack the Nice.”

30  • What Do We Do Now?

 The president had an exceptionally painful Staff work and decision memoranda to the
first year: gays in the military, successive nom- president would henceforth go through him.
inations of attorneys general, a deadly raid on He took control of staff payroll and hiring. The
the Branch Davidian cult in Waco, Texas, a size of senior staff meetings was cut from
scandal over the firing of White House Travel thirty to ten, and direct staff access to the
Office employees. Could McLarty have eased Oval Office went from ten to two. Perhaps
the president’s burdens? Clinton apparently Panetta could not have created this order if he
thought so. His memoir suggests that his had been Clinton’s first chief of staff rather
problems resulted in part from the two of than his second.
them (“he and I”) suffering “from some of our McLarty, however, did not go home. He
tone deafness about Washington’s political stayed at the White House for five years after
and press culture.” exiting the chief of staff’s suite, moving to a
But Robert Reich, from his observation post West Wing ground floor office from which he
in Clinton’s cabinet as secretary of labor, chose to helped his presidential friend secure interna-
identify causes beyond a lack of Washington tional financing for peacekeeping operations
experience. “Poor Mack,” Reich wrote in Locked in Bosnia, win congressional approval of
in the Cabinet (Vintage, 1997), a memoir of his the North American Free Trade Agreement
four years in the Clinton administration, “has (NAFTA), structure the 1995 Mexican peso
been unable to impose discipline on a chroni- stabilization program, and organize two hemi-
cally undisciplined president and a chaotic spheric summit meetings as Clinton’s “special
White House staff.” envoy to the Americas.” Many Latin American
On June 28, 1993, seventeen months into countries awarded him their highest civilian
his term, Clinton replaced McLarty as chief of honors. Since 1999 he has been president of
staff with Leon Panetta, his director of the McLarty Associates (formerly Kissinger Mc-
Office of Management and Budget, who had Larty Associates), an international strategic
had a long career in Congress. Panetta imme- advisory and advocacy firm.
diately tightened White House operations.

What Do We Do Now? • 31
 Picking Your Press Secretary
It would be useful if your press secretary had great briefing skills:
an ability to explain your policies with brevity and accuracy, to deflect
difficult questions without rancor, and to cut tension with good humor
or a quip. It would also be useful if reporters considered your press
secretary to be a fun sort of person—if only because they will have to
spend so much time together and because nothing is gained by a hos-
tile workplace.
It would be useful, but not sufficient.
Pierre Salinger, President Kennedy’s press secretary, had all these
skills. He was a good fellow, but the White House press corps at the
time did not hold him in the highest regard. Why? Because he lacked
what reporters consider the one essential: membership in the presi-
dent’s inner circle. When important de-
cisions were being debated in the White
House about the Bay of Pigs invasion,
Salinger’s name was not on the mani-
fest. The opposite was true of President
Carter’s press secretary, Jody Powell.
Powell was far from a personal favorite
of the Washington press corps, yet he
was valued for his closeness to Carter.
News organizations spend a lot of
money to cover you, yet White House
reporters will have limited opportuni-
ties to ask you questions directly (un-
less you are very different from those
who came before you). Because of this,
reporters need to feel the information
they get from your press secretary is
bankable.
So, what career path produces the
“I have a brief statement, a clarification,
and two denials.” perfect press secretary—journalism or
Cartoon by Peter Steiner, ©The New Yorker political communications? Ideally, your

32  • What Do We Do Now?

press secretary will have a background in both fields. This was the case
with President Eisenhower’s press secretary, James Hagerty, who in-
vented the modern White House Press Office. Hagerty had been a re-
porter for the New York Times before becoming press secretary to New
York Governor Thomas Dewey and, later, the spokesman for Ike’s 1952
presidential campaign.

Rating Press Secretaries

The first presidential assistant whose sole responsibility was press relations—hence the
first press secretary—was George Akerson, who served (not very successfully) from 1929
to 1931 under Herbert Hoover. Through the George W. Bush presidency, twenty-seven men
and two women have held the job. Here are my picks for the top three:

1. James C. Hagerty (Eisenhower, 1953–61)

Jim Hagerty earns my top rating if only for a month of briefings in the fall of 1955. On
September 23, while vacationing in Denver, Eisenhower had a serious heart attack. For
three weeks Hagerty held five briefings a day, releasing such intimate details as the num-
ber of bowel movements recorded on the president’s medical chart. The illnesses of previ-
ous presidents, most notably Woodrow Wilson, had been shrouded in mystery and lies.
Hagerty’s full frankness policy (obviously with Eisenhower’s support) reversed the way the
White House now responds to presidential illnesses.

2. Marlin Fitzwater (Reagan, 1987–89; George H. W. Bush, 1989–93)

Except for short carryover periods during unexpected changes in presidential administra-
tions, press secretaries serve one president. What elevates the genial Marlin Fitzwater to
the top of the pantheon of press secretaries is that he was so skillful in representing two
presidents of such different personalities, abilities, and needs.

3. Mike McCurry (Clinton, 1994–98)

Measure the degree of a president’s hostility to the press, measure the degree of the press
corps’ suspicion of a president’s truthfulness, then put a press secretary in the crosshairs
where they meet and you describe Mike McCurry at the White House during the Monica
Lewinsky scandal. I doubt any press secretary could have done a better job of trying to
direct reporters to everything else in the nation and the world that the Clinton presidency
was engaged in.

What Do We Do Now? • 33
 But if your press secretary doesn’t have experience in both careers, the
record suggests a background as a political communicator is the better fit.
The estimable James Brady came to the Reagan press operation after
having handled press relations for the OMB in the Ford administration
and having been chief spokesman for a defense secretary and a senator.
The fundamental duality of the
White House job is less wearing on
Press Secretaries on the political communicator. As
Press Secretaries Hagerty told reporters, “I’m here to
help you get the news. I am also
Joe Lockhart (Clinton, 1997–2000) here to work for one man, who hap-
If you had asked me before I was going out to my pens to be the President. And I will
daily briefing—if you’d given me the choice [of]
do that to the best of my ability.”
five minutes with the president or . . . five minutes
Press secretaries who come to
with John Podesta, the chief of staff, most days I’d
take it with the chief of staff. Because in the struc- the White House with a journal-
ture of the White House that I worked in, that was ism-only background seem more
where all roads led to. I could, in three or four min- conflicted. Jerald terHorst, who
utes, find out what was going on throughout the left the Washington bureau of the
government—all the things that were likely. Where- Detroit News to become President
as half of these decisions hadn’t made it to the Ford’s first press secretary, lasted
president’s desk yet.
only thirty days, resigning when he
Ron Nessen (Ford, 1974–77) could not support Ford’s decision
People in the White House never trust the press to pardon former President Nixon.
secretary. It’s one of the reasons why the single TerHorst was an honorable man
most important quality for a good press secretary who made a conscientious deci-
is access. To get the information firsthand, so you
sion—but it was not a decision that
don’t have to ask somebody how should I answer
this question. That is the most important quality.
was helpful to President Ford.
And I think there’s this sense among other White The usual habit is to elevate
House staff people, “Gee, if we don’t tell the press the campaign spokesman. In
secretary, he won’t accidentally blurt it out when some recent cases, unfortunately,
we don’t want anybody to know about it, or not this has not produced complete
right now, anyway.” satisfaction.
Source: Stephen Hess and Marvin Kalb, editors, The Media
and the War on Terrorism (Brookings, 2003).

34  • What Do We Do Now?

Lesson to Apply to Your Transition
☞Ask candidates for press secretary to repeat after you this “oath” of office:
“ I, ___________ , am here to work for the President and it is my job to
explain my president’s position—whatever it is—to the best of my ability.”

Messages
There is nothing you can do during your transition that will not be
interpreted and reinterpreted by careful—and careless—observers.
You can limit confusion by making your announcements as explicit as
possible, or by running them in sequences (what’s first, what’s sec-
ond?), or by bundling (what messages go together?). Unfortunately,
most presidents-in-transition simply announce their intentions as
they make up their minds and thus fail to take advantage of the early
opportunities. If you don’t tell us what you mean, others will.

Action Reaction

Eisenhower puts the UN ambassador in the cabinet. Is this a policy change or simply payback to Lodge?
Kennedy retains Hoover as FBI director and Keep watching “the hidden hand” of old
Allen Dulles at the CIA. Joe Kennedy.
Nixon appoints Harvard professors Kissinger Maybe Herblock’s right and a “new Nixon”
and Moynihan to his White House staff. deserves a “free shave.”
Seven of Carter’s top eight White House aides Maybe he doesn’t trust anybody else.
are from Georgia.
James Baker becomes Reagan’s chief of staff. Did you know Reagan is that cunning?
What does this mean for Meese?
Bush retains three of Reagan’s cabinet. Count on bloodletting between the holdovers
and the Bush people who want in.
Clinton assigns health care to Hillary. “Buy one; get one free.”
Cheney is the voice of the transition. Who’s in change over there, anyway?

Lessons to Apply to Your Transition

☞Decide on the impression you want to make with these early announcements.
☞Take advantage of the size of your initial audience; everyone’s listening now.
☞When do you prefer to have others deliver the message?
☞Whom do you want to speak for you?
What Do We Do Now? • 35
 Presidents and Their Initial Press Secretaries
Age Campaign experience

President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953–61)

James C. Hagerty (1953–61) 44 Eisenhower presidential campaign
(1952)
President John F. Kennedy (1961–63)
Pierre Salinger (1961–63) 36 Kennedy presidential campaign
(1960)

President Richard M. Nixon (1969–74)
Ron Ziegler (1969–74) 29 Nixon presidential campaign (1964),
Nixon gubernatorial campaign (1962)
President Jimmy Carter (1977–81)
Jody Powell (1977–81) 34 Carter presidential campaign (1976)

President Ronald Reagan (1981–88)
James Brady (1981–87) 41 Reagan presidential campaign (1980)

Larry Speakes (1981–87)* 42 Reagan presidential campaign (1980)

President George H. W. Bush (1989–93)
Marlin Fitzwater (1989–93) 47 Bush presidential campaign (1988)

President Bill Clinton (1993–2001)
Dee Dee Myers (1993–94) 32 Presidential campaigns of Michael
Dukakis (1988) and Bill Clinton (1992)
George Stephanopoulos (1993)** 32 Presidential campaigns of Michael
Dukakis (1988) and Bill Clinton (1992)
George W. Bush (2001–09)
Ari Fleischer (2000–03) 40 Presidential campaigns of George
H. W. Bush (1992) and George W.
Bush (2000)
* Brady was unable to return to work after being shot during the assassination attempt
on President Reagan on March 30, 1981. Although Brady retained the title of Press
Secretary, Larry Speakes performed those duties as Acting Press Secretary.
** Dee Dee Myers was the official Press Secretary. However, communications director
George Stephanopoulos gave the press briefings during the first six months of the
Clinton administration.

36  • What Do We Do Now?

 Journalism experience Government experience

Reporter, New York Times (1934–42) Press secretary for New York Governor
Thomas E. Dewey (1943–52)

Reporter, San Francisco Chronicle and Investigator with Robert Kennedy on the
contributing editor, Collier’s (1940s and Senate anti-racketeering committee
1950s) (1957–59)

None None

None Press secretary for Georgia Governor

Jimmy Carter

None Press secretary for various government

departments (1973–77)
Journalist/editor for various Mississippi Press secretary for Presidents Nixon and
newspapers (1961–68) Ford (1974–77)

Journalist for various Kansas newspapers Press secretary for Vice President Bush
(1961–65) (1985–87), President Reagan (1987–89)

None None

None Aide to Representative Richard

Gephardt (1988–92)

None Press secretary for various Republicans

(1982–94)

What Do We Do Now? • 37
 Picking Your Congressional Lobbyist
No job on your staff will have as large a pool of talented people to choose
from. Draw a circle with a ten-mile radius from the White House, and
you will capture dozens—if not hundreds—of members of your party
who have vast experience as former members of Congress or as current
or former congressional staffers. Most will take a substantial cut in pay to
become your chief lobbyist. Why? Because the job is important, it is fun
for the right kind of person, it is highly visible in their world of political
advocacy—and it is only deferred income anyway.
What is amazing is that one president-elect could get this pick so
wrong. Jimmy Carter chose a man without any Capitol Hill experi-
ence, whose lobbying history was limited to the Georgia legislature.
Warned away from this selection during the transition, Carter ada-
mantly replied, “Frank Moore is my man.”
Within a month of taking office, Carter had proposed eliminating or
reducing federal funds for eighteen water projects in sixteen states. To
the legislators who had not been consulted, these were not wasteful
pork-barrel projects. The Senate promptly passed an amendment re-
quiring that the projects be built. This was Carter’s “first decision,” re-
called budget director Bert Lance in his memoirs The Truth of the Matter
(Summit Books, 1991), and it “alienated about as many members of Con-
gress that you can possibly do.” Carter’s policy agenda created a serious
legislative overload, with too many proposals going too quickly to the
same committees at the same time. Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill
concluded that Moore “didn’t know beans about Congress.”
Now consider an earlier presidential transition aided by a man
whose career had included managing congressional relations for two
presidents: Bryce N. Harlow, who in November 1968 was working at
New York City’s Hotel Pierre, headquarters for President-elect Nixon:
I’m there in this room, phones ringing, jumping off the wall. Suddenly
over runs a secretary, “Mr. Harlow, President Johnson’s calling.” I cut
off who I was talking to and I said, “Yes, Mr. President . . . yuppity yup,
yes, sir. . . .” And over runs the secretary. I put my hand over the receiver.
“President Eisenhower is calling.” “Tell him I’m talking to the President

38  • What Do We Do Now?

 Margins Matter
Statistically speaking, Frank Moore’s job as chambers. Only the three Democratic pres-
President Jimmy Carter’s chief congressio- idents-elect—Kennedy, Carter, and Clinton—
nal lobbyist should not have been as diffi- came into office with a majority in Senate
cult as it later became when presidents and House. In 2001 Gorge W. Bush had an
faced closely divided Congresses. The Dem- evenly split Senate—and hence the vice
ocrats in Carter’s first Congress held signifi- president could cast a deciding vote.
cant margins over the Republicans in both

Senate House

President and Congress Democrats Republicans Democrats Republicans

John F. Kennedy
87th Congress (1961–63) 64 (+28) 36 262 (+87) 175
Richard M. Nixon
91st Congress (1969–71) 58 (+16) 42 243 (+51) 192
Jimmy Carter
95th Congress (1977–79) 61 (+23) 38 292 (+149) 143
Ronald Reagan
97th Congress (1981–83) 46 53 (+7) 242 (+50) 192
George H. W. Bush
101st Congress (1989–91) 55 (+10) 45 260 (+85) 175
Bill Clinton
103rd Congress (1993–95) 57 (+14) 43 258 (+82) 176
George W. Bush
107th Congress (2001–03) 50 50 212 221 (+9)

and I’ll call him right back, or if he prefers, we’ll put him on hold.” Be-
lieve me, we put President Eisenhower on hold. Now I’ve got the Presi-
dent [on the line], got the former President waiting. In runs [Nixon aide]
Larry Higby, and he says, ‘’Mr. Harlow, Mr. Harlow,” very imperiously,
“The President-elect wants you in his office immediately.”

The story of a man whose counsel was demanded simultaneously by

a former president, the current president, and the future president may

What Do We Do Now? • 39
 suggest an extraordinary ego. But Harlow was a small, unassuming man
who spoke almost in whispers and gladly let others take credit. His ré-
sumé: after graduating from the University of Oklahoma, Harlow went
to Washington and became an assistant to his member of Congress. He
rose to chief clerk of the House Armed Services Committee and was the
Pentagon’s liaison officer to Congress during World War II. He was the
chief lobbyist for Presidents Eisenhower and Nixon and, between these
periods of White House service, directed the governmental relations of-
fice of Proctor & Gamble. In other words, Harlow was a man who had
worked long and hard to take the measure of government.
What made Harlow such an effective bridge between the execu-
tive and legislative branches was his skill as a negotiator. As the

Bryce Harlow—In His Own Words

The White House is the universe of American politics. It’s where everything comes to-
gether and therefore should be the most universal place in the whole operation of the
government. Oddly, it becomes the most parochial place because of the way the White
House functions and because of the steel fences around the White House manned by
police to keep people out. . . .
It’s rather axiomatic in this work [White House lobbying] that a president cannot have
too many congressional issues that are “presidential” at one time. Otherwise none of
them are presidential, and all of them suffer. My rule of thumb is that a president should
not have more than about five really presidential issues working at a time. There’s no way
to get the members of Congress to react to them as all presidential. Fewer if possible is
better. . . .
All of us who have been around the process very long realize that politics is not a
hobby, it’s a business. The bottom line is not profit and loss, it’s votes. A congressman’s
profit is more votes than a competitor can get. That puts him in the black. So whatever
contributes to his getting a profit in the next election instead of a deficit, which is fatal, is
a motivator for him. A lot of people sneer at this and say it creates only weathervane,
thoughtless robots, but that’s the way our system is. The members of the Congress are
supposed to reflect the will of the people of the United States. So they do that.
Source: Bryce Harlow interview with the author, 1976.

40  • What Do We Do Now?

go-between, he had an uncanny knack for discerning what was most
crucial to each player. He knew when a legislator could afford to give
in and when the legislator would have to stand firm. He understood
the trick was to make sure, if possible, that everyone would be able to
claim some victory. Moreover, he was eminently practical: his job
was to solve problems for the president—not to turn legislative pro-
posals into moral imperatives.
In seeking a Harlow type—and they’re still around—you should
make sure that they report each side accurately to the other, that they
do not promise what they cannot deliver, that they do not make cutting
comments in drawing rooms for recirculation in gossip columns and
blogs, and that they do not call opponents’ motives into question.

Lessons to Apply to Your Transition

☞Make sure you know that the person who will represent you has the trust
of the congressional leadership of both parties.
☞Require a “recusal” commitment: no contact with former clients on mat-
ters before Congress.
☞Require a four-year commitment to discourage in-and-out opportunists.

Picking Your Speechwriters

No president had a White House speechwriting shop as oddly con-
structed as Richard Nixon’s. Its three senior writers were about as
far apart in background and ideology as it is possible to get: Raymond
Price (liberal, WASP), Patrick Buchanan (conservative, Catholic), and
William Safire (centrist, Jew). According to Safire, “When Nixon want-
ed to take a shot at somebody, he turned to Buchanan. . . . When
Nixon wanted a vision of the nation’s future, he turned to Price.”
Safire himself contributed “a touch of humor.” Nixon did not want
them to work together as a committee. The moral of the story is,
I guess, that a president can have any type of staff that he feels serves
his purpose.

What Do We Do Now? • 41
 Pick a Presidential Portrait

George Washington by Charles Willson Peale (1741–1827)

Hung in the Oval Office during the presidencies of Richard Nixon,
Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan.

42  • What Do We Do Now?

 Where you look for a speechwriter also defies a simple answer.
Among those who did heavy work for Franklin Roosevelt, Raymond
Moley was a professor at Columbia University, Samuel Rosenman left
his seat on the New York Supreme Court to join the White House staff
(not as a lawyer, but as the speechwriter), Robert Sherwood was a
playwright who won four Pulitzer Prizes, Archibald MacLeish was a
poet who won three Pulitzers, and Charles Michelson was the public-
ity chief at the Democratic National Committee. Good speechwriters
are merely people who are good at putting words—in speech form—in
other people’s mouths.
Since you already have speechwriters—presidential candidates
have to have them, as well as those who hold the jobs that lead to the
presidency—your basic question is probably not where to find them
but what you do with them in the White House. The argument among
scholars revolves around whether to put them in their own box (and
direct them to stay in it) or distribute them among policymaking of-
fices, as they were in an earlier time.
The problem is that presidents now make so many more speeches.
Robert Schlesinger, in White House Ghosts: Presidents and Their
Speechwriters (Simon & Schuster, 2008), notes that Herbert Hoover
averaged eight public appearances a month, Kennedy nearly nineteen,
and Clinton more than twenty-eight. Your speechwriters will have to
be tightly organized to meet this demand. At the same time, you should
seek ways to take advantage of the talents they could bring to creating
your policies, not just to explaining them.

Ghost Stories
In these days, when speechwriters are often better known than the
people for whom they write speeches, it is hard to recall that they were
once known as “ghosts.” One of Franklin Roosevelt’s writers—Charles
Michelson—even called his memoirs The Ghost Talks (G. P. Putnam’s
Sons, 1944).

What Do We Do Now? • 43
 Gloomdoggle
My first words for Dwight D. Eisenhower were spoken on September
26, 1958, at the bicentennial celebration of Fort Ligonier, in Pennsyl-
vania, which had just been restored: “Today we see it much as it must
have appeared to young Colonel Washington two hundred years ago.”
I had been hired at age twenty-five to assist my college mentor, Mal-
colm Moos, in working primarily on the president’s campaign speech-
es in what was to be a disastrous midterm congressional election.
The country was in the midst of a deep recession, and my instruc-
tions were to keep calling the Democrats “prophets of gloom and
doom,” a phrase I truly detested by the end of October.
The president’s last campaign speech was to be in Baltimore on Oc-
tober 31, and we were meeting in Dr. Moos’s East Wing office to review
my draft. The “we” was a team of staff lawyers there to nix anything
that could not be sworn to in court. This would be a problem—for I had
made up a word to replace “gloom and doom”: gloomdoggle. If boon-
doggle means “create unneeded work,” then surely gloomdoggle could
mean “create unneeded gloom.” The lawyers hated my invention. But
Mac Moos’s wife, Tracey, an effervescent lady, suddenly burst into the
room, spread enthusiasm for keeping my word in the draft, and won
the day. The president loved his new word—as he often did with the
colorful phrases we sneaked past the vetters. (He had once been a
speechwriter himself.)
So we trooped off to Baltimore to hear the president. When the
cheering stopped and we left the Fifth Regiment Armory, newsboys
were hawking the bulldog edition of the next day’s Baltimore Sun.
Across an eight-column front page, in all caps and the boldest, blackest,
largest type short of declaring war, ran the headline:
IKE CALLS DEMOCRATS “GLOOMDOGGLERS”
IN SPEECH HERE CLOSING THE CAMPAIGN

The page—framed, of course—is the only bit of political memora-

bilia that I keep in my office.

44  • What Do We Do Now?

Dinner with Ike
If ever there was a case of divine intervention on behalf of the harried
speechwriter, it occurred just before a “Dinner with Ike” for 7,000 in
Los Angeles on January 27, 1960. The speech of that evening was a big
deal: eighty-three dinners around the country designed to raise $5
million were connected by closed-circuit TV, with Richard Nixon in
Chicago, Nelson Rockefeller in Washington, Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. in
Pittsburgh, and the president accepting the tributes in Los Angeles.
And the piece of paper in my typewriter was absolutely blank.
But in my in-box appeared a letter:

My dear Mr. President,

I have just turned 21 years of age. I am now old enough

to vote and mature enough to take part in political
elections. My problem is, which party am I best suited to
serve? I thought you would be able to help me by telling
me what the Republican Party stands for.

What are its goals and in what way may I help it to

achieve them?

Shirley Jean Havens

Arvada, Colorado

Here’s the divine intervention part: I had nothing to do with presi-

dential correspondence. The correspondence section at the White
House had never before forwarded a letter addressed to the president
to me (nor would it ever do so again).
So the president would tell Shirley Jean why she should be a Re-
publican. The president loved the idea, picked up the phone, and asked
Aksel Nielson, a Denver banker who was a good friend, to go to Arvada
and give him a report on Shirley Jean. (Maybe she was a communist or
a drug dealer.) The report came back that Shirley Jean was polite,
pretty, a mother of two, and the wife of a plumber. Equally nice: she
had written the same letter to Harry Truman and had received a gruff

What Do We Do Now? • 45
 reply to go read a book. Shirley Jean was then invited to the “Dinner
with Ike” in Denver so that she could witness (along with Time and
Life) the president’s reply to her letter.
After that, she kept writing the president—but of course that wasn’t
my department.

Get Me Rewrite!
For the speechwriters, the State of the Union Address, delivered by the
president before a joint session of Congress in January, is a massive
exercise in finding some grid to link all the recommended commit-
ments of the departments of the federal government in a proposed
flight plan for the next year. The speech usually goes through thirteen
or more drafts. (A draft gets a new number every time the president
makes changes.)
That isn’t always the case, however, as I can attest. Unbeknown
to everyone including President Eisenhower, his address sent to Con-
gress on January 12, 1961, had a simpler history—in terms of drafts. It
began the previous spring, when I was told to write a first draft of the
1960 National Republican Platform. The White House understood
that the platform ultimately would be the product of the presidential
candidate (Richard Nixon) and the party’s platform committee. But
the White House staff wanted to start the process in a way that en-
sured Ike’s accomplishments would not be overlooked.
The platform went through buffeting changes culminating in the
so-called Treaty of Fifth Avenue, when Nixon met Nelson Rockefeller
in New York and dictated paragraphs to those of us on the other end of
the call at the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago. Nothing was left of my
original draft.
Now fast-forward to the end of the Eisenhower administration. The
president wanted to give a televised farewell address, now famous for
its “military-industrial complex” reference, which he wrote with the
aid of Mac Moos and navy captain Ralph Williams. I was assigned to
write the State of the Union to be sent to Congress, not read to the Con-
gress by the president. The speech began: “Once again it is my Consti-
tutional duty to assess the state of the Union. On each such previous

46  • What Do We Do Now?

 Speechwriter Match Game
Following are five familiar lines spoken by presidents and a list of speechwriters to whom
these phrases have been attributed. Match the phrases with the speechwriters. The correct
answers are on page 48.

___ R
 obert T. Hartmann A.  “Congress will push me to raise taxes, and I’ll say no,
(Gerald Ford) and they’ll push, and I’ll say no, and they’ll push again.
___ D
 avid Frum and And I’ll say to them: Read my lips. No new taxes.”
Matthew Scully B. “My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is
(George W. Bush) over.”
___ P
 eggy Noonan C.  “In the councils of government, we must guard against
(George H. W. Bush) the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether
___ T
 ed Sorensen sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.”
(John F. Kennedy)
D.  “Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what
___ M
 alcolm Moos and you can do for your country.”
Ralph Williams
E.  “States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an
(Dwight Eisenhower).
axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world.”

occasion during the past eight years I have outlined a forward course
designed to achieve our mutual objective—a better America in a world
of peace. This time my function is different.” He would review the re-
cord of those past eight years in the hope that, out of the sum of those
experiences, lessons useful to the nation would emerge. The rest of
President Eisenhower’s 1961 State of the Union Address is the first
draft of the 1960 Republican Platform that I wrote the previous spring.
It made no sense to waste good material.

Calibrating Conflict
The practice of rubbing two advisers together to create sparks was per-
fected by Franklin D. Roosevelt. Not that you need to worry about not
having enough conflict in your administration. There are built-in con-
flicts: for example, between the State Department (peace) and Defense

What Do We Do Now? • 47
 Answers:
A. “No new taxes” comes from the title of a the “military-industrial-scientific complex,”
Tim Curry album. Peggy Noonan incorpo- but science adviser James Killian, the
rated the phrase into George H. W. Bush’s president of MIT, asked for the deletion.
acceptance speech at the 1988 Republi- D. “Ask not what your country can do for
can National Convention. In 1990, how- you,” from President John Kennedy’s in-
ever, President Bush compromised with augural address, was the hallmark of
Congress and agreed to a tax increase. speechwriter Ted Sorensen’s famous
B. “Our long national nightmare is over” was contrapuntal style. William Safire in his
written by Robert T. Hartmann for Presi- new edition of Safire’s Political Dictionary
dent Gerald Ford’s first address to the na- (2008) writes that the “ask not” line may
tion after President Richard Nixon left of- have been modeled on a phrase in an
fice in 1974. “Isn’t that a little hard on 1884 Memorial Day address delivered by
Dick?” wondered Ford, as quoted by Oliver Wendell Holmes.
Hartmann in his book Palace Politics E. The “axis of evil,” according to President
(1980), who threatened to resign if the George W. Bush in his January 29, 2002,
line was cut. “Junk all the rest of the State of the Union Address, was Iraq, Iran,
speech,” he remembers saying, “but not and North Korea. Speechwriter Matthew
that. That is going to be the headline in Scully, writing in the Atlantic (September
every paper, the lead in every story.” 2007), claims that the line from speech-
C. “The military-industrial complex” was in writer David Frum was “axis of hatred,”
President Dwight Eisenhower’s farewell and Scully changed “hatred” to “evil.” Mi-
radio and television address of January 17, chael Gerson and John McConnell were
1961. In an early draft, speechwriters Mal- the other speechwriters working on the
colm Moos and Ralph Williams warned of draft.

Department (war), which is why State often pushes for military options
and Defense often resists the use of force. And there are always personal-
ity clashes that go beyond policy: Reagan’s secretary of state, George
Shultz, and secretary of defense, Caspar Weinberger, were not fond of
each other. (See the “Why Can’t We All Just Get Along” section in this
chapter for an example of their testy exchanges.)
The advantage of so-called multiple advocacy as a management
technique is the expectation that all points of view will be fully

48  • What Do We Do Now?

 Pick a Presidential Portrait

George Washington by Rembrandt Peale (1741–1827)

Hung in the Oval Office during the presidencies of George H. W. Bush,
Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush.

What Do We Do Now? • 49
 Case in Point: Moynihan vs. Burns

Rarely has multiple advocacy been as clearly over the Family Assistance Plan, a welfare
set in motion as when President-elect Nixon proposal that Moynihan was pushing—Burns
appointed two Ivy League professors to the opposing—to guarantee income for poor fam-
White House staff as his senior advisers on do- ilies with children.
mestic policy. A stranger to Nixon, Daniel Pat- Nixon was frustrated that their long-drawn-
rick Moynihan of Harvard was a liberal whose out debate was forcing him to wait until Au-
only intellectual connection to the president gust to announce a domestic agenda, well
may have been that he had recently written beyond the Hundred Days that presidents like
scathing criticism of some parts of Lyndon to set for themselves. John Ehrlichman, the
Johnson’s Great Society poverty program. president’s counsel, noted that Nixon “soon
Arthur Burns of Columbia was a conservative, began dreading his appointments with the
a friend, and a sturdy ally of Nixon’s during antagonists. He was never one to enjoy being
the Eisenhower years when he was chairman pulled and hauled upon by special pleaders,
of the Council of Economic Advisers. Burns and Burns and Moynihan were experts.” In the
and Moynihan were strong-willed, articulate, end, Nixon’s proposal to Congress was light
and experienced in high-level government years removed from anything he had prom-
combat, and for the first seven months of ised in his campaign.
the new presidency they involved the entire Had Nixon’s transition decisions backed
upper reaches of the administration in a war him into this corner? He recalls in his memoirs

explained and challenged. This is a worthy aim. While scholars love it,
presidents are not as sure that it always serves their purposes. No
White House argument stays behind closed doors for long; staff con-
flicts usually lead to leaks to reporters, which, in turn, can create the
impression of an indecisive president. Moreover, dueling arguments
for Policy A or Policy B can produce a split-the-difference compromise
that lacks the rigor of either A or B.
As Nixon was about to take office in 1969, his speechwriter Ray Price
sent him a memo: “For a third of a century, the fashionable critics have
been measuring progress according to the standards established by
Roosevelt in his first 100 days. If we’re going to change the pattern of
government, we’ve got to change the standards of measurement.” Nice

50  • What Do We Do Now?

that Burns’s conservatism was meant to be a term appointment that would not be available
“counterweight to Moynihan’s liberalism.” Per- until January 1970. What to do with him in
haps. This was written ten years later, and, as the meantime? The answer was to give him
with all memoirs, was part of the process of cabinet rank, a grand title, and modest duties.
tidying history. My own view—I was deputy to (Initially he was to oversee citizen task forces
Moynihan and knew Nixon well from previous that had been set up during the transition.)
work—was that there was nothing Hegelian in Moynihan was a player in Nixon’s desire
Nixon’s nature or in his management practic- to lure a prominent Democrat into his ad-
es up to that time. He tended to place aides in ministration. Always a partisan figure, Nixon
distinct boxes on a chart. Moreover, domestic had won an extremely close election. He had
matters were low priority to a future president asked Senator Henry Jackson to be secretary
dreaming of a breakthrough with Communist of defense and was turned down. Moynihan
China and ending the war in Vietnam. Choos- became a prize of considerable worth and
ing Burns and Moynihan was important to was even promised a cabinet-level council
Nixon for very different reasons unrelated to somewhat analogous to the National Security
how the professors would interact and affect Council.
policy. Nixon solved two personnel problems. But
Burns was penciled in to be the next chair- I doubt he ever reflected on the price he paid
man of the Federal Reserve System. It was a for his inattention to process.

try. But on every Day One Hundred of every new presidency, every pres-
idential scholar in the country will be called by a reporter for his or her
assessment of the president’s failures.
In this case, multiple advocacy can be the enemy of the demands
for prompt action, as Nixon was to find out in a clash between Daniel
Patrick Moynihan and Arthur Burns.

Lessons to Apply to Your Transition

When thinking about how much conflict you wish to deliberately build into
your staff structure, remember this:
☞You can discourage conflict by giving more narrowly drawn titles and duties.
☞Overlapping jurisdictions encourage conflict (see the case in point).

What Do We Do Now? • 51
 Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?
Every presidency must make its way around many fault lines—some
divisions are constitutionally built into the system, some are institu-
tionally arranged within the executive branch, some are promoted by
competing outside interests or inspired by the political opposition, and
some simply result from the many voices of an open society. That is
why the problems presidents make for themselves within their own
administrations are so vexing.
Among the most unnecessary arise from personality conflicts. Pres-
idents-in-transition often make appointments having little in the way
of personal relationships with their appointees. They have even less
knowledge of how unknown official X will interact with unknown of-
ficial Y—even though X has been slated to become the secretary of state
and Y the national security assistant. The appointees’ experiences are
later recounted in troubling memoirs that often start with a stranger’s
call to service, as in the opening paragraph of Alexander Haig’s Caveat:
Realism, Reagan and Foreign Policy (Macmillan, 1984): “When, on De-
cember 11, 1980, President-elect Ronald Reagan asked me to be his Sec-
retary of State, I had spent no more than three hours alone with him.
About an hour of that time had been passed in a Marine helicopter. . . .
There was little conversation in the helicopter.” A similar passage
opens the memoirs of Donald Regan, Reagan’s first treasury secretary.
Whatever irritants exist initially within the inner circle are sure to
rub raw after staff and media get hold of them, as the following exam-
ples illustrate.

Nixon Presidency
Richard Nixon: “[Secretary of State] Rogers and [Secretary of Defense]
Laird occasionally carried on sensitive dealings and negotiations with-
out coordinating them with the White House. . . . [S]ometimes it was
done to preclude [National Security Assistant] Kissinger’s or my own dis-
approval; and sometimes, I think, it was done just to show themselves,
their departments, and the press that they were capable of independent
action. . . .

52  • What Do We Do Now?

 “Eventually the relationship between Kissinger and Rogers took on a
fairly combative aspect. . . . Rogers felt that Kissinger was Machiavel-
lian, deceitful, egotistical, arrogant, and insulting. Kissinger felt that
Rogers was vain, uninformed, unable to keep a secret, and hopelessly
dominated by the State Department bureaucracy.” (Richard Nixon, RN:
The Memoirs of Richard Nixon, Grosset & Dunlap, 1978)
Henry Kissinger: “Rogers must have considered me an egotistical nit-
picker who ruined his relations with [the] President. I tended to view
him as an insensitive neophyte who threatened the careful design of
our foreign policy. The relationship was bound to deteriorate. Had both
of us been wiser we would have understood that we would serve the
country best by composing our personal differences and reinforcing
each other. . . . But all our attempts to meet regularly foundered. Rog-
ers was too proud. I intellectually too arrogant, and we were both too
insecure to adopt a course which would have saved us much needed an-
guish and bureaucratic headaches.” (Henry Kissinger, The White House
Years, Little, Brown, 1979)

Rogers remained secretary of state into Nixon’s second term until

September 1973, when he was replaced by Henry Kissinger (who con-
tinued to serve also as national security adviser). Nixon then awarded
Rogers the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Carter Presidency
Zbigniew Brzezinski: “[Secretary of State Cyrus Vance’s] reluctance to
speak up publicly, to provide a broad conceptual explanation for what
our Administration was trying to do, and Carter’s lack of preparation for
doing it himself, pushed me to the forefront. (I will not claim I resisted
strongly.) That in turn fueled resentments, if not initially on Cy’s part,
then clearly so on the part of his subordinates. . . . I was struck, even in
the very early months . . . by how much pressure there is from one’s own
subordinates to engage in conflict with one’s principal peers.
“The press seized on these disagreements with a passion and a ven-
geance. . . . It got to a point that I was not sure whether I was more
outraged by pieces portraying Vance as the winner or mortified by
ones that celebrated my alleged predominance. . . . [T]he press kept it
up, thereby harming everyone concerned, while in fact considerably
exaggerating the split between us.” (Zbigniew Brzezinski, Power and

What Do We Do Now? • 53
 Principle: Memoirs of the National Security Adviser, 1977–1981, Farrar,
Straus and Giroux, 1983)

Vance resigned in April 1980, in protest over the secret mission to res-
cue American hostages in Iran.

Reagan Presidency
On George Shultz and Caspar Weinberger: “[Secretary of State] Shultz
and [Secretary of Defense] Weinberger never had a honeymoon. They
were natural rivals, burdened by ancient animosities and a competing
view of U.S.-Soviet relations. . . .
“Those who observed the conflict at close hand differed in their assign-
ment of fault but are nearly unanimous in believing that the struggles
between these two powerful cabinet secretaries undermined policy co-
herence and wore down Reagan.
“Neither Shultz nor Weinberger made life easy for Reagan. Weinberger
was convinced he knew what Reagan would do if left to his own instincts,
and Shultz behaved as if he knew what was best for the president. But
the self-indulgent scenes they staged in the president’s presence did not
bring out the best in Reagan. . . . One can hardly blame him, given this
disconcerting example of pettiness that has survived in notes made by
an administration official [Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Di-
rector Ken Adelman]:
SHULTZ: I wanted to give you a military opinion on this matter, Mr.
President, but I couldn’t get one. The secretary of defense wouldn’t
let me talk to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
WEINBERGER: You could come to me for the military opinion. My
phone number’s in the book.
SHULTZ: I wanted another opinion.
WEINBERGER: You could have called me and asked. As I said, my
phone number’s listed.” (Lou Cannon, President Reagan: The Role of
a Lifetime, Simon & Schuster, 1991)

Weinberger resigned on November 23, 1987; he was indicted for lying

in the Iran-Contra case, and subsequently pardoned by President Bush in
1992. Shultz remained Secretary of State until Reagan left office in 1989.

54  • What Do We Do Now?

Lesson to Apply to Your Transition
☞W
 hen making people decisions, ensure interviews and vetting go beyond
paper qualifications to questions of personality that could reflect on group
dynamics.

Looking Ahead
Now your White House Office is organized! The boxes are where you
want them on the organizational chart and your own people are in the
boxes. You can move on: there are simply more interesting matters to
engage your attention. Management questions are a bore. At least that
was the opinion of most of your predecessors who thought that creat-
ing their organization was akin to pinning a butterfly to a corkboard; it
will always be there in a pristine state, unless there is a crisis.
Unfortunately, management arrangements are fluid, even under or-
dinary circumstances. A year from now your organization will be out
of shape, more or less. Your staff needs will shift as you move from
formulating policies to lobbying your proposals through Congress,
then to implementing the new programs. Does your staff adequately
reflect the changing circumstances?
People change. They get tired. They develop strong or weak rela-
tionships with other people. They leave and are replaced by people
with different talents, forming new alliances and rivalries. And, frank-
ly, you cause problems for yourself! Presidents, out of impatience or
frustration, often reach out to the person at their elbow to deal with
whatever matter is at hand. It’s called the Law of Propinquity—and it
plays havoc with trying to have a smooth-running organization.
Mark your calendar to reexamine your White House organization
one year from today (at the latest).

What Do We Do Now? • 55
 Perks
Incoming staff should be aware that some perks go along with their
jobs. Here are two that are worth looking into:

Great Art
Make a call to the National Gallery as you move into your West
Wing office. Request a curator to drop by with suggestions for what
paintings you should borrow for your walls.
In 1969, as deputy assistant to the president for urban affairs, I
picked a fine Jacob Lawrence, possibly the most famous African
American painter of the twentieth century. But my happiest choice
was a very large oil by Alma Thomas, a Washington artist, whose
bold, irregular yellow dashes filled my days with absolute sunshine.
(I sent letters of thanks to all the artists I hung, hoping they would
like to know that they had been displayed with satisfaction at the
White House.) Next door, New Yorker Pat Moynihan chose a portrait
of the cartoonist who brought down the Tweed Ring, Thomas Nast,
looking stern and unforgiving. Perhaps Pat’s message was that mis-
deeds would not be permitted here.

Cheap Vacations
There are great places to stay in national parks, including the Virgin
Islands. These houses were included in land acquired by the Depart-
ment of the Interior and are now available to federal officials (in
order of rank—White House staff will be bumped by a cabinet mem-
ber). One site that my family enjoyed—but is no longer available—is
Camp Hoover, a group of cabins that Herbert Hoover built on the
Rapidan River in Virginia. John Whitaker, who was secretary to the
cabinet in the Nixon White House, told me this story about a time
he had been fishing there. When a park ranger stopped to chat,
Whitaker said, “I understood the camp was built here because Pres-
ident Hoover was a great fisherman. But I’ve been fishing all morn-
ing and I haven’t even seen a fish.” The ranger replied: “Well, you
see, sir, when Mr. Hoover was president, the Secret Service stood at
the head of the stream and dropped the trout in.”

56  • What Do We Do Now?

 Case in Point: “Never Give Major Public Policy Responsibilities to . . .

. . . someone you can’t fire”*

*Includes president’s parents, siblings, spouse, and children; for the appropriateness of
applying this rule to in-laws and vice president’s family, contact the editorial board of
the New York Times.

“Leadership—Bush, Cheney and The Horse,” by Pat Oliphant, 2007 (Susan Conway Gallery,
Santa Fe, N.M.)

What Do We Do Now? • 57
 Door
Homeland Security
Veterans
Affairs

Housing and Urban

Development
Transportation

Commerce Agriculture

Treasury
Defense

The Cabinet Table

President Vice President

State
Attorney General

Interior
Labor

Health and
Human Services
Energy
Door

Education

58  • What Do We Do Now?

 The Cabinet
You have designed and staffed your White House, so you can
now effectively move on to choosing your cabinet members
and other key officials. You will need to consider the diver-
sity, political, and talent requirements that go into making
these choices, including whether you want to reach out to
the opposition party. Where are the best pools of talent avail-
able to you? What lessons can you learn from the failures of
other presidents? And what must be done to get your nomi-
nees confirmed by the Senate? These are the questions to
which I now turn.

What Do We Do Now? • 59
CHAPTER 3 The Cabinet

The “Looks Like America” Cabinet

Cabinet-making for you will be a lot more complicated than it was for
Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Nixon. The original Eisenhower
cabinet was dubbed “eight millionaires and a plumber.” The million-
aires were all white males—as was the plumber, Secretary of Labor
Martin Durkin, who had been president of the American Federation of
Labor (AFL) Plumbers and Pipe Fitters Union. Eisenhower added a
woman to his cabinet, Oveta Culp Hobby, when the Department of
Health, Education, and Welfare was created in 1953. She was also white
and a millionaire.
The Kennedy and Nixon cabinets were solidly stocked with white
men. Kennedy made the “unsubtle gesture” of arranging for Represen-
tative William Dawson, an African American, to “decline” his offer of
the postmaster-generalship, according to Kennedy adviser Ted Soren-
sen. (The Post Office was a cabinet department until 1970.) Nixon was
turned down by two African Americans: Senator Edward Brooke and
Whitney Young, executive director of the Urban League. There is no
evidence that he considered appointing a woman or a Hispanic Ameri-
can to a cabinet post. What is remarkable about this period is how little
outcry was caused by this absence
of diversity.
You will have many more opportunities than Presi-
Carter was the first president-
dents Eisenhower and Kennedy to make cabinet
elect to commit himself to a cabi-
appointments. Since 1965 the government has been
on a department-creating binge: Housing and Urban net that “looks like America.” Yet
Development (1965), Transportation (1966), Energy by December 15 he still had not ap-
(1977), Veterans Affairs (1988), and Homeland Se- pointed an African American or a
curity (2003). In 1979 the Department of Housing, woman, and he was beginning to
Education, and Welfare (HEW) was split into Hous- feel the heat. “The overwhelming
ing and Human Services (HHS), and Education. support blacks gave to Mr. Carter—
in his primary campaign as well as

60  • What Do We Do Now?

Up against the Walls
Behind the president and across from him, behind the vice presi-
dent, are rows of chairs. When the cabinet meets, who sits in them? The
answer shown below is from a cabinet meeting of President George H. W.
Bush (note seating differences in the Bush II cabinet, page 58).

Council on
Environmental

Door
Quality
(CEQ) Chief of Staff

Legislative OMB Director Veterans

Affairs Affairs

Domestic Housing and Urban

Development
Policy Transportation

Deputy
Cabinet Chief of Staff
Secretary
Commerce Agriculture
Staff
National Security
Adviser Secretary
(NSA)

Communications
Joint Chiefs Treasury
Defense Director
of Staff

Central NSA Deputy

Intelligence The Cabinet Table
Agency
(CIA) President Vice President
Environmental VP’s Chief
Protection of Staff
Agency
(EPA)
State Media
Drug Control Attorney General Affairs
Policy

Intergovernmental
Council of
Interior Affairs
Economic
Advisers Labor
(CEA)

Science and
Technology Health and
Human Services
Energy
Door

Press
Secretary
Education
Trade

What Do We Do Now? • 61
 in the general election—marks the first time a president has been so in-
debted to a minority community,” wrote a New York Times reporter,
“and blacks fully expect appropriate payoffs.”
Carter’s first appointment of an African American was Representa-
tive Andrew Young of Atlanta to be U.S. ambassador to the United
Nations. The problem for Carter was that having filled his “inner cabi-
net” (State, Treasury, Defense, and Justice) with white men, advocates
for women and minorities complained that their constituents were be-
ing treated with disrespect by being offered only “outer cabinet” posi-
tions. This issue would have greater consequences for the next Demo-
cratic president. Over 65: 12.4%

Under 18: 24.7%

Demographic
Female: Estimates:
Male: “What America Looks
45–64: 25%
Like”
50.8% 49.2% 18–24: 9.9%
Total Population 100%
Over 65: 12.4% Over 65: 12.4%
SEX
AGE
Under25–44:
18: 24.7%
28% Under 18: 24.7% Othe
Female: Female: Male: Male: 45–64: 25% 45–64: 25%
50.8% 50.8% 49.2% 49.2% 18–24: 9.9% 18–24: 9.9%

SEX SEX
AGE AGE
25–44: 28% 25–44: 28%

Asian:
American Indian: 0.7% EDUCATION** Other: 2%
African 4.3%
American: Population 25 years and over 65.4
1 2.4% No diploma 10.4
Independent
High school graduate
36% 19.7 Democrat
Hispanic/ White: Some college, no degree 12.8 33%
Latino: 73.9%
Asian: 14.7% Asian: Associate’s degree 4.8
Other: 2%
Bachelor’s degree Other: 2% 11.2
African 4.3% American
African Indian:
4.3% 0.7%
American Indian: 0.7%
American: American:
RACE* Graduate degree
PARTY*** 6.5
1 2.4% 1 2.4% Republican: 29%
Independent Independent
Source: 2006 American Community Survey (U.S. Census Bureau).
36% 36% Democrat Democrat
Hispanic/ Hispanic/ White: White: 33% 33%
Latino: Latino: 73.9% 73.9%
14.7% 14.7%

RACE* 62  • What

RACE*Do We Do Now? PARTY*** PARTY***
Republican: 29% Republican: 29%
 No president-elect worked as hard as Bill Clinton to fit all the
pieces—geography,
Over 65:ideology,
12.4% politics, gender, ethnicity—into the Undesignated: 1%
None: 1 2%
cabinet puzzle. When he announced at a press conference on No-
vember 12, 1992, that “my cabinet will
Under 18: look more like America
24.7% than 1 2%
Other specific:
previous administrations,” it was as if he were making representa- Protestant:
45–64: 25% Mormon: 1% 49%
tion the theme of his transition.18–24:
On 9.9%
December 9 the New York TimesJewish: 2%
wrote that Clinton was seeking a woman for attorney general. As the
process dragged on, according to insider George Stephanopoulos, Catholic: 23%
“the transition
AGE team was scrambling to find the best female attorney
25–44: 28% RELIGION
general rather than the best attorney general period.”

Over 65: 12.4% Other: 2% Undesignated: 1%

None: 1 2%

Independent Under 18: 24.7% Other specific: 1 2%

36% Democrat Protestant:
45–64: 25% 33% Mormon: 1% 49%
18–24: 9.9% Jewish: 2%

Catholic: 23%
PARTY***
AGE RELIGION
Republican: 29%
25–44: 28%

Source: Gallup, June 9–12, 2008. Source: Gallup, 2007.

*T
 hese numbers add up to more than 100% because of multiracial Americans who checked off more than
one box on the form.

** T
 he “education” question was only asked of the 65.4% of Americans age 25 and over, but the percent-
ages here represent percent of total Americans.

*** T
Other: 2%
 his does not reflect actual party registration numbers, but a response to the question “Do you consider
yourself a Republican, a Democrat, or an independent?”

Independent
36% Democrat
33%

PARTY*** What Do We Do Now? • 63

Republican: 29%
 Clinton’s first choice, Zoë Baird, had to withdraw when it was re-
vealed that she and her husband, a Yale Law School professor, had
hired illegal immigrants as household help and had not paid the Social
Security tax on their employment. Clinton’s second choice, U.S. district
court judge Kimba Wood, also had employed an undocumented im-
migrant as a nanny. Clinton’s third choice, Janet Reno, was finally con-
firmed by the Senate on March 11. The situation reminded journalist
R. W. Apple Jr. of Casey Stengel’s famous lament to the 1962 Mets:
“Can’t anybody here play this game?”
Inner cabinet diversity, on the other hand, was never much of an issue
for President-elect George W. Bush, since it was clear from the early
stages that Colin Powell, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
and an African American, would be his pick for secretary of state.
Yet it is obvious that you are going to spend a lot of your transition
seeking balances that create a “Looks Like America” cabinet. When
weighing diversity as a cabinet standard, consider these pros and cons:

Pros
• Broad representation on your policymaking team.
• Payback to the constituencies that elected you.
• Symbolism of inclusiveness.

Cons
• Risk of creating the appearance that a nominee’s gender, race, or
religion is more important than his or her qualifications to do the job.
• Risk of angering groups whose candidates are not selected.
• Risk of painting yourself into a corner.

How to Expand Your Cabinet

Beyond the mandatory department secretaries, you can put anyone you
want in your cabinet. With the stroke of a pen, President Carter added his
UN ambassador, Andrew Young, to his cabinet. The UN post had been
given cabinet rank twice before. Eisenhower bestowed it on Henry Cabot
Lodge Jr., one of the president’s early supporters who had just lost his

64  • What Do We Do Now?

Senate seat to John F. Kennedy. As president-elect in 1960, Kennedy gave
it to Adlai Stevenson, his party’s presidential candidate in 1952 and 1956,
who would rather have been Kennedy’s secretary of state.
President Clinton added three women to his cabinet: Madeleine
Albright (UN ambassador), Laura D’Andrea Tyson (Council of Eco-
nomic Advisers), and Carol Browner (EPA administrator). Clinton
also made cabinet members out of the drug czar, the director of the
Small Business Administration, and the director of the Federal Emer-
gency Management Agency. As a result, it was hard to fit them all
around the cabinet table.
If recent history is any indication, you are most likely to give cabinet
status to your chief of staff, OMB director, and trade representative.
Note that President George H. W. Bush, who had been both UN repre-
sentative and CIA director, chose not to put either in his cabinet. The
CIA, he felt, “should not be in the policy business,” and “there is no
point in the United Nations Ambassador sitting around, as I did for a
while, talking about ag policy.”

The Add-on Cabinet Officials

Appointee Post
Eisenhower (1953)
Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. Ambassador to the United Nations
Kennedy (1961)
Adlai Stevenson Ambassador to the United Nations
Nixon (1969)
Arthur Burns Counselor to the president
Carter (1977)
Zbigniew Brzezinski Adviser to the president on National Security
Affairs
Bert Lance Director, Office of Management and Budget
Charles L. Schultze Chairman, Council of Economic Advisers
Andrew Young Ambassador to the United Nations
Reagan (1981)
William E. Brock III U.S. Trade Representative
William J. Casey Director, Central Intelligence Agency
Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Ambassador to the United Nations
Edwin A. Meese III Counselor to the president
continued

What Do We Do Now? • 65
 Appointee Post
George H. W. Bush (1989)
Richard G. Darman Director, Office of Management and Budget
Carla A. Hills U.S. Trade Representative
Clinton (1993)
Madeleine K. Albright Ambassador to the United Nations
Lee P. Brown Director, Office of National Drug Control Policy
Carol M. Browner Administrator, Environmental Protection Agency
Michael Kantor U.S. Trade Representative
Thomas F. “Mack” McLarty Chief of staff
Leon E. Panetta Director, Office of Management and Budget
Laura D’Andrea Tyson Chair, Council of Economic Advisers
George W. Bush (2001)
Andrew Card Jr. Chief of staff
Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. Director, Office of Management and Budget
Christine Todd Whitman Administrator, Environmental Protection Agency
Robert B. Zoellick U.S. Trade Representative

Check out presidential transitions on the Brookings website (www.brookings.

edu/transition) for profiles of the start-up cabinets of Presidents Eisenhower
(1953), Kennedy (1961), Nixon (1969), Carter (1977), Reagan (1981), George H.
W. Bush (1989), Clinton (1993), and George W. Bush (2001). Who picked gov-
ernors? From which states? And senators? What schools were the academics
from? Who was the oldest cabinet member? The youngest? Who was the
attorney general who later became secretary of state? Which presidents put
the party chairman in the cabinet? Lots of data!

The Original Cabinets:

Eisenhower to George W. Bush
Follow the fascinating progression of presidents’ start-up cabinets
over the past half-century, using the chart on page 67. From the all-
white cabinets of Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Nixon to the
two most recent presidents, Democrat Bill Clinton and Republican
George W. Bush, who chose men and women—mostly men—only half
of whom were of white European origin.

66  • What Do We Do Now?

The Start-up Cabinets: Race (other than European-origin white)

Eisenhower (1953) None

Kennedy (1961) None
Nixon (1969) None
Carter (1977) Patricia R. Harris, African American (HUD)
Reagan (1981) Samuel Pierce, African American (HUD)
George H. W. Bush (1989) Manuel Lujan, Hispanic (Interior)
Louis Sullivan, African American (HUD)
Lauro D. Cavazos, Hispanic (Education)
Clinton (1993) Mike Espy, African American (Agriculture)
Ronald H. Brown, African American (Commerce)
Hazel O’Leary, African American (Energy)
Henry G. Cisneros, Hispanic (HUD)
Federico F. Peña, Hispanic (Transportation)
Donna E. Shalala, Lebanese American (HHS)
Jesse Brown, African American (Veterans)
George W. Bush (2001) Colin Powell, African American (State)
Elaine Chao, Asian American (Commerce)
Spencer Abraham, Lebanese American (Energy)
Mel Martinez, Hispanic (HUD)
Rod Paige, African American (Education)
Norman Mineta, Asian American (Transportation)

Talent Hunt
Now comes the moment when you must find the people to head the
fifteen departments and the major agencies of the federal government.
Look at what you are asking executives to manage: the smallest de-
partment (in terms of budget) is Commerce, which will be authorized
to spend nearly $9 billion a year during your presidency; the largest,
Health and Human Services, will have budget authority of more than
$765 billion. You have only a four-year contract, once renewable, so
you will want leaders who can get things done in a hurry. Yet the Con-
gress—from which your departments receive their money—also has
ideas about how the departments should be run, as has the civil ser-
vice, which can wait out the appointed officials. Meanwhile, the media
are poised to enjoy any false step.

What Do We Do Now? • 67
 The Start-up Cabinets: Eisenhower to George W. Bush

Gender
14
Labor
Female Male Justice Interior
Energy Agriculture
12 HHS Labor
Commerce
HUD
10
HEW

0
Eisenhower Kennedy Nixon Carter Reagan George Clinton George
(1953) (1961) (1969) (1977) (1981) H.W. Bush (1993) W. Bush
(1989) (2001)

Average Age
70
Race
Age of President when elected 69
14
Average
White age of his first Cabinet
African-American Hispanic
65 Asian-American Other Race
12 64
62
60
10 [–4] [+4]
58 [–8] 58
55 [–15] 56
8 55 [–1] [+7]
54 54 54
[–1] 53
52
6 51
50
[+5]
48
4
45 46

2 43
40
Eisenhower Kennedy Nixon Carter Reagan George Clinton George
0 (1952) (1960) (1968) (1976) (1980) H.W. Bush (1992) W. Bush
Eisenhower Kennedy Nixon Carter Reagan George
(1988) Clinton George
(2000)
(1953) (1961) (1969) (1977) (1981) H.W. Bush (1993) W. Bush
Note how most presidents-elect seem to have a “comfort zone” in which they pick
(1989) (2001)
cabinet officials from their own age cohort.

68  • What Do We Do Now?

 Almost everyone you ask to serve is making a lot more money than
the $191,300 salary a cabinet officer gets. Yet you will usually get the
people you want for the “inner cabinet”—State, Treasury, Defense, and
Justice. Beyond that, it can be difficult: President Reagan was turned
down by six of his first choices—five for “outer cabinet” jobs. President
Nixon endured four rejections (Kissinger says there was a fifth). If your
choices turn you down, don’t twist arms: those who say no usually have
a good reason for not taking the job, even if it may not sound like a good
reason to you.
As you proceed with your talent hunt, powerful groups will take a
keen interest in which way you appear to be leaning. When it became
known that President-elect Carter was weighing the merits of Harold
Brown or James Schlesinger for secretary of defense, there was a sud-
den campaign for Paul Warnke. Its purpose was to position Brown,
who had been deputy secretary of defense in the Johnson administra-
tion, as a moderate compromise between the liberal Warnke and con-
servative Schlesinger, who had held the secretary of defense position
under Presidents Nixon and Ford. Washington games such as this can
provide you with hints of candidates’ strengths and weaknesses.
Here are five suggestions on where to look for the kinds of officials
who have been productive in the past.

University and College Presidents

The job of university president closely resembles that of running a
government department. As with cabinet officers, these administra-
tors have more responsibility than authority. (You might find a way of
asking them and other candidates for your cabinet, “What have you
accomplished without formal authority?”) They have learned how to
deal with ambiguity, which corporate executives often find disquiet-
ing. They have also learned to deal with competing constituencies
(trustees, faculty, students, administrators, alumni, the local commu-
nity, and, in the case of public institutions, legislative bodies).
Review the records of the following university presidents who went
on to have successful stints in government: Edward Levi, University of
Chicago, attorney general (Ford); Harold Brown, Cal Tech, secretary

What Do We Do Now? • 69
 of defense (Carter), Donna Shalala, University of Wisconsin–Madison,
secretary of health and human services (Clinton).

Governors
All incoming presidents since Eisenhower have picked at least one
governor (Kennedy and Nixon each picked three), but hardly ever for
the inner cabinet. Western governors have been popular choices for
interior secretary.
The record of governors as cabinet secretaries is a mixed bag: Or-
ville Freeman of Minnesota, secretary of agriculture for Presidents
Kennedy and Johnson, and Richard Riley of South Carolina, Clinton’s
secretary of education, were outstanding. Another South Carolina gov-
ernor, James Edwards, barely lasted a year as Reagan’s secretary of en-
ergy; and Nixon had to fire Alaskan Walter Hickel, another western
governor at interior.

Members of Congress
Watch out for members of Congress: management is rarely their forte.
Although some may have had business experience before arriving in
Washington, law is more likely their occupation. Their skill is in lobby-
ing former colleagues (defense secretaries Mel Laird and Dick Cheney
were notably effective in this manner). If you go with legislators, be
sure to pair them with talented managers as their deputies. You will be
much better off if you select the deputies yourself—as long as the cabi-
net officials feel they can live with your choices. This creates a sort of
“double veto” system.

Business
The size of government agencies might suggest that the natural choic-
es for these executive positions reside in corporate America. The an-
swer is yes and no, depending on factors such as whether the execu-
tives have spent their entire careers in one company (not good
prospects), whether their type of company has extensive contact with
or regulation by the government (useful prospects), and whether their
résumés also show substantial community involvement, such as being
a school board chair (very good prospects).

70  • What Do We Do Now?

 Faux Bipartisanship
In the “tradition” of bipartisanship, you will be urged to appoint people from the
opposition party either to your cabinet or other prominent positions—especially
if you just won a close election. Some of these officials will give you good ser-
vice, but not because they voted for your opponent.
How far Nixon went during the 1968 transition to get a Democrat into his
administration is illustrated by his negotiations with Sargent Shriver, President
Kennedy’s brother-in-law. After being offered the UN post, according to Nixon’s
memoirs, Shriver “required a pledge that the federal poverty programs would
not be cut.” Such meddling in domestic affairs was too much for the president-
elect, who told William Rogers, his secretary of state–designate, “to inform
Shriver that I have decided against him and to let him know why.” Shriver then
tried, unsuccessfully, to backpedal.
President-elect Kennedy had more success in luring Douglas Dillon, a
Republican with a distinguished record in public service, to be his secretary of
the treasury, thus easing the fears of Wall Street. He also made Henry Cabot
Lodge Jr., Nixon’s running mate in the 1960 presidential election, U.S. ambassa-
dor to Vietnam, a convenient place to put a Republican if things got too hot.
Such actions do not violate the Trading with the Enemy Act, but neither
do they buy what is usually their intended purpose—bipartisan support. The
Republican in a Democratic administration, or vice versa, is typically viewed as a
turncoat. As Clinton’s secretary of state Madeleine Albright accurately observes
in her book Memo to the President Elect (HarperCollins, 2008), “Such an ap-
pointment will provide more the appearance of bipartisanship than the reality.”
Two questions to ask yourself before appointing a Democrat (Republican) to
your Republican (Democratic) administration:

1. What do I expect to gain by appointing this person?

__________________________________________________

__________________________________________________

2. Is this the best person for the job—regardless of party?

o Yes, definitely. o No, we can do better.

What Do We Do Now? • 71
 Being too rich can also pose a “problem.” How to divest assets in
order to conform to standards of public service? Charles E. Wilson of
General Motors and Ford’s Robert McNamara sold their stock in the
companies they ran before becoming secretaries of defense. But this
was more difficult for Hewlett-Packard cofounder David Packard, who
owned 29 percent of the company’s stock when Nixon chose him to be
deputy secretary of defense in 1969. Packard could not dump his stock
on the market without penalizing the other shareholders. He finally
proposed putting his stock in a trust with all income and increase in
value going to educational and charitable institutions. The Senate then
confirmed him.

Government
The safest place to look for good cabinet officials is among those
who have already been good cabinet officials—the repeaters. There
are people in both parties, as well as others who have served under
presidents of both parties, who have already proved their worth.
Take a look at a résumé like that of the late Elliot Richardson, the
only person who ever held four cabinet-level positions: secretary
of health, education, and welfare; secretary of defense; attorney
general; and secretary of commerce. And for good measure, he had
also been under secretary of state. Richardson was not an expert in
welfare policy or commerce; his expertise was in running large
government departments. You cannot go wrong with people like
Richardson.
One of the strangest discoveries about selecting cabinet officials has
to do with how well presidents know their appointees. You might as-
sume that the better you know your pick, the more likely you will pick
the right person for the job. But it does not necessarily work that way.
Nixon’s closest friend in his cabinet was Robert Finch, the secretary of
health, education, and welfare. At the other extreme, Nixon’s notes to
himself at the time he was making his cabinet announcements show
that he didn’t know the first name or how to spell the last name of
George Shultz, his pick for labor secretary. Finch was a disaster and
had to be removed to the White House staff, where he wasn’t given

72  • What Do We Do Now?

much to do; Shultz was so successful that Nixon later elevated him to
the inner cabinet.
Once you have settled on a choice for a cabinet post and your vet-
ters have done their work, dispassionately assess your nominee’s
chances at confirmation by the Senate:
• If the vetting process raised no red flags, proceed to “When to Grovel.”
• If there might be trouble with this nomination, skip forward to “When to
Fold.”

Idea to Apply to Your Transition

☞Start your selection process by asking those who have held cabinet positions
to tell you the qualities necessary for success and what you should avoid.

When to Grovel
Although confirmation hearings are conducted by different Senate
committees filled with different interests and egos, you have probably
noticed something holistic about the way senators deal with a new
president’s initial slate of appointments.
Perhaps the energy expended in fighting one nominee cannot be
recycled.
Perhaps there is a point past which opposition is perceived as ob-
structionism and becomes politically counterproductive.
The result is that you will get a lot of brushfires, but only one truly
horrendous conflagration. Senators seem to demand that there always
be one. Perhaps you should designate one of your appointees to be
the sacrificial lamb so that the others can survive unscathed. (Just
joking!)This is the way it worked for two of George W. Bush’s nomi-
nees. His choice for attorney general, Senator John Ashcroft, had
well-documented, deeply controversial views on abortion, gun con-
trol, and the death penalty. The nomination produced weeks of an-
guished debate before he was finally confirmed, 58 to 42, on February
1. The brouhaha probably eased the confirmation of Bush’s candidate
for interior secretary, Gail Norton, who should have been equally

What Do We Do Now? • 73
 controversial. Environmentalists waged a fierce fight, but it had little
effect on the Senate and Norton was comfortably approved, 75 to 24.
The experiences of cabinet appointees Ashcroft and Norton—being
challenged on the basis of their policy beliefs rather than personal be-
havior—is a relatively new phenomenon, going back no further per-
haps than Nixon’s appointment of interior secretary Walter Hickel, a
business-oriented governor of Alaska who was accused of being insen-
sitive to conservation. The rule of thumb for that earlier time was that,
given minimum ethical standards, a president was entitled to his

“We’re dead meat”

Cartoon by Ann Telnaes, used with permission

74  • What Do We Do Now?

choice, since the appointee served only at his pleasure and would not
be passed on to the next president. Those were the good old days.
In response to more and more confirmation fights, a group has
emerged in Washington known as the sherpas, who have turned
steering nominees through the confirmation progress into a fine art.
There are Republican sherpas and Democratic sherpas. It’s not ex-
actly a club, but they are known to each other. Sign up the ones you
need early.
Your nominees should be prepared to explain themselves. One of
the more painful experiences befell Dr. Louis Sullivan, George H. W.
Bush’s choice for secretary of health and human services, who was
twice forced to reverse course to get in line with his president’s posi-
tion. Belatedly, the White House staff put him through a cram course
(known in Washington parlance as a “murder board”) to simulate
how he would be grilled by the senators.
Your nominees will need to understand what most worries the
senators on their oversight and appropriating committees. Before
Brock Adams, Carter’s choice for transportation secretary, could be
confirmed, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York made sure
he promised to meet with northeastern governors to discuss the pos-
sibilities of using a large portion of their highway money for mass
transportation and would review federal support for the Westway
highway project in lower Manhattan.
Your nominees will have to endure being confronted by growl
and swagger. (Every Senate committee seems to have a designated
growler.) This is no easy task for nominees who also have a similarly
high sense of self-importance. The best advice for the poor souls
who come from pursuits other than the political is to smile and grov-
el. In the end, the senators will give you pretty much what you ask
for—but only once your nominees have given them the respect they
think they deserve.

Idea to Apply to Your Transition

☞Advise your nominees that their long-term success may require suffering
short-term pain.

What Do We Do Now? • 75
 Pick a Presidential Portrait

Andrew Jackson after Thomas Sully (1783–1872)

Hung in the Oval Office during the presidencies of Richard Nixon,
Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton.

76  • What Do We Do Now?

When to Fold
Life would be much easier for presidents-in-transition if only their
personnel selection process could test for the five criteria laid out by
Pendleton James, a corporate headhunter who was in charge of re-
cruitment for President-elect Reagan:
1. Commitment to the president’s philosophy and program.
2. The highest integrity and personal qualifications.
3. Experience and skills that fit the task.
4. No personal agenda that conflicts with being a member of the
president’s team.
5. The toughness needed to withstand the pressures and induce-
ments of Washington and to accomplish the changes sought by
the president.
So you follow this prescription, you think you have the person you
want, and suddenly there’s a problem. Why? Most likely one of two
things has happened.

Inadequate Vetting
Inadequate vetting—the failure to dig deep enough to get the troubling
information—was what caused problems for President Carter (in the
case of Kennedy administration veteran Ted Sorensen), Clinton (in
the case of Lani Guinier), and George W. Bush (in the case of Linda
Chavez).
Nominated to be CIA director, Sorensen’s offense was that he took
classified material with him when he left the White House after Ken-
nedy’s assassination to write a book.
Guinier, nominated to be assistant attorney general in charge of the
civil rights division, had expressed views in her writings that were,
Clinton wrote in his memoirs, “in conflict with my support for affir-
mative action and opposition to quotas.” He withdrew the nomination,
saying he had not been aware of her views.
Chavez, nominated to be secretary of labor, had taken a battered
woman into her home, an illegal immigrant from Guatemala, who did

What Do We Do Now? • 77
 occasional chores and had been given at least $1,500. Chavez had not
provided this information to Bush’s vetters or the FBI. After her name
was withdrawn, Bush announced a replacement nominee just two days
later. In Washington he was given more credit for acting expeditiously
than blame for making a flawed appointment. It probably also helped
that the new nominee (Elaine Chao) was married to a prominent Repub-
lican senator.

Insufficient Understanding of Political Risks

Not realizing or understanding the political risks of a particular nomi-
nee is what caused problems for Nixon (in the case of Dr. John Knowles,
who was to be nominated as assistant secretary for health until the
American Medical Association, which disliked Knowles’s support for
universal health care, opposed him), George H. W. Bush (in the case of
John Tower; see page 80), and Clinton (in the case of Zoë Baird).
Remember Zoë Baird, the candidate for attorney general who had
employed illegal aliens as household help? Surely this belongs in the
category of inadequate vetting. Not so, according to Clinton: “The em-
ployment of illegal immigrants was not that uncommon then,” he wrote
in his memoirs, and Baird had not tried to conceal the information.
“We had simply underestimated its significance.” This miscalculation
caused her to endure a brutal confirmation hearing:
Senator Thurmond: You admit you did wrong?

Baird: Yes.

Thurmond: You’re sorry you did wrong?

Baird: Absolutely.

Thurmond: You’re repentant for doing wrong?

Baird: Yes, sir.

Baird’s nomination was withdrawn.

The Baird case also should remind us how repeatedly presidents-

78  • What Do We Do Now?

elect have been in trouble because they acted contrary to information
that was known to them. Mack McLarty “told me he would prefer an-
other job more suited to his business background,” Clinton wrote.
“Nevertheless, I pressed Mack to accept the [chief of staff ] position.”
Paul O’Neill met with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and outlined
all the reasons he should not be appointed treasury secretary. He cited
policy positions that he favored and they opposed, such as a heavy tax
on gasoline. Most important, he said that after years of running Alcoa,
“I think it might be hard to take a staff job.”
“Bush laughed. Dick laughed,” according to the account O’Neill
gave to Ron Suskind in The Price of Loyalty (Simon & Schuster, 2004).
“We know all that stuff,” Bush said. “Doesn’t matter. We want you to
take the job.”
O’Neill’s reasons for not taking the job accurately reflected what
was to happen and why he was fired. Most of these cases begin as loose
threads that, when pulled, unravel the whole garment. The classified
material in the Sorensen case was the thread, in itself not necessarily
disqualifying. But others soon were pulling: Republicans and elements
of the Democratic Party not friendly to the Kennedys, intelligence
community professionals who objected to his lack of experience in the
field and his status as a conscientious objector in World War II, and
information that his law firm represented certain foreign govern-
ments. At his confirmation hearing, Sorensen did exactly what he
knew had to be done. He folded. He escaped with his reputation in-
tact. Carter had his mandatory Senate defeat, caused by his staff’s in-
sufficient vetting.
The most significant failed nomination is that of John Tower, the
former senator from Texas, whom George H. W. Bush nominated to be
secretary of defense. He would not fold. His nomination was not de-
feated until March, causing three other cabinet confirmations to be
delayed.

Idea to Apply to Your Transition

☞When a nomination is in trouble, count votes and move quickly.

What Do We Do Now? • 79
 Case in Point: The Tower Nomination

John Tower was no innocent traveler in the Washington wilderness.

He had retired from the Senate in 1985 after 24 years of service. As
the virtual founder of the modern Republican Party in Texas, Tower
had long supported George H. W. Bush’s political aspirations and
had stuck with him through some difficult times. His knowledge of
the Pentagon was profound. He badly wanted to be secretary of
defense. Confirmation would be easy: the Senate has the reputation
of a clubby place, and rejection of a cabinet nomination had hap-
pened only eight times in 200 years.
On February 23, 1989, the Armed Service Committee, the com-
mittee Tower had once chaired, split along party lines and voted
down his nomination, 11 to 9. During the committee hearings Tow-
er was subjected to an almost daily barrage of allegations about
drinking and womanizing, with other charges leveled against his
defense industry connections. On March 9 the full Senate reject-
ed Tower, 53 to 47, with three Democrats voting for him and one
Republican voting against. It was the first time in history that an
incoming president had been denied a cabinet member of his
choice.
The administration had put too much faith in the Senate’s habit
of looking out for its own. (Only one former senator had ever been
denied a cabinet seat, and that was in 1868.) Its own handling of the
nomination was remarkably incompetent, given how many of the
Bush people were experienced Washington hands who had served
under President Reagan. Moreover, at a key moment, the president
and his top aides were away in Japan for Emperor Hirohito’s fu-
neral. When Committee Chairman Sam Nunn finally concluded that
Tower’s drinking problem made him unfit to stand in the chain of
command of the nuclear arsenal, nothing could be done to get the
nominee through the Democratic Senate.
Bush had stood by his man—as Carter had not with Sorensen,
and as Clinton had not with Guinier. Some honored him for going
down fighting, even if incompetently. But he paid a heavy price for
the Tower humiliation.

80  • What Do We Do Now?

Failures
Cabinet selection is guesswork; it’s about future performance. You try
hard to improve your odds. You ask people you respect and trust to
propose names or comment on candidates, you interview finalists and
ask the right questions, you turn to experienced vetters to review the
files. And a year later you know you appointed the wrong person. In
some cases, your mistake is serious.
Here are three appointments to the highest posts in government—
State, Defense, and Treasury. All three had brilliant careers yet were
fired by the presidents who appointed them. The failures, in this con-
text, were the presidents.
To demonstrate, I construct mock “personal selection forms” for
the three in question: Alexander Haig, appointed secretary of state by
President-elect Ronald Reagan (1980); Les Aspin, appointed secretary
of defense by President-elect Bill Clinton (1992); and Paul O’Neill, ap-
pointed secretary of the treasury by President-elect George W. Bush
(2000). These are followed by mock “performance evaluations” pre-
senting evidence that led the presidents to reverse course (it consists
only of information that was or could have been known to the appoint-
ers at the time).
The exercise concludes with an assessment (also based on the evi-
dence at hand or evidence that could have been assembled at the time)
of whether the presidents should have made the appointments. Two of
them seemed ill suited from the outset; the third failure remains a
mystery (at least to me).

What Do We Do Now? • 81
 Personnel Selection Form
Reagan Transition, December 1980

Office:  Secretary of State

Candidate:  Alexander M. Haig Jr.
Career Summary:  Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1924
B.S., United States Military Academy, 1947
M.A. (international relations), Georgetown University, 1961
Service in Korea, awarded two Silver Stars
Service in Vietnam, awarded Distinguished Service Cross
Deputy assistant to president for national security affairs, 1970–73
White House chief of staff, 1973–74
NATO commander, 1974–79
Retired from U.S. Army as four-star general, 1979
CEO, United Technologies, 1979 to present

Assessment: 
Management
Noted as excellent manager since his days as a young officer on
General Douglas MacArthur’s staff in Japan.
Expertise
Obviously knows Department of Defense matters, but also well versed
in all national security aspects from his days as Henry Kissinger’s
deputy in the Nixon White House.
Political Skills
As Nixon’s chief of staff, Haig credited with keeping government
running during Watergate scandal. Nixon gives highest recommendation
to be secretary of state.
Loyalty
Your advisers fear he wants to run for president. Haig claims this
is not true at this time.
Personal
Known to have a temper. Otherwise, high marks.

Decision:  Hired

82  • What Do We Do Now?

Performance Evaluation for President Reagan

July 1982
Alexander Haig
Secretary of State

Secretary Haig has publicly accused the White House staff of waging a
“guerrilla campaign” against him. Chief of Staff James Baker, Deputy
Chief of State Mike Deaver, and policy adviser Ed Meese all find him
difficult to work with. You have personally talked with the secretary
and your former national security adviser (NSA), Dick Allen, about
their conflicts. Apparently matters are not much better between Haig
and your new NSA, Bill Clark. He has asked you to fire UN Ambassador
Jeane Kirkpatrick, which you refused to do. His displeasures appear
to be more about people than about policy, although he contends
otherwise. He believes, for instance, that you are unhappy with his
policy of shuttle diplomacy in the Falklands War, which is not true.
He repeatedly claims his status is being undercut and his turf
encroached upon. Some concerns relate to matters of protocol. Most
recently he complained about his accommodations on Air Force One
and about not being assigned to your helicopter on the flight from
Heathrow to London. You have witnessed repeated displays of his
temper. He is once again threatening to resign.

Decision:
The president will inform Secretary Haig that he has accepted his
resignation.

What Do We Do Now? • 83
 Personnel Selection Form
Clinton Transition, December 1992

Office:  Secretary of Defense

Candidate:  Leslie “Les” Aspin Jr.
Career Summary:  Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 1938
B.A., summa cum laude, Yale University, 1960
M.A., Oxford University, 1962 (Rhodes Scholar)
Ph.D., economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1966
Officer, U.S. Army, 1966–68
Systems analyst in the Pentagon (one of McNamara’s “whiz kids”)
Member, U.S. House of Representatives, 1971 to present
Chairman, House Armed Services Committee, 1985 to present

Assessment:
Management
No experience in management other than running a small congressional
office. Not necessarily a problem: another Wisconsin representative,
Mel Laird, did well as defense secretary under President Nixon.
Expertise
Important consideration, given that the president-elect has no
military experience. Senator Sam Nunn will not accept the appoint-
ment, leaving Aspin the leading expert available. However, some of
his positions worry General Colin Powell and others in the military.
Political Skills
Excellent congressional district relations. Occasional problems with
Democratic House colleagues over support for opposition policies (MX
missile and aid to Nicaraguan Contras in 1987; support for military
force in Kuwait in 1991). Still, expect a smooth confirmation.
Loyalty
Not in Clinton’s inner circle (“FOB”). But was a campaign adviser.
Personal
No known John Tower–type problems. Divorced. Rumored to be dating a
New York Times reporter. Said to be in good health.

Decision:  Hired

84  • What Do We Do Now?

Performance Evaluation for President Clinton

December 1993
Les Apsin
Secretary of Defense

Secretary Aspin had difficulty dealing with your gays-in-the-

military commitment. His contradictory comments on national TV
contributed to the initial confusion about the policy. He also had
problems on policy revisions that would allow servicewomen to
serve in combat situations. Personnel matters are apparently not
his strong suit.
Serious heart ailment, February 1993; pacemaker implantation
the next month. His style seems to make the Joint Chiefs uncom-
fortable: late for meetings, unfiltered dialogue, a preference
for analysis over decision. Bob Woodward has written in the
Washington Post that “the starkest skeptics fear that Clinton
has sent Hamlet, the Prince of Reconsideration, to the Pentagon.”
Aspin’s role in the Haiti fiasco last October demands review.
You approved the plan to send the USS Harlan County, carrying
200 troops, to Port-au-Prince to help reinstate President
Aristide. When met by a jeering mob, our ship turned around and
came home. Hardly our finest hour. The point is that Aspin opposed
the action yet refused to press his objections. Why? Some think
that as an outsider——different as such from your National Security
Council adviser and secretary of state——he feels hesitant to push
his positions.
Now we have Black Hawk Down. The secretary acknowledges that he
erred in not granting General Powell’s request to reinforce the
U.S. commander in Somalia with tanks, armored vehicles, and AC-130
Spectre gunships. Eighteen U.S. soldiers are dead in Mogadishu,
and more than seventy-five wounded.

Decision:
We will announce the resignation of the secretary of defense on
December 15, 1993, for personal reasons.

What Do We Do Now? • 85
 Personnel Selection Form
George W. Bush Transition, December 2000

Office:  Secretary of the Treasury

Candidate:  Paul H. O’Neill
Career Summary:  Born in St. Louis, Missouri, 1935
B.A., economics, Fresno State College, California, 1960
M.P.A., Indiana University, 1966
Computer systems analyst, Veterans Administration, 1961–66
Joined U.S. Office of Management and Budget, 1967
Deputy director of OMB, 1974–77
Vice president, International Paper Company, 1977–85
President, International Paper Company, 1985–87
Chairman and CEO, Alcoa, 1987-99

Assessment:
Management
Highest rating in both U.S. government and private industry. But has
been out of government for nearly twenty-five years.
Expertise
Brilliant record at Alcoa. But background in manufacturing sector
concerns Wall Street and financial services industry. Close to Fed
Chairman Alan Greenspan.
Political Skills
Blunt style. Vocal and controversial stands——on issues such as global
warming and gas tax——that are not in keeping with the views of the
president-elect. However, highly recommended by Cheney.
Loyalty
No personal history with president-elect (they met once).
No contribution to campaign.
Personal
Dedicated family man. Deeply involved in community service. Will have
to take multimillion-dollar stock-option loss on entering government.

Decision:  Hired

86  • What Do We Do Now?

Performance Evaluation for President George W. Bush

December 2002
Paul O’Neill
Secretary of the Treasury

Almost from the beginning, Secretary O’Neill has committed a series

of indiscretions, such as telling the Wall Street Journal that Wall
Street professionals are “people who sit in front of a flickering
green screen” and “are not the sort of people you would want to
help you think about complex questions.” The Los Angeles Times has
characterized him as “a man who has elevated candor to a martial
art.” Others have called him “refreshingly candid.”
He has not been available during several stock market meltdowns.
On one such occasion, he was in Africa with Irish rock star Bono.
His relations are strained with several cabinet members who feel
he is trying to poach on their territory, notably EPA administrator
Christine Whitman and Education Secretary Rod Paige. It is also
rumored that House Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas is not
speaking to him. It is an inescapable conclusion that O’Neill
has a tin ear for politics.
The big problem, of course, is that the secretary did not get
behind our 2001 economic stimulus package, and he has made it clear
that he could not publicly support the second round of tax cuts that
you will be proposing.

Decision:
Tell Vice President Cheney to call Secretary O’Neill and ask
him to resign.

What Do We Do Now? • 87
 In Retrospect
Should the presidents have made the hiring decisions they made?

President Reagan: Secretary of State Alexander Haig

“I had admired Haig very much and respected his performance as
commander of NATO,” Reagan wrote in his memoir, An American Life
(Simon & Schuster, 1990), “and [I] selected him as my secretary of state
because of this record and his experience in Washington during the
Nixon years.” But Reagan’s experience with Haig in government left
him somewhat less enamored: “The Al Haig who was my secretary of
state wasn’t the same Al Haig I met when he was at NATO.”
Put aside Haig’s petulant reactions to what he perceived as slights.
They did him no good. But those in powerful positions have been
known before to be offensive. Rather, Haig, who as Nixon’s chief of
staff had been so brilliant at the center of one of the country’s greatest
political crises, had now been defeated in minor combat. Nothing in
the Reagan administration of 1981–82 was remotely comparable to the
Machiavellian intrigues of life in the final days of Watergate, when
James Rosen, John Mitchell’s biographer, considered Haig “perhaps
the era’s shrewdest practitioner of palace politics.” Yet Haig was un-
able to understand, win over, run over, or get around the wall of assis-
tants that defined how Reagan chose to manage his presidency.
Reagan was right. Al Haig wasn’t the person he had a right to expect.
So Reagan did the best that a transitioning president could do: he made
his choice for the right reason—and it turned out to be the wrong choice.

President Clinton: Secretary of Defense Les Aspin

Management was the scale on which Aspin rated lowest. Great manag-
ing skills are not equally in demand in every government department:
John Foster Dulles could be an outstanding secretary of state without
having ever run anything larger than a corner suite in an elite New
York law firm, and Henry Kissinger was a university scholar, not even
an academic administrator, before coming to Washington. But you
can’t survive at the top of the Pentagon with the poor management
abilities of a Les Aspin.

88  • What Do We Do Now?

 The problem, in part, was Bill Clinton’s, as Bob Woodward pointed
out in the Washington Post: “With no military service, and no Wash-
ington or national security policymaking experience, Clinton has come
into office as perhaps the least experienced commander-in-chief in
more than 60 years.” So when Clinton reached out to the chairman of
the House Armed Services Committee, it might have seemed like a
good choice.
But if Clinton had known Aspin—or had deeply inquired about
him—he would have discovered that underneath the expertise was a
ruminating intellectual, fascinated with arcane questions, undisci-
plined, really more the absent-minded professor than focused execu-
tive expected to run an incredibly complex, multibillion-dollar enter-
prise. Even if he had not been wrong on some of the major problems
that faced the president, Aspin should have been marked as a bad
choice to be secretary of defense.

President George W. Bush: Secretary of the Treasury Paul O’Neill

This one is even easier. Paul O’Neill met with Bush and Cheney during
the transition and outlined for them all the reasons he should not be
appointed secretary of the treasury. Some of the reasons were that he
simply didn’t agree with them. His blunt style, regardless of his opin-
ions, would be a liability in media-saturated Washington. And, strange-
ly most important, after twelve years of running Alcoa, he didn’t think
he could be on somebody’s staff. And even the secretary of the treasury
is ultimately a staffer. They would not believe him.
Part of the reason, one can assume, was because Dick Cheney knew
him and admired him when they were both in the Ford administra-
tion. But that had been a quarter century earlier. What is so stunning
about this mistake is how totally self-inflicted it was.

Make several copies of the following personnel selection form and

use them to assess the qualifications of your choices for cabinet-level
positions:

What Do We Do Now? • 89
 Personnel Selection Form
2008 Transition

Office:___________________________________________
Candidate:_______________________________________

Career Summary:
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________
___________________________________________________________________

Assessment:
Management
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Expertise
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Political Skills
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Loyalty
_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Personal


_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Decision:_________________________________________

90  • What Do We Do Now?

“Résumés over there”
Cartoon by Tom Cheney, ©The New Yorker

What Do We Do Now? • 91
 Beyond the Outer Cabinet
Many of your key appointments, some of which are more important
than secretaryship of an outer cabinet department, will be in jobs that
have a fixed term, such as the FBI director. Watch their expiration
dates carefully. This can be as significant as knowing the date on a can
of salmon. The Federal Reserve Board, for example, has seven mem-
bers, but three positions are vacant at present, and another member’s
term expires in January 2009. Thus, concludes the Wall Street Journal
(May 29, 2008), “the next president could have a rare opportunity to
redraw the Federal Reserve’s leadership . . . quickly putting finger-
prints on regulatory policy.” Following are some important chair posi-
tions, with their current officeholders. These appointments are subject
to Senate confirmation.

Plum Jobs
The Plum Book The Prune Book
“The Plum Book” is the name commonly After every presidential election, the Coun-
given to a congressional report, “United cil for Excellence in Government publishes
States Government Policy and Supporting a book aimed at those who may wish to
Positions,” published just after every presi- join the incoming administration at a rela-
dential election, which lists over 7,000 jobs tively high level—“prunes,” according to
in the legislative and executive branches of the authors, are “plums seasoned by wis-
the federal government that may be sub- dom and experience, with a much thicker
ject to noncompetitive appointment. Many skin.” Each volume is different. Past edi-
people seeking positions in the new admin- tions have included “The 60 Toughest Sci-
istration start by checking here to see what ence and Technology Jobs” and “The 45
is available. In 2008 it will be prepared by Toughest Financial Management Jobs.” The
the U.S. Office of Personnel Management 2008–09 edition—the first to be published
(OPM) and published by the Senate Com- online—will highlight “the 25 toughest sub-
mittee on Government Reform. Check cabinet management positions” in the fed-
OPM’s website at www.opm.gov. eral government. See www.excelgov.org.

92  • What Do We Do Now?

 Fixed-Term Appointments

Securities and National Labor

Exchange Commission Relations Board
Christopher Cox, Peter C. Schaumber,
Chairman Chairman
5-year term, expires 2010 2-year term, expires 2010

Federal Communications Surgeon General

Commission Vacant
Kevin J. Martin, Chairman 4-year term
5-year term, expires 2011

Export-Import Bank Equal Employment

James H. Lambright, Opportunity
Chairman Commission
3-year term, expires 2009 Naomi C. Earp, Chair
5-year term, expires 2010

Nuclear Regulatory Federal Bureau of

Commission Investigation
Dale E. Klein, Chairman Robert Mueller, Director
5-year term, expires 2011 10-year term, expires 2011
(can be fired)

Federal Deposit Insurance Joint Chiefs of Staff

Corp. Mike Mullen, Chairman
Sheila C. Bair, Chair 2-year term, expires 2009
5-year term, expires 2011

What Do We Do Now? • 93
 Activities
So much to do and so little time! Once you deal with the first
imperative, which is to concentrate on the White House and
cabinet (the biggest pieces in the puzzle of putting together
a government), many other matters will demand your atten-
tion. But how to handle them all? What about these transi-
tion teams that you are being urged to send into the depart-
ments? Can they help or hinder you in pinpointing what is
necessary to turn campaign promises into the reality of draft
legislation and executive orders? Then there is a meeting
with the president at the White House to prepare for, meet-
ings with the media (stumbling blocks for many a previous
president-elect), and overtures to the civil service. These are
among the “activities” you will be fully engaged in right up
to the inauguration.

Facing page: John T. McCutcheon, Chicago Tribune, 1912?

What Do We Do Now? • 95
CHAPTER 4 Activities

Transition Teams
Past presidents-elect have picked teams of supporters to go into the
executive departments and report on what they think the new execu-
tive should know. The transition teams produce briefing papers that
will be passed along to the people you will eventually appoint to cabi-
net and subcabinet positions.
These temporary jobs will be in great demand. Moreover, taxpayer
money is available for authorized transition costs, so they can even be
paid jobs—perfect for campaign workers who need to be tided over
until you can put them on the permanent payroll. Some supporters,

“My son, you have survived the ordeal by fire and the ordeal by water.
You now face the final challenge—ordeal by media.”
Cartoon by Lee Lorenz, ©The New Yorker

96  • What Do We Do Now?

particularly lobbyists, will not aspire to be on the government payroll
but will still want some type of recognition. Assigning them to transi-
tion teams is a way of providing this recognition on the cheap. Since
your predecessors have done this, what can be wrong with following
their precedent?
Plenty!
Ask those who have had to contend with the havoc such teams have
created for them—the self-important leaks to the media, the time-
consuming meetings, the wires crossed in the departments that had to
be uncrossed when the designated cabinet officers arrived, some re-
ports with the superficiality of campaign handouts.
Commenting on the 1,500-person Reagan transition of 1980, C.
Boyden Gray—who would serve as legal counsel to George H. W.
Bush’s transition—called the teams a “waste of time and money.” Rich-
ard Darman, an executive director of Reagan’s transition, later said, “If
there has been a more colossal waste, I’m not aware of it.” And this
was the best use of transition teams, according to transition expert
Richard Neustadt, who concluded that the teams “get in the way of
serious preparation for governing.”

Simple Cost-Benefit Analysis for Transition Teams

Transition teams can generate political rewards by creating short-term
plum jobs for loyalists. Transition teams also incur political costs, in
terms of expended energy, demands on your key assistants, leaks, and media
distractions. When the costs exceed the rewards, avoid appointing transi-
tion teams.
The rule: the costs almost always exceed the rewards.

Task Forces
Task forces are quite another matter. Are we splitting hairs?
No, the differences between transition teams and task forces have
to do with size, expertise, and assignment. Instead of blockbuster
mandates (“Go figure out what the Interior Department is doing!”),

What Do We Do Now? • 97
 task forces deal with relatively narrow questions that require very spe-
cific solutions.
In 1992, for instance, President-elect Bill Clinton selected William
A. Galston to chair two separate task forces to examine how he could
quickly honor campaign promises to establish a new national service
program and to reform student loan programs. Galston’s explanation
of his student-loan assignment is revealing on at least two fronts—the
focus on a specific problem to be solved, and the quickness with which
the work of the task force led to legislative action:
During the campaign, Clinton had offered two different proposals to
reform the federal student loan program. One was to establish a new
system of direct lending from the federal government to students, by-
passing state-level and private-sector intermediaries. The other was to
allow students to pay their loans back, not on fixed terms, but rather as
a percentage of their earnings over time. Our mission was to figure out
how to redeem these two promises, which we did with the assistance of
highly knowledgeable experts.

The outcome, Galston continued, was that “the direct lending pro-
posal triggered a memorable battle in the Senate, which lasted all sum-
mer and was only resolved with a compromise that allowed a substan-
tial portion of the old system to survive in parallel with the new one.”

Consider Setting up a Task Force

☞When you need specific policy options to solve a narrowly focused problem.
☞When you need the proposals soon.

Reorganizations
You are about to be besieged by reports offering ways to reorganize
parts—or even all—of the government. Some suggestions will come
from task forces you have set in motion. Others will come from well-
meaning and deeply experienced outsiders. There will be calls for cen-
tralizing and calls for decentralizing, for creating new offices and posi-
tions and for abolishing old offices and positions. Some of the ideas will
be good ones and will deserve the most serious consideration; some

98  • What Do We Do Now?

will deserve to be ignored completely. If you have a magic wand to
distinguish the two—wave it.
But always keep this thought in mind: reorganizations come with
costs. And not merely the cost of printing new stationery when you
change the name of an agency, but real political costs. Congressio-
nal committees oversee executive agencies as they currently exist
and may not respond kindly to plans that might move matters out of
their jurisdiction. Changes within agencies
create confusion for the workers, if not outright
hostility. Losing organizational fights—which
The Reinventing
Main Street usually does not care about any-
Government Project
way—will be a black mark in the ledger the me-
dia keep on you. You may wish to make the vice presi-
Of course, some things will need to be changed. dent your reorganization specialist.
What to do? That is what President Clinton did in
1993, when he put Vice President Al
Start with this wise counsel that outgoing
Gore in charge of an interagency task
President Eisenhower gave to incoming Presi- force to determine the challenges that
dent Kennedy at the White House on December federal employees faced on the job and
6, 1960: “Avoid any reorganization until you be- to make recommendations to improve
come well acquainted with the problem.” services, reduce the workforce, and set
Eisenhower clearly thought this was advice customer service standards. It later con-
worth emphasizing: he himself provided the centrated on agencies with a high de-
gree of interaction with the public, such
italics when he recounted his discussion with
as the National Park Service and the In-
Kennedy in his memoirs.
ternal Revenue Service. On the basis of
the task force’s recommendations, Con-
If You Decide a Reorganization Is Necessary
gress adopted savings of about $136 bil-
☞ Always begin with the changes that are easiest to lion and reduced the size of the federal
accomplish. workforce by 17 percent. In May 2000
testimony before a Senate committee,
☞Don’t ask for a constitutional amendment if what
public administration expert Donald F.
you want to accomplish can be done by legislation.
Kettl, now a professor at the University
☞Don’t ask for legislation if what you want to accom- of Pennsylvania, gave the Gore opera-
plish can be done by executive order. tion an overall grade of “B,” saying there
☞Don’t issue an executive order if what you want can was “room for improvement.”
be accomplished with a handshake.

What Do We Do Now? • 99
 Pick a Presidential Portrait

Abraham Lincoln by George Henry Story (1835–1922)

Hung in the Oval Office during the presidency of George W. Bush.

100  • What Do We Do Now?

The Contrariness Principle
George W. Bush did not make Bill Clinton’s mistakes, and you will not
make George W. Bush’s mistakes. Each president has a mandate to be
different. Although the drive to be different is clearest when there is a
change of party, it can happen even when the president’s successor is
the vice president. The principle of contrariness—the desire to do
things differently than your predecessor did—is that strong.
Consider these contrary actions:
☞Newly inaugurated President Kennedy disbanded President Eisenhower’s
National Security Council staff and consequently was left without a prop-
erly functioning advisory body in the White House during the Bay of Pigs
crisis.
☞Newly installed President Carter wanted to tear down the so-called Berlin
Wall that characterized Nixon’s White House under chief of staff Bob Hal-
deman and policy adviser John Ehrlichman. Deciding to have no chief of
staff, Carter initially performed tasks that should have been handled by
subordinates.
☞Newly installed President Clinton’s choice of Thomas “Mack” McLarty as
chief of staff is a contrary action if viewed as a response to the sharp-edged
management of John Sununu in the George H. W. Bush White House.
In the rush to change, it takes courage to guard against taking ac-
tions simply because of their provenance. A case in point is George W.
Bush’s vigorous record of attempting to expand—he would say restore—
presidential powers, many of which related to prosecuting the war on
terrorism. You will have to consider these carefully along the security–
civil rights axis. But other actions grew out of his reaction to the chip-
ping away of powers—once hailed as Rooseveltian—in the wake of
Vietnam, Watergate, and President Clinton’s personal scandals.
In the tug-of-war of between Articles I and II of the Constitution—
Congress up, President down; President up, Congress down—these
are delicate days. Weigh carefully your—and future presidents’—insti-
tutional interest in preserving executive power.

What Do We Do Now? • 101
 The White House Meeting
You are going to have the obligatory session with the president in the
Oval Office. Your spouses, perhaps, will go off to tour the residence. Is
this meeting just a courtesy call—or is it something more?
A good question.
Outgoing President Herbert Hoover wanted incoming President
Franklin D. Roosevelt to jointly deal with the nation’s banking crisis;
Roosevelt refused, knowing that he would soon have the power to
work out his own solution. Outgoing President Lyndon Johnson want-
ed to call Congress into special session to consider the Nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty; incoming President Richard Nixon preferred to
deal with the issue on his own terms.
There was a very different sort of interaction between the outgoing
and incoming presidents in 1980. President Jimmy Carter was engaged
in delicate negotiations for the release of American hostages in Iran.
President-elect Ronald Reagan wanted the negotiations to be conclud-
ed by the time he took office and let it be known that the Iranians
would not get a better deal from him. The hostages were released mo-
ments after Reagan took the oath of office on January 20, 1981.
Between his defeat in November 1992 and leaving office the follow-
ing January, President George H. W. Bush sent troops to Somalia in a
humanitarian effort to relieve the suffering caused by the country’s
civil war. Bush sought and received the support of President-elect Bill
Clinton. According to Clinton’s memoirs, “Bush’s national security ad-
visor, General Brent Scowcroft, had told [Clinton aide] Sandy Berger
they would be home before my inauguration.” But that was not to be.
Eighteen Army Rangers were killed in the Battle of Mogadishu on Oc-
tober 3–4, 1993, and a few days later Clinton declared that all U.S.
troops would be withdrawn by March 31, 1994. “The battle of Mogadi-
shu haunted me,” Clinton wrote. “I thought I knew how President
Kennedy felt after the Bay of Pigs.”

102  • What Do We Do Now?

Preparing for Your Meeting with the President
☞Have your staff “game-play” what the president will want from you and
possible responses.
☞Compile a list of questions to ask the president. Do you want his assess-
ment of world leaders, friends, and foes? Of areas of government that work
well, need improvement, should be scrapped? Best use of the cabinet? Les-
sons from National Security arrangements? While you may view these as
courtesy questions, his answers may surprise you!
☞After you have had your one-on-one session, what others should be invited
in? National security team? The economics team?
☞Are there matters for which you may wish to request the president’s future
involvement?
☞The White House press corps will expect a statement of how useful the
meeting has been.

Reaching Out to Your Government

To incoming President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the permanent employ-
ees of the federal government—the bureaucrats he was charged by the
Constitution to lead—were a bunch of entrenched conservatives. To
incoming President Richard Nixon, they were akin to a branch office
of Moscow on the Potomac. It is expected that you will engage in some
early stroking of the civil service: perhaps a message, perhaps a day of
assemblies among the various departments. But after years of hearing
the candidates of both parties campaign against “the mess in Washing-
ton,” a few nice words are not likely to have a strong impact.
Part of the reason the effort will be unheeded is that neither you nor
your cabinet officials are going to have much to do with most govern-
ment employees. This is how it works inside a government agency:
most of the interaction between your political government and the
permanent government takes place between high-ranking civil ser-
vants and your subcabinet (usually at the deputy assistant secretary
level). Based on the quality of your subcabinet officials—their style and
generosity, how articulate they are at explaining your policies, how

What Do We Do Now? • 103
 well they listen, the way they seek information and advice—the word
will go out, and down, to the rest of government.
Two groups of civil servants are a must to have on your team: the
senior executives and Grade 15’s.

The Senior Executive Service

This is a unique personnel system that includes most of the top mana-
gerial, supervisory, and policy positions in the executive branch that
are not required to be filled by presidential appointment and confirmed
by the Senate. In 2008, senior executive service salaries ranged from
$114,468 to $158,500.

Grade 15 of the General Schedule

This is the highest level of the system that employs most government
workers. There are ten salary steps at each grade. The maximum pay in
2008 at the highest GS-15 step was $124,010.
Here’s my advice: put away the shotgun for spraying your rhetorical
praise over the federal government and take careful aim at these key
members of the permanent government. Set up small meetings. As-
sume that they want to help. Assume that they know a lot more than
your appointees about the substance of federal programs. Advise your
appointees to listen carefully to what they are being told about how
power flows within a department, between agencies, and between the
agencies and the congressional committees that have oversight re-
sponsibility for them.
If this does not improve government, you can always revive Presi-
dent-elect George H. W. Bush’s address to an audience of senior bu-
reaucrats in which he praised them as “unsung heroes.”

Getting Good Press, Avoiding Bad Press

In the beginning you will have to work hard to get bad press. Even the
unloved Nixon got favorable press at first—in part by cleverly unveiling
his entire cabinet at one time on television. Nor did it hurt that Nixon’s
transition headquarters was located on bustling Fifth Avenue in New
York City.

104  • What Do We Do Now?

 Poor Bill Clinton: Little Rock was not
a place to amuse a bored national press
corps. But the real problem was the ab-
sence of hard news. So the reporters
stared at the walls of their rooms in the
Capitol Hotel and wrote stories like this
by Susan Bennett of the Philadelphia
Inquirer: “Thanks to snippets of video
and a few remarks on the run, it is known
that President-elect Clinton likes a
morning jog and weekend golf. What is
not known after more than thirty days of
the transition is anything of substance.”
No appointments were announced until
the transition’s sixth week.
The transition press corps is a curi-
ous hybrid of campaign reporters and
White House regulars. The campaign
reporters may feel they know you but
not the presidency, while the White Cartoon by Herblock, following
House regulars may know the presiden- Nixon’s election in 1968, courtesy
cy but not you. They arrive with a of the Herbert Block Foundation
healthy curiosity—and perhaps even a
little goodwill.
But the so-called honeymoon period is not really reporters trying to
be nice. In fact, it has nothing to do with niceness. Rather, it’s the con-
junction of two definitions of “good news” at the start of any presidency.
Good news for journalists means fresh and interesting stories, while
good news for presidents means favorable stories. New people and new
policies usually add up to fresh and interesting stories, which hence
tend to be favorable.
The trick, of course, is to “feed the beast,” as they say in the
White House press corps. Give reporters “a constant supply of
doggie biscuits,” claimed the press secretary of former senator and
Clinton treasury secretary Lloyd Bentsen, and they will “gleefully

What Do We Do Now? • 105
 lick the hand that fed them.” Run out of treats, and they will “de-
vour your arm.”
So what should your press office do when you are behind closed
doors deliberating on your choice of cabinet officials?
☞Manufacture news. An experienced press operation—which at that time
did not describe Clinton’s youthful team of George Stephanopoulos and
Dee Dee Myers—would have followed the example of President Eisenhow-
er’s press secretary, Jim Hagerty, who produced a continual stream of
“news”—events, meetings, reports—even as the president himself was re-
covering from a heart attack.
☞Bring in the experts. If there are to be long pauses between announce-
ments, have your press team engage reporters on the issues that you will
be confronting in the next four years. Use policy experts to put on daily
briefings on economic, diplomatic, military, scientific, geographic, demo-
graphic, and social policy. An educated press corps can’t be all bad.

Holding Press Conferences

You may have trouble making the adjustment from being covered by
the campaign press corps to the White House press corps. Bill Clinton
did. Less than two months after taking office he told the White House
regulars, “I can stiff you,” talk show host Larry King recounted in his
book Anything Goes (Grand Central, 2000), because “Larry King liber-
ated me by giving me to the American people directly.”
But the fact of the matter is that you are not going to appear on
Larry King—or Bill O’Reilly or Keith Olbermann—every night. You are
going to appear on the evening news programs and in tomorrow morn-
ing’s headlines. And these stories are produced by sixty or so reporters
at the daily press briefings. And you’ll need to prepare for sudden shifts
in who’s reporting: News organizations often reassign reporters when
a presidential administration changes. Continuing turbulence in the
media industry may also reduce the number of reporters assigned to
the expensive White House beat.
An excellent way for you to try to control the flow of information in
your first year is to hold frequent, full-dress, televised press conferences.

106  • What Do We Do Now?

This is exactly what the White House press corps says it wants—and this
is exactly what many of your predecessors have been eager to avoid.
The press conference has a mythical reputation as a breathtaking
contest between reporters and the president. Columnist William
Rusher once called them “metaphorical bullfights. The president is
the bull. The excitement stems from the tension over which of the ma-
jor protagonists will triumph—the bull or the matador.” While Rush-
er’s characterization may be more exaggeration than truth, it is in your
interest not to disturb this impression.
First, you can exert considerable control over the press conference
with your opening statement, with scripted answers to expected ques-
tions, the occasional plant of a question with a friendly reporter, as
well as your skill with a Kennedyesque quip, or a deliberately confus-
ing response in the manner of Eisenhower. Or you can simply decline
to answer on the grounds of national security.
Second, don’t be intimidated. Questioners often sound confronta-
tional, and their questions often sound tough. (For the journalists, this
is good for business and their egos.) But deconstruct the transcripts
and you will see how easily you can parry what is coming. You would
have to look long and hard to find an instance of a clever questioner
forcing a president to reveal information that he wanted to keep to
himself. And while it is true that you could seriously misspeak, this has
happened only once in the history of presidential press conferences
(when Truman implied that the atomic bomb might be used against
China during the Korean War).
Finally, hold frequent press conferences. What is “frequent?” Presi-
dent George W. Bush has averaged only about six a year. If you hold
one press conference every other week (twenty-six a year), you will be
hailed in the media for having restored “a critically important means
of communication.” Moreover, holding frequent press conferences al-
most guarantees that you will rarely be surprised—because most of the
questions will be about things that have happened in the two weeks
since you last faced the press.
Preparing for the press takes time, always a scarce commodity. But
you should make frequent press conferences an important part of your

What Do We Do Now? • 107
 2008 White House Press Corps

CNN Reuters ABC

Ed Henry Caren Bohan Martha Raddatz
Elaine Quijano Tabassum Zakaria John Hendren
Suzanne Malveaux

AP Radio New York Times Washington Post

Mark Smith Steven Lee Myers Michael Abramowitz
Sheryl Gay Stolberg Dan Eggen

ABC News Radio National Public Radio Washington Times

Ann Compton Don Gonyea Jon Ward
David Greene

Hearst Newspapers Voice of America Newsday

Scott Stearns Craig Gordon
Paula Wolfson

Houston Chronicle FOX Radio Salem Radio Network

Julie Mason Rich Johnson Greg Clugston

Dow Jones Scripps Howard Baltimore Sun
Henry J. Pulizzi News Service David Nitkin
Ann McFeatters

Washington Examiner BNA New York Post

Nancy Ognanovich Charles Hurt

Sources: Julie Mason, Houston Chronicle, Mark Knoller, CBS Radio.

108  • What Do We Do Now?

 PODIUM

Helen Thomas CBS Associated Press NBC

Bill Plante Terry Hunt David Gregory
Jim Axelrod Ben Feller John Yang
Jennifer Loven
Deb Riechmann

FOX News Bloomberg CBS Radio Wall Street Journal

Bret Baier Edwin Chen Mark Knoller John D. McKinnon
Wendell Goler Roger Runningen Peter Maer
Mike Emanuel

Los Angeles Times Cox News Service USA Today Agence France-
James Gerstenzang Ken Herman David Jackson Presse
Olivier Knox
Laurent Lozano

Chicago Tribune McClatchy National Journal American Urban

Mark Silva William Douglas Alexis Simendinger Radio Networks
David Lightman April Ryan

CCH U.S. News Time Newsweek

Paula Cruickshank Kenneth T. Walsh Massimo Calabresi Holly Bailey
Richard Wolffe
Media News Boston Globe UPI Politico
Marie Horrigan Mike Allen

New York Daily News San Diego Union-Tribune Dallas Morning Christian Science
Kenneth R. Bazinet George E. Condon Jr. News Monitor
Finlay Lewis Todd J. Gillman Linda Feldman

What Do We Do Now? • 109
 strategy of getting your presidency off to a fast start. Just as the public
is forming its indelible image of you as president, you’ll be stepping
into the bullring.

Press Conference Tips

☞Your press officers should be able to accurately predict 95 percent of the
questions you will be asked. If they can’t, make changes!
☞Your chief of staff must be sure that you have the facts and data to back up
your answers to expected questions.
☞Don’t avoid tough questions. They make for better answers. (If you’re
prepared.)
☞Count on your press secretary, who runs the morning gaggle and the daily
briefing, to alert you to what’s going on with “the regulars” (marriages,
births, even bad news).
☞Although they are not usually “regulars,” call on foreign correspondents
and regional reporters from time to time. It will pay dividends.

Living with Leaks

Leaks, said President Ford in an extraordinary understatement, are a
“real pain.” Even life in the Senate can’t prepare you for the high-level
attention they will command within your White House. While prepar-
ing yourself for life at the top of a leaky government, it is useful to un-
derstand who the leakers are and what steps you might take to keep
leaks from causing too many distractions.
If you are like your predecessors, you will first blame leaks on the
bureaucrats. But it is a rare bureaucrat who engages in leaking. The
civil servants’ world faces inward. They know how to work within
their own agency to thwart you. In contrast, most journalists are out-
side their ken and represent risk beyond possible gain. You may next
choose to blame press offices. But press offices try to avoid a practice
that antagonizes the reporters who do not receive the leaks.
And then you realize: the leakers are your own people—your ap-
pointees. New York Times columnist James Reston used to say that the
ship of state is the only vessel that leaks from the top.

110  • What Do We Do Now?

 President Carter was right. There is no “effective way to deal with
the situation.” Attempts to stop leakers—which might involve wire-
taps and lie detectors—are always painful, sometimes illegal, rarely
successful, and inevitably receive bad press.
So what to do?
☞Keep the classification of documents within reasonable bounds.
☞Do not tempt journalists by stamping “secret” on a document unless the
purpose is to get something in the media.
☞Be prepared to make a case with editors not to publish some documents.
☞Use cabinet and staff meetings to remind high-level appointees of their ob-
ligations not to discuss sensitive information with members of the press.
☞Consider personality as a factor in making top appointments: rivals with-
in your own administration, working at cross-purposes, will be destined to
produce leaks.
☞Finally, keep in mind these wise words of Nixon’s secretary of state, Henry
Kissinger: “Most of the leaks—if you are philosophical about it—go away.
I mean, they’re unpleasant, but so what? If you ignore them, most of them
are not of that huge significance.”

Tales out of School

When I was on the White House staff in the closing years of the Eisen-
hower presidency, we had an informal rule: the President has the right
to tell his story first—then the staff can pile on. The one exception, in
our collective opinion, was that Chief of Staff Sherman Adams, who
was driven out of government following a scandal, should have the
right to defend himself in book form. Eisenhower left office on Janu-
ary 20, 1961; his memoirs were published in 1963. Robert Gray, the sec-
retary to the cabinet, broke our rule when his Eighteen Acres under
Glass (Doubleday) was published in 1962. Even though it was an in-
nocuous “insider” book, we were incensed by what we considered dis-
courtesy to the president.

What Do We Do Now? • 111
 Why Leakers Leak

The Ego Leak

Giving information primarily to satisfy a sense of self-importance: in effect,
“I am important because I can give you information that is important.” This
type of leak is popular with staff, who have fewer outlets for ego tripping.
Assistants like to tell (and embellish) tales of struggle among their superi-
ors. I believe ego is the most frequent cause of leaking, although it may not
account for the major leaks. Other Washington observers disagree. Many
reporters and officials prefer to think of leaks as more manipulative and
mysterious, but this, of course, also serves their egos.

The Goodwill Leak

A play for a future favor: the primary purpose is to accumulate credit with
a reporter, which the leaker hopes can be spent at a later date. This type of
leak is often on a subject with which the leaker has little or no personal in-
volvement and happens because most players in governmental Washington
gather a great deal of extraneous information in the course of their business
and social lives.

The Policy Leak

A straightforward pitch for or against a proposal using some document or
insider’s information as the lure to get more attention than might be other-
wise justified. The great leaks, such as the Pentagon papers in 1971, often fit
in this category.

The most critical book by a former Eisenhower staffer, Emmet

John Hughes’s Ordeal of Power (Atheneum), came out in 1963. Ac-
cording to Texas A&M professor Martin Medhurst, “When JFK read
the book, he was appalled that someone with such access could dis-
play such disloyalty to his principal. He ordered that no one on his
staff was ever to produce such an exposé once his administration left
office. No one did.”

112  • What Do We Do Now?

The Animus Leak
Used to settle grudges. Information is disclosed to embarrass another
person.

The Trial-Balloon Leak

Revealing a proposal that is under consideration in order to assess its assets
and liabilities. Usually proponents have too much invested in a proposal to
want to leave it to the vagaries of the press and public opinion. More likely,
those who send up a trial balloon want to see it shot down, and because it is
easier to generate opposition to almost anything than it is to build support,
this is the most likely effect.

The Whistle-Blower Leak

Unlike the others, usually employed by career personnel. Going to the press
may be the last resort of frustrated civil servants who feel they cannot cor-
rect a perceived wrong through regular government channels. Whistle-
blowing is not synonymous with leaking; some whistle-blowers are willing
to state their case in public.

Leaks can be meant to serve more than one purpose, which complicates
attempts to explain the motivation behind a particular leak. An ego leak
and a goodwill leak need not be mutually exclusive; a policy leak also could
work as an animus leak, especially since people on each side of a grudge
tend to divide along policy lines; and all leaks can have policy implications
regardless of motive.

Source: Adapted from Stephen Hess, The Government/Press Connection: Press

Officers and Their Offices (Brookings, 1984).

For Jimmy Carter the tales-out-of-school came when James

Fallows left the White House to become Washington editor of the
Atlantic and wrote “The Passionless Presidency” for that magazine
(May 1979). In the New York Times, under the four-column headline
“Ex-Speech Writer Views Carter as ‘Arrogant, Complacent and Inse-
cure,’” the UPI story began, “James Fallows, President Carter’s former
chief speech writer, says that Mr. Carter took office ‘in profound igno-

What Do We Do Now? • 113
 rance’ of his job and had made matters worse ‘by a combination of ar-
rogance, complacency and insecurity.’” Fallows’s assessment included
“insider gossip,” such as naming the cabinet members that “the White
House inner circle ‘detest[s].’” According to Time, Fallows “seems to
have been surprised when the press publicized the nastiest quotes
from his piece” and said his article “had been misinterpreted.”
Other less-than-flattering accounts of presidents written by insid-
ers while their presidents were still in office (who had not been fired or
resigned in protest) include Clinton communications director George
Stephanopoulos’s All Too Human (Little, Brown, 1999) and George
W. Bush press secretary Scott McClellan’s What Happened: Inside the
Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception (Public
Affairs, 2008).

Lessons to Apply to Your Transition

☞Make clear to your appointees that they are not there to be historians-in-
residence or future journalists.
☞Frank and open discussion is not possible if participants are taking notes
for their memoirs.
☞Insider accounts published while you are president will be viewed as intol-
erable behavior.

Getting Rid of Deadwood

If you are like most presidents before you, you will be notoriously bad at
firing people. This inability is almost a presidential trait. But a year from
now you will know whom you should not have hired in the first place.
In some cases you will have to fire someone because a dereliction of
public trust is involved or because you need to send a warning to other
appointees. In most cases, however, you will simply want the sacked
appointee to go away as quietly as possible, without making a fuss.
The easiest way to remove someone is to offer him or her another
position. This assumes that the unwanted person is not untalented,
but merely in the wrong place. To find the right place involves the fine
art of equivalency, balancing the prestige of two different positions.

114  • What Do We Do Now?

 The master at playing equivalency was President Lyndon Johnson.
To remove Robert McNamara as defense secretary, Johnson offered
McNamara the presidency of the World Bank. (McNamara accepted.)
For Health, Education, and Welfare Secretary Anthony Celebrezze,
LBJ dangled a federal judgeship at the U.S. Court of Appeals. (A dis-
trict court appointment would have been too low.) For Postmaster
General John Gronouski, the first Polish American to serve in a presi-
dent’s cabinet, what could be better than getting appointed U.S. am-
bassador to Poland? (It is an added plus for the president if the new job
is out of Washington.)
Other presidents paid a price for not understanding how equiva-
lency works. If President Reagan had offered his chief of staff, Donald
Regan, an appointment such as ambassador extraordinary and pleni-
potentiary to the Court of St. James’s, perhaps the fired Regan would
not have written a destructive best seller about life in the Reagan
White House while Reagan was still living there. Reagan’s predeces-
sor, Jimmy Carter, had no aptitude for firing people nicely, as when he
abruptly asked for the resignations of five cabinet officers in July 1979
after concluding there was a “crisis of confidence” among the Ameri-
can people.
Assuming you can skillfully remove appointees you come to con-
sider deadwood, there is more good news: you will know what you
want. You may even know whom you want. Given a second chance,
the historical odds are great that you will pick the right person. After
President Eisenhower cut loose Labor Secretary Martin Durkin, he
turned to labor-management specialist James Mitchell, a choice that
was even hailed at the AFL-CIO. President Johnson’s replacement at
Health, Education, and Welfare was John W. Gardner, who became
the architect of Johnson’s Great Society program. President Nixon
was delighted with his new treasury secretary, John B. Connally, af-
ter finding an equivalency for Chicago banker David M. Kennedy.
(Kennedy became ambassador-at-large, negotiating trade matters
around the world.) President Clinton’s second defense secretary,
William Perry, rates high on the lists of those who make their living
ranking defense secretaries. In fact, it is difficult to find an occasion

What Do We Do Now? • 115
 in which a president did worse after deliberately making a midterm
cabinet correction.

Mea Culpas
You will make mistakes other than just appointing the wrong person to
a cabinet position—all presidents do. But not all presidents admit their
mistakes and convince us that they understand why something was a
mistake. This, of course, can be the biggest mistake of all.
If you make a mistake and quickly issue a heartfelt mea culpa, it is
possible that the media and the public will move on to the next story.
That should have been the lesson from President John F. Kennedy’s
public admission that he had made a mistake by ordering the invasion
at Cuba’s Bay of Pigs. It is possible that with a meaningful mea culpa—
and the jailing of a few co-conspirators—President Nixon would have
survived Watergate and not had to resign the presidency.
The one exception to the mea culpa rule is President Bill Clinton’s
affair with Monica Lewinsky. Had the president’s relationship with the
intern been quickly confessed, the president would have been toast.
His presidency was saved by a long stall during which the opposition
overplayed its hand.
Here are some examples of how some of your predecessors admit-
ted (or didn’t admit) their mistakes:

“ There is an old saying that victory

has a hundred fathers and defeat is an
orphan. . . . I am the responsible officer of the
government and that is quite obvious.

”
President John F. Kennedy on the Bay of Pigs (April 21, 1961)

116  • What Do We Do Now?

 “ People have got to know whether
or not their President is a crook.
Well, I’m not a crook. I’ve earned

”
everything I’ve got.

President Richard Nixon on Watergate (November 17, 1973)

“ First, let me say I take full

responsibility for my own actions and for those of my
administration. . . . A few months ago I told the American
people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best
intentions still tell me that’s true, but the facts and
the evidence tell me it is not.

”
President Ronald Reagan on Iran-Contra (March 4, 1987)

“ Now, I have to go back to work on my

State of the Union, and I worked on it until pretty late last
night. But I want to say one thing to the American people. I want
you to listen to me. I’m going to say this again: I did not have sexual
relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky. I never told anybody to lie,
not a single time; never. These allegations are false, and I need to go
back to work for the American people.

”
Thank you.

President Bill Clinton on the Monica Lewinsky affair (January 26, 1998)

What Do We Do Now? • 117
 Pick a Presidential Portrait

Franklin D. Roosevelt by Elizabeth Shoumatoff (1888–1980)

Hung in the Oval Office during the presidency of Lyndon Johnson.

118  • What Do We Do Now?

It’s Not All Work!
If by now you feel institutional forces encircling you, it is worth re-
membering that being president need not be a grim experience. Some
presidents have had a very good time. (A lot depends on personality.)
It may be a bit much to think of the White House as a pleasure pal-
ace, but I recall President Eisenhower on sunny afternoons in tan
sweater, cap, and golf shoes walking through the doors of the Oval
Office onto the South Lawn to practice some swings. Not being a golfer,
I once asked his Secret Service escort for instruction and was told that
Ike used a nine iron to loft a shot over an obstacle and stop dead. (When
I returned to the White House staff eight years later, President Nixon
decided to replace the Oval Office’s cork floor—badly pockmarked by
golf shoes—and Nixon’s secretary, Rose Mary Woods, asked me for a
list of Ike’s friends who might like a square as a remembrance.)
Ike was also a great movie fan, and whenever I walked past the
White House theater in the East Wing I’d check the cans of film to see
what the president had watched last night. One I remember was Gun-
fighters of Abilene, starring Buster Crabbe. Jim Hagerty, the press sec-
retary, told me the president’s favorite movie was Angel in the Outfield,
something to do with a baseball team aided by divine guidance (not to
be confused with a later Walt Disney film of nearly the same name).
As president, you can also see movies at Camp David, your week-
end retreat in Maryland’s Catoctin Mountains. President Eisenhower
took British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan there in 1960 to dis-
cuss nuclear weapons tests, and they watched The Mouse That Roared:
the tale of a tiny country that declares war on the United States, figur-
ing that the loss will bring American aid and solve its economic prob-
lems; instead the invaders capture our secret bomb and bring peace to
the world by threatening its use.
As for other entertainment possibilities, if you’d like to book a mu-
sical group or a soloist for a dinner party, just give a call—usually they
are delighted to show up. Invite your friends and staff. Oddly, I was
there for one of the most thrilling evenings and one of the most disap-
pointing in the history of White House performances.

What Do We Do Now? • 119
 The disappointing evening first: In September 1959 Nikita Khrush-
chev became the first Soviet leader to visit the United States. It was a big
moment in the cold war. For the White House event we dressed in
“white tie” (in the manner of Fred Astaire), while the commissars wore
business suits. (Fortunately I found a going-out-of-business store that
sold the tails for $19.95, and slightly less than $40 with the dress shirt,
collar, and tie.) We climbed the long flight of marble stairs leading up to
the gold ballroom with the delicate crystal chandeliers, took our seats,
quickly rose as the center doors swung open to admit the Eisenhowers
and the Khrushchevs. Now the entertainment: As reported by President
Eisenhower in his memoirs, “This evening’s program consisted of some
robust music by Fred Waring and his Pennsylvanians that our guest
seemed to enjoy thoroughly.” My notes, however, read, “The Russian en-
tourage sat stone-faced through the tepid choral performance.”
(In fairness to music at the Eisenhower White House, on another
evening we heard Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic
play a Mozart concerto and Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.” My notes
that night, however, were more about Secretary of Defense Thomas
Gates “suddenly ill three rows in front of us. . . . Another person far
more interested in Mr. Gates’s health than in the music was Paul Hume,
music critic for the Washington Post.”)
Now the thrilling evening: April 29, 1969. Gather in the East Room
to celebrate Duke Ellington’s seventieth birthday. Imagine “Sophisti-
cated Lady,” “Mood Indigo,” “Take the ‘A’
Train,” “I Got It Bad (And That Ain’t
A tape recording of the Duke Ellington Good),” and “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It
birthday concert was produced for the Ain’t Got That Swing)” performed by jazz
Voice of America by Willis Conover. It is greats Dizzy Gillespie, Gerry Mulligan,
available on CD as “Duke Ellington 1969: Paul Desmond, Billy Taylor, J. J. Johnson,
All-Star White House Tribute” on the Blue Louie Bellson, Clark Terry, Earl Hines,
Note label. Also see Leonard Garment’s
Marian McPartland, Hank Jones, Milt
Crazy Rhythm: From Brooklyn and Jazz to
Hinton, Urbie Green, Jim Hall, Bill Berry,
Nixon’s White House, Watergate, and Be-
yond (Da Capo Press, 2001).
Lou Rawls, Mary Mayo, and Joe Williams.
And Richard Nixon plays “Happy Birth-
day” in the key of G. To which Ellington

120  • What Do We Do Now?

improvises “Pat,” a song for First Lady Pat Nixon. The excitement of
being among the hundred guests: Isn’t that Richard Rodgers, Harold
Arlen, Cab Calloway, Billy Eckstine, Otto Preminger, Willie “The Lion”
Smith, Vice President Spiro Agnew?
At midnight, the President says good night, but urges guests to stay
around for a jam session and dancing. The chairs are cleared. Len Gar-
ment, White House aide and former Nixon law partner, who once
played tenor sax with Woody Herman, and is most responsible for the
Ellington tribute, thinks the East Room has been “transformed into
the old Cotton Club.” The last of us leaves at 2:45 a.m.
So you see: It’s not all work.

What Do We Do Now? • 121
 A Checklist for the President-Elect

✔ Prioritize policy goals. What to start on Day One and what are long-
term objectives.

✔ Design White House organizational plan to balance efficiency and cre-

ativity with my work habits.

✔ First appointments: White House staff, starting with 5 positions needed

to identify, vet, announce, and confirm Cabinet.

COMPLETE WHITE HOUSE STAFF BY THANKSGIVING

✔ Make National Security and Economic appointments in clusters. Special

attention to personality factors that can affect close cooperation.

✔ Highlight the message when announcing appointments. Do not leave

impression of randomness.

✔ When picking the rest of the Cabinet, consider honorific add-ons for
demographic and political purposes.

✔ Stress to nominees that it is unacceptable to write about my presidency

while I’m still president.

122  • What Do We Do Now?

COMPLETE CABINET BY CHRISTMAS

✔ Appoint transition teams for political reasons, if necessary.

✔ Appoint task forces to move policy commitments.

✔ Schedule meetings with the following:

Budget Director (review of next fiscal year options)

Outgoing president

Congressional leaders

Cabinet

Inaugural committees

Speechwriters (discuss themes for inaugural address)

White House usher (living arrangements, special needs)

NOMINEES PREPARED FOR CONFIRMATION HEARINGS, JANUARY 3

OATH OF OFFICE, JANUARY 20

What Do We Do Now? • 123
 The Inauguration
Dress warmly, Mr. President. I still remember my first
Inauguration Day in Washington—January 20, 1961. John
F. Kennedy would be sworn in as the new president at
noon. Snowfall the night before had left eight inches on the
ground. The temperature was 22° F when he took the oath
of office and, in the words of Michael Kernan in the Wash-
ington Post, “The cold wind whisked the cheers from the
mouths of the crowd.”
But even that day was not a record. The temperature was
4° F at Grant’s second inauguration in 1873. It was 55° F for
Reagan’s first inauguration in 1981, the warmest on record.
May you too be a lucky president.

What Do We Do Now? • 125
CHAPTER 5 The Inauguration

At the Capitol
The ceremony itself is fairly formulaic (see the list of inaugural events
on page 127), but there is still room for individual touches. President
Carter shed the usual morning coat and striped pants for a standard
business suit. President Reagan moved the ceremony to the Capitol’s
west front terrace from the traditional East Portico. (So you will now
face the Mall and an audience of many thousands.)
Within patriotic limits, you can choose the musical selections.
A chorus from Atlanta University sang “The Battle Hymn of the Re-
public” at Carter’s inauguration. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir
sang “This Is My Country” for President Nixon. The Marine Band
performed Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man” at the
inauguration of President Clinton. Pick a grand voice for “The Star-
Spangled Banner.” Past presidents chose the operatic voices of Dor-
othy Maynor (Eisenhower), Marian Anderson (Kennedy), and Mar-
ilyn Horne (Clinton). President Kennedy opened a new vein of
creativity by asking Robert Frost to recite a poem; a second poet,
Maya Angelou, read for Clinton.
Choosing the “right” clergy will be
According to the National Oceanic and noted, of course. Kennedy’s invocation
Atmospheric Administration, average noon- was delivered by Richard Cardinal Cush-
time conditions for January 20 are about
ing, Archbishop of Boston, a close family
37˚ F with partly cloudy skies and wind of
friend. Billy Graham was there for Nix-
about 10 miles per hour. There is about a
15 percent chance of precipitation during
on, George H. W. Bush, and Clinton. Al-
the inaugural event, but only a 5 percent most as difficult as trying to select a cabi-
chance of snow. There is about a 30 percent net that “looks like America“ is trying to
chance that there will be snow on the arrange a “four faiths” inaugural cere-
ground from a previous snowfall. mony, in which your options include
Catholic, Protestant (possibly one white,

126  • What Do We Do Now?

 Inauguration Day Events
The Joint Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies has overseen the inaugural ceremonies at
the U.S. Capital since 1901. The following events are the highlights of the day:

Morning Worship Service Inaugural Address

This tradition began in 1933 when Franklin The tradition of delivering an inaugural
and Eleanor Roosevelt attended a church address began with George Washington’s
service at St. John’s Episcopal Church across inauguration on April 30, 1789, in New
Lafayette Square from the White House. York City. Only five presidents never gave
an inaugural address: John Tyler, Millard
Procession to the Capitol Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Chester Arthur,
The outgoing president and the president- and Gerald Ford.
elect ride together from the White House
to the Capitol. This has been a tradition, Inaugural Luncheon
with few exceptions, since Martin Van Buren The luncheon, held in the Capitol’s Statuary
and Andrew Jackson took the trip in 1837. Hall and hosted by the Joint Congressional
Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, dates
Swearing-in of the Vice President back to 1897.
The vice president’s swearing-in was held
in the Senate chamber, separate from the Inaugural Parade
president’s swearing-in, until 1937, when the The inaugural parade is a tradition that also
ceremony was moved to the outside plat- began with George Washington’s first in-
form. Since World War II, the oath of office auguration. The parade first took place in
has been administered by a person chosen Washington, D.C., for Thomas Jefferson’s
by the vice president. inauguration in 1801. Women first partici-
pated in 1917, and the first televised parade
Swearing-in of the President occurred in 1949.
The president’s oath of office is prescribed
by Article II, Section 1, Clause 8 of the Con- Inaugural Ball
stitution, but the Constitution says nothing This tradition began with Dolley Madison’s
about the inaugural ceremony. hosting a gala in 1809. Charity balls became
the fashion in the 1920s and 1930s. Official
balls are now planned by the Presidential
Inaugural Committee.

Source: Joint Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies website (inaugural.senate.gov).

What Do We Do Now? • 127
 one African American), Jewish, and Greek Orthodox. There has not yet
been a Muslim.
Immediately before you take the oath of office, your vice president
will be sworn in. There is no set protocol for the vice presidential
swearing-in. The oath of office was administered to Vice President
Lyndon Johnson by his fellow Texan, Speaker of the House Sam
Rayburn. Vice President Richard Nixon chose a fellow Californian, Sen-
ator William Knowland, and Vice President Dan Quayle chose Supreme
Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. The oath of office was adminis-
tered to Vice President Al Gore by retired Justice Thurgood Marshall.
Once this is done, you will join the chief justice of the United States
and place your hand on a Bible, opened to a passage if you wish. You

“Okay, bring in the new guy . . . ”

 artoon by Tony Auth, ©2006 The Philadelphia Inquirer, used by
C
permission of Universal Press Syndicate. All rights reserved

128  • What Do We Do Now?

will then repeat the thirty-five-word oath from Article II, Section I of
the Constitution:
I, ________________ , do solemnly swear [or affirm] that I will faithfully
execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best
of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United
States.

You will probably also add the words “So help me God,” as most of
your predecessors have—a tradition that is said to date to the very first
presidential inauguration. Franklin Pierce and Herbert Hoover are the
only presidents to “affirm” the oath.
Now, for the first time, ruffles and flourishes and “Hail to the Chief”
will be played for you. In the distance a twenty-one-gun salute will be
fired from howitzers of the Military District of Washington. You will
be given the card that unlocks the nuclear code.

Inauguration Ceremony Checklist

Bible(s): _ ____________________________________________________

Biblical passage(s) (optional): ____________________________________

Preferred music: _______________________________________________

Musicians: ____________________________________________________

Poet (optional): _______________________________________________

List of clergy to attend (minimum of three faiths):

____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

The Speech
Mr. President, it would be wonderful if you deliver a great inaugural
address. But if you don’t, take comfort: very few of your predecessors

What Do We Do Now? • 129
 Capitol Ceremony

President Oath

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953) Chief Justice Frederick Vinson

John F. Kennedy (1961) Chief Justice Earl Warren

Richard M. Nixon (1969) Chief Justice Earl Warren

Jimmy Carter (1977) Chief Justice Warren Burger

Ronald Reagan (1981) Chief Justice Warren Burger

George H. W. Bush (1989) Chief Justice William Rehnquist

Bill Clinton (1993) Chief Justice William Rehnquist

George W. Bush (2001) Chief Justice William Rehnquist

did. In fact, as the history books often point out, the inaugural address
that had the most immediate effect was certainly one of the worst: six-
ty-eight-year-old William Henry Harri-
son spoke for nearly two hours (at 8,445
The Avalon Project of the Yale Law School words, also the longest-ever address) on a
is an online collection of important docu- snowy day in March 1841. He caught cold
ments in law, history, and diplomacy— and died of pneumonia a month later.
including the fifty-four presidential inaugu- William Safire, a former speechwriter
ral addresses from George Washington for President Nixon and author of Lend
to George W. Bush. See www.yale.edu/
Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in History
lawweb/avalon/presiden/inaug/inaug.htm.
(W. W. Norton, 2004), writes that there
have been four great inaugural addresses:

130  • What Do We Do Now?

 Bible Attire Weather

George Washington’s Bible Morning coat, striped pants, Cloudy, 49° F

(open to Psalm 127:1) and the black homburg
West Point Bible (open to
2 Chronicles 7:14)

Family Bible (closed) Morning coat, striped pants, Sunny, 22° F

top hat

Family Bible (open to Morning coat, striped pants Cloudy, 35° F

Isaiah 2:4)

George Washington’s Bible Business suit Sunny, 28° F

(open to Micah 6:9)

Family Bible (open to Morning coat, striped pants Cloudy, 55° F

2 Chronicles 7:14)

George Washington’s Business suit with silver Cloudy, 51° F

Bible (open to Matthew 5) necktie

Family Bible (open to Business suit with blue Sunny, 40° F

Galatians 6:8) necktie

Family Bible (closed) Business suit Rainy, 35° F

Lincoln’s two, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first, and John F. Kennedy’s.

Others make claims for Jefferson’s first and Wilson’s second.
Lincoln, elected on the eve of the Civil War, wanted to make clear
that he was not going to let the South walk away from the Union. He
was prepared to fight. Lincoln’s second, delivered four years later
and thirty-seven days away from the end of the Civil War, was a ser-
mon looking to reconciliation. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s speech of
March 4, 1933, also came in the midst of exceptional crisis. One out
of every four workers was out of a job, and many banks in all forty-
eight states were either closed or placed restrictions on how much
money depositors could withdraw. Roosevelt’s “bold tone and buoy-
ant delivery,” Safire writes, “encouraged people parched for hope.”

What Do We Do Now? • 131
 What is so remarkable about Kennedy’s speech is that 1961 was no
more a moment of crisis than were any of the other inaugural years of
the cold war from Truman through Reagan. Rather, what was in-
stantly hailed was the sheer brilliance of the words, the flow of pas-
sion celebrating youth and idealism.
Inaugural addresses are not expected to be heavy on specifics, to
detail legislative or administrative proposals. That is what your State of
the Union message is for. But you can make an exception to this rule, if
you choose, as President Truman did in 1949 when he used his inaugu-
ral address to outline four points of action for “world recovery and last-
ing peace.” His fourth point—which called for “a bold new program for
making the benefits of our scientific advances and industrial progress
available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas”—
quickly turned into a major U.S. foreign policy initiative.
Nor are inaugural addresses expected to sound like campaign
speeches. Again, there are exceptions: Ronald Reagan’s first inaugural
address repackages the same themes—often using the same words—
that he had been honing into a basic message since campaigning for
Barry Goldwater in 1964.
As a member in good standing of the Judson Welliver Society, the
collectivity of former presidential speechwriters, I offer here some ad-
vice to review with your own team of future Welliverians:

Length
You will not set the record for the short-
The Judson Welliver Society is a social club
for former presidential speechwriters of
est inaugural address. George Washington
both political parties. Founded by William will always hold that one—a mere 135
Safire (Nixon) and Jack Valenti (Johnson), words. The gold standard is now Kenne-
the club takes its name from Judson dy’s twelve minutes. If you can stay
Welliver, who served Warren Harding and around twelve minutes, the commentator
is widely considered the first official presi- class will take note with appreciation.
dential speechwriter.

132  • What Do We Do Now?

 Famous Passages from Inaugural Addresses
In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the
momentous issue of civil war. The Government will not assail you. You can
have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors. You have no oath
registered in heaven to destroy the Government, while I shall have the most
solemn one to “preserve, protect, and defend” it.
Abraham Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1861

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as
God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to
bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle,
and for his widow, and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a
just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.
Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865

This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper.
So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to
fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes
needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.
Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1933

In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted
the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink
from this responsibility—I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would
exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy,
the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country
and all who serve it—and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.
And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you—
ask what you can do for your country.
John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961

What Do We Do Now? • 133
 Style
Do not try to be a Kennedy clone. Clinton did—and while there were
moments that were quite good in his first inaugural address, do you
really want to be thought of as a weak carbon copy of someone else?
Don’t worry about creating applause lines for the people facing you
on the Mall. They are your devoted supporters; they already love you.
Your primary audience is measured in millions, in the United States
and abroad, curious for a first impression of the new president and
willing to give you a few minutes in the midst of their busy lives. Hu-
mor rarely works. A catchphrase might work for Kennedy (“new fron-
tier”), but how many remember which president created “new cove-
nant” and “new spirit”?

Tone
George W. Bush’s first inaugural was a great speech—for some other
president. Was a Texas “brush-whacker” supposed to sound that ele-
gant? (Apparently he thought so.) Jimmy Carter—who is said to have
written his own speech—did well by sounding like Jimmy Carter, even
if there were some at the time who were disappointed. Be comfortable
with your rhetorical self.

Theme
Refer back to worksheets in the first chapter in which you wrote down
why you were elected and what you promised to accomplish as presi-
dent. If you campaigned for “change” or “reform,” this is the moment
to put those ideas in the context of how you plan to govern. Ask not
what you can cram into twelve minutes, but rather what is the one
thought—even the one word—that best describes what you want your
presidency to stand for.

134  • What Do We Do Now?

 Case in Point: Speeches from Ike to Bush

Take a moment to look at what your predecessors said on Inaugu-

ration Day—and then find the words to make your own speech
memorable.

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953)

Context
The former five-star general, who led the Allies in Europe during
World War II, brought the GOP back to the White House for the
first time since 1933, with an overwhelming victory over Democrat
Adlai Stevenson. The nation was still engaged in fighting the Ko-
rean War and, during his transition, Ike kept his campaign promise
(“I shall go to Korea”) by visiting American forces there in Decem-
ber 1952.

Speech (2,460 words; 21 minutes)

In the forty-eight pages of his prepared text, Eisenhower devoted
forty-one of them to foreign affairs. The speech was described by
the Washington Post as “a fervent plea for free world unity in time
of peril” and by W. H. Lawrence in the New York Times as promis-
ing a ceaseless “quest for an honorable worldwide peace.” The
president outlined nine “fixed principles” for peace, including ex-
panded regional defense arrangements, making the United
Nations an effective force, and encouraging world trade.

Reaction
The speech was interpreted as a clear break with the isolationist
policies that had once dominated the Republican Party and was,
according to John Norris in the Washington Post, “a declaration
of continuity of American foreign policy.” In fact, concluded
James Reston of the New York Times, “The first reaction here was
that it was not much different from the rhetoric that had poured
out of Democratic leaders here and in the United Nations and in
other capitals of the Western world during the last year of the
Cold War.”

continued

What Do We Do Now? • 135
 Case in Point: Speeches from Ike to Bush, continued

John F. Kennedy (1961)

Context
Defeating Vice President Richard Nixon in one of the closest presiden-
tial elections in history, Kennedy became America’s first Roman Catholic
president. The youngest man ever elected president (at age forty-three),
Kennedy took over from Dwight Eisenhower, who at the age of seventy
was then the oldest president to have occupied the White House.

Speech (1,364 words; 12 minutes)

“Let the word go forth . . . that the torch has been passed to a new
generation of Americans—born in this century, tempered by war, disci-
plined by a hard and bitter peace.” In one of the shortest inaugural ad-
dresses ever delivered, Kennedy’s recurring theme was muscular chal-
lenges confronting “the new generation,” which was ready to “pay any
price, bear any burden, meet any hardship . . . to assure the survival and
the success of liberty.”

Reaction
The speech was instantly hailed as a great speech, the words “almost
Biblical in their simplicity” and “Churchillian,” according to Robert
Albright in the Washington Post. Albright compared the style of the
speech to both Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, which also “shied away
from long words,” and to Franklin Roosevelt’s First Inaugural Address:
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” (Roosevelt)
“Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.”
(Kennedy)

Richard M. Nixon (1969)

Context
In the midst of the long, costly, and increasingly unpopular war in Viet-
nam, President Johnson declined to seek reelection. His vice president,
Hubert Humphrey, narrowly lost the general election to Richard Nixon,
who brought to the office a history of razor-sharp partisanship.

136  • What Do We Do Now?

Speech (2,124 words; 17 minutes)
Avoiding the major themes of his campaign—law and order and civil
disobedience—Nixon asked Americans to “stop shouting at one anoth-
er.” His speech was designed to stress reconciliation, both at home and
abroad. “No man can be fully free while his neighbor is not. . . . This
means black and white together, as one nation,” borrowing a phrase
from the civil rights anthem, “We Shall Overcome.” In the words of the
Washington Post’s Chalmers Roberts, “There was no note of partisan
political triumph.”

Reaction
The speech’s muted tone was appreciated. Liberal columnist Joseph
Kraft noted that the new president emphasized words like “together”
and “negotiations.” Kraft concluded, “Mr. Nixon, in sum, was speaking
in homilies. But he had the right homilies for the moment.”

Jimmy Carter (1977)

Context
Losing the support of his party in the wake of the Watergate scandal,
Nixon resigned the presidency on August 9, 1974. He was succeeded
by his vice president, Gerald Ford, who brought a friendly and easygo-
ing manner to the office. In the general election in 1976, Ford’s oppo-
nent was a little-known former governor of Georgia, but the Watergate
scandal and the legacy of Vietnam were sufficient to depose the Re-
publican and send a Democrat to the White House.

Speech (1,229 words; 15 minutes)

Carter’s theme was a restatement of America’s traditional ideals.
“I have no new dream to set forth today,” he said, “but rather urge
a fresh faith in the old dream.” The tone was sermonic, recalling the
Hebrew prophet Micah: “He hath showed thee, O man, what is good;
and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love
mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”

continued

What Do We Do Now? • 137
 Case in Point: Speeches from Ike to Bush, continued

Reaction
“It was, on balance, a strongly religious speech—too simply pietistic
perhaps,” concluded Time. “But it was also an accurate expression of
Carter’s faith—a faith shared by a great many Americans.” Yet it was
not the speech that most engaged Americans. “Most dramatic,” wrote
Haynes Johnson in the Washington Post, was “the sight of the new
President strolling down Pennsylvania Avenue hand-in-hand with his
wife and [nine-year-old] daughter Amy.” There was plenty of symbol-
ism for all as Carter “set out on his own and walked his way to the
White House.”

Ronald Reagan (1981)

Context
Carter’s presidency was tarnished by the Iranian hostage crisis, dou-
ble-digit inflation, and long lines at the gas pump. The election of for-
mer California governor Ronald Reagan completed a conservative re-
alignment within the Republican Party that had begun with the 1964
campaign of Barry Goldwater—in which the former actor Reagan first
emerged as a national conservative spokesman.

Speech (2,423 words; 20 minutes)

“Government is not the solution to our problem,” Reagan said. “Gov-
ernment is the problem.” Lou Cannon, a Washington Post reporter and
later a Reagan biographer, called the speech “a subdued, evocative
version of the same basic message which elected him.” The speech
was also meant to contrast with the outgoing president’s “talk of self-
sacrifice and a ‘national malaise.’”

“We have every right to dream heroic dreams,” declared the new
president.

Reaction
Iran released the fifty-two American hostages just minutes after Rea-
gan was sworn into office. According to Hedrick Smith in the New York

138  • What Do We Do Now?

Times, “Almost unavoidably the human drama in Iran overshadowed an
Inaugural Address that was less an inspirational call to national great-
ness than a plain-spoken charter of Mr. Reagan’s conservative creed. . . .
In political terms, the hostage release enabled Mr. Reagan to enter the
White House in a glow of good feeling.”

George H. W. Bush (1989)

Context
With the nation celebrating relative peace and prosperity, the elector-
ate did something unusual: it gave one political party three victories in
a row. Reagan, after two terms, still had enough of a breeze at his back
to sweep his vice president into the White House. In the process, Bush
became the first sitting vice president elected to succeed a president
since Martin Van Buren in 1837. His inaugural address would have to
promise continuity along with change.

Speech (2,320 words; 201/2 minutes)

“A nation refreshed by freedom stands ready to push on,” wrote
David Hoffman in the Washington Post. The speech “displayed a low
key, almost humble style.” “Some see leadership as high drama, and the
sound of trumpets calling. And sometimes it is that,” Bush said. “But I
see history as a book with many pages. . . . Today a chapter begins: a
small and stately story of unity, diversity and generosity, shared, and
written, together.”

Reaction
In a day almost unmarked by protest and dedicated to the pomp
and circumstance of the transfer of power, the reaction to the speech
was quietly positive. It was nicely written. What most appealed to
Washington—which had witnessed many battles between the execu-
tive and legislative branches during Reagan’s tenure—was the new
president’s announcement of a “new engagement” with Congress.

continued

What Do We Do Now? • 139
 Case in Point: Speeches from Ike to Bush, continued

Bill Clinton (1993)

Context
After twelve years of one party’s occupying the White House, the out-
party can usually count on a collection of unmet needs and a general
desire for new faces and new energy. But what was most important in
propelling the election of Clinton was the poor state of the economy.
Aided by gadfly independent candidate Ross Perot, who skimmed
votes from the incumbent, Clinton picked a good time to run against
Washington and the Republican Party.

Speech (1,598 words; 14 minutes)

Now a generation removed from John Kennedy, another young Demo-
crat—inspired by Kennedy as a teenager—employed some of the same
themes of a new generation rising to meet the country’s challenges.
“A new season of American renewal has begun.” “While America re-
builds at home, we will not shrink from the challenges, nor fail to seize
the opportunities, of this new world.” “There is nothing wrong with
America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.” Washing-
ton Post reporter Dan Balz noted that the speech “was short—14 min-
utes almost to the second—and crisply delivered, with a fresh cadence
rarely achieved in his other major speeches.” But Kennedy’s Inaugural
Address is a hard act to follow.

Reaction
The inauguration was less memorable for the address than for the rest
of the celebration. Mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne sang the national
anthem. Poet Maya Angelou read one of her verses. The parade fea-
tured everyone from gay groups to Elvis impersonators. The crowds
along Pennsylvania Avenue chanted “walk, walk!”—and the Clintons
got out of their new armor-plated Cadillac to take the last few blocks
on foot. One report said there were eleven inaugural balls, another
said fourteen. The national reaction to Clinton’s inauguration was that
Washington was once again going to be a lively place.

140  • What Do We Do Now?

George W. Bush (2001)
Context
The winner received 500,000 fewer votes than the loser. George W.
Bush became only the fourth president in history—the first since 1888—
to win the election despite losing the popular vote. He was the first
president whose victory was decided by the Supreme Court, thirty-six
days after voters went to the polls, in a 5–4 decision. Bush was also the
first son of a former president to become president since 1825.

Speech (1,584 words; 141/2 minutes)

The dominant word was “civility.” He used it again and again: “Civility is
not a tactic or a sentiment. . . . I will live and lead by these principles—
to advance my convictions with civility, to pursue the public interest
with courage, to speak for greater justice and compassion, to call for
responsibility, and try to live it as well.” Folksy in manner and never
noted for rhetorical skills, Bush chose a text that the New York Times
described as both “elegant” and “eloquent.” His alliterative promise
to the nation was to lead with “civility, courage, compassion, and
character.”

Reaction
When the overwhelming political need was to bring opposing forces
closer together in Washington, where the new Senate was divided
50-50, and Republicans held a mere nine-seat majority in the House, a
well-received speech whose themes were inclusiveness and compas-
sion was a good beginning, but the new president offered no clues on
whether he planned to moderate his conservative agenda.

What Do We Do Now? • 141
 The Oval Office
You are about to move into the Oval Office—one of the most
dramatic, architecturally satisfying rooms in the world—
and you are going to have to make a basic decision: do you
wish to admire it or work in it?

What Do We Do Now? • 143
CHAPTER 6 The Oval Office

Room with a View

Clearly, this is a great ceremonial place. You will call in members of the
press pool to snap photos of you chatting with world leaders, with the
marble mantel of the fireplace in the background, the presidential seal
set in plaster on the ceiling, the flags of the United States and the pres-
ident behind the desk. But is this really where you want to roll up your
sleeves, spread out your papers, loosen your tie and work?
I have worked in the White House twice, for two very different
people, and their answers were yes (Eisenhower) and no (Nixon).
The Oval Office was where President Eisenhower chose to conduct
the affairs of state. He didn’t even bother to change the green carpet
and draperies from Harry Truman’s occupancy. Nixon, on the other
hand, established his serious workspace across the gated West Ex-
ecutive Street and up a flight of stairs in Room 180 of the Executive
Office Building (since renamed the Eisenhower Executive Office
Building; see chapter 2). It was here
that Nixon probably had a hole drilled
The oval shape of the president’s office, ac- into his desk to secure the wires to the
cording to the White House Historical As- machine that was taping “Watergate”
sociation, was inspired by rooms George conversations. The Oval Office was rel-
Washington had remodeled for his formal egated to the ceremonial place.
receptions (“levees”) in the president’s res-
The president who made himself
idence in Philadelphia. When men of prom-
inence—wearing formal dress (silver buck-
most at home in the Oval Office was
les, powdered hair)—arrived to meet the John F. Kennedy. He brought in a rock-
president, they formed a circle. Washington ing chair to ease his back pain; his col-
walked around the circle addressing each lection of ship models; maritime paint-
guest in turn. He bowed, but never shook ings (instead of presidential portraits);
hands. See www.whitehousehistory.org. a silver goblet from New Ross, Ireland,
the town from which his great grand-

144  • What Do We Do Now?

 President Nixon had the Oval Office redecorated in the summer of 1969
while he was vacationing in San Clemente. I was in my ground-floor office in
the West Wing when I got a call from Pat Moynihan: Come upstairs to the
Oval Office (a request followed by a string of exclamation points).
The door to the Oval Office is open when the president is not there. Pat
had been passing by on his way to the swimming pool (soon to be covered
over to make extra space for the press corps). What he had to show me was
the sudden redecoration: gold draperies under a single gold valance, gold
upholstery for sofas and chairs, a royal blue rug with gold presidential seal.
This gold was so bright that my eight-year-old son, after visiting the presi-
dent, complained that the color had hurt his eyes.
But for Pat the greatest offense was the seals on the chair cushions. He
picked up the phone outside the Oval Office and asked to be connected to
Bob Haldeman in San Clemente. “Bob, I’m standing outside the Oval Office.
If you don’t do something fast, every member of Congress will soon be fart-
ing on the seal of the presidency.”
By the time the president returned to Washington, there were fewer
decorative seals in the Oval Office. When President Ford promised “our
national nightmare is over,” this included toning down Nixon’s Oval Office
décor, the royal blue rug replaced with one of light yellow and the gold
draperies replaced by rust-colored ones.

father set off for America; a watercolor of the White House painted
by his wife; a chair from his student days at Harvard; and a plaque,
given to him by Admiral Hyman Rickover, inscribed with the words
of the Breton fisherman’s prayer: “O, God, Thy sea is so great and my
boat is so small.” On his desk, encased in plastic, sat the coconut shell
carved with the message that led to his rescue after PT-109 was cut
in two by a Japanese destroyer in the Solomon Islands.
Other presidents added their own personal touches. Reagan gave
the Oval Office a distinctly Western flavor with Remington cowboy
sculptures and miniature bronze saddles. George H. W. Bush fea-
tured blue and white, the colors of Yale, his alma mater. His son hung
scenes of Texas by Texan artists on loan from Texas museums.

What Do We Do Now? • 145
 146  • What Do We Do Now?
List Personal Items to Keep in the Oval Office
____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________

Portraits
You don’t have to hang a presidential portrait in the Oval Office (Eisen-
hower and Kennedy didn’t), but if you do, the odds are that it will be
Washington. You can choose Washington in military uniform or in
civilian clothes. He comes in all sizes. The question, then, is which
one? There are portraits of Washington by Charles Willson Peale, by
his son Rembrandt Peale, and by Gilbert Stuart.

George Washington
Charles Willson Peale (1741–1827), Philadelphia’s leading artist, paint-
ed the first seven presidents as well as Benjamin Franklin. (President
Ford hung Peale’s Franklin portrait in the Oval Office.) Peale traveled
to Mount Vernon in 1772 to paint his first por-
trait from life of Washington. It was a three-
quarter-length likeness (from the knees up) in
Many of the most famous portraits of
the uniform of a Virginia militia colonel, U.S. presidents are on permanent
Washington’s rank at the close of the French exhibition at the National Portrait
and Indian War. Peale’s next knees-up portrait Gallery, part of the Smithsonian Insti-
(50" x 39") was painted in 1776. It was com- tution, in Washington, D.C. “Portraits
missioned by John Hancock and shows Wash- of the Presidents” is the National Por-
ington as commander-in-chief of the Conti- trait Gallery’s online exhibit, with brief
biographies and portraits of presi-
nental Army. Washington last sat for Peale in
dents from Washington to Clinton.
1795, when the artist brought his sons Rapha- Go to www.npg.si.edu.
elle and Rembrandt to paint the president. In
all, Charles Willson Peale painted Washington
from life seven times.

What Do We Do Now? • 147
George Washington, by George Washington, by George Washington, by
Charles Willson Peale Rembrandt Peale Gilbert Stuart
This portrait hung in the This portrait hung in the This portrait hung in the
Oval Office during the Oval Office during the Oval Office during the
presidencies of Nixon, presidencies of George presidencies of Johnson
Ford, Carter, and Reagan. H. W. Bush, Clinton, and and Nixon.
George W. Bush.
o Yes, this is the portrait o Yes, this is the portrait
I would like to hang in o Yes, this is the portrait I would like to hang in
the Oval Office. I would like to hang in the Oval Office.
the Oval Office.

Rembrandt Peale (1778–1860) was one of the eleven children of

Charles Willson Peale by his first wife. (He had six more children by his
second wife.) Rembrandt studied for several years in Paris where he
developed a neoclassical style that was distinct from his father’s. It was
written that “his portraits were distinguished by a much crisper mod-
eling, harder surfaces, and brighter coloring.” He painted more than
100 portraits of Washington in a range of sizes.
Gilbert Stuart (1755–1828), America’s leading portraitist of the Fed-
eral period, spent the Revolutionary War in London (unlike Charles
Willson Peale, who fought in the battles of Trenton and Princeton).
Stuart returned to America in 1793 and secured his first sitting with

148  • What Do We Do Now?

Andrew Jackson, after Abraham Lincoln, by Franklin D. Roosevelt, by
Thomas Sully George Henry Story Elizabeth Shoumatoff
Four presidents kept George W. Bush had this Lyndon B. Johnson had this
Jackson on the wall during portrait in the Oval Office. portrait in the Oval Office.
their time in the Oval Office: o Yes, this is the portrait
o Yes, this is the portrait
Nixon, Reagan, George I would like to hang in
I would like to hang in
H. W. Bush, and Clinton. the Oval Office.
the Oval Office.
o Yes, this is the portrait
I would like to hang in
the Oval Office.

Washington in Philadelphia in 1795. He made about twelve copies of

this portrait. Martha Washington then commissioned portraits of her-
self and her husband; they sat for him in 1796, but he never delivered.
(The now-famous portraits remained with him until his death.) He
was notorious for not finishing commissions. Thomas Jefferson was
still waiting for his portrait twenty years after first sitting. One hazard
of having done so many Washington portraits is that Stuart spent
much time in court fighting unauthorized copying.
If you choose not to hang one of the Washington portraits, there are
many other presidential portraits you may consider, including these
famous ones of Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin D.
Roosevelt.

What Do We Do Now? • 149
 Andrew Jackson
According to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, this portrait of
Andrew Jackson is a replica of a study that Thomas Sully (1783–1872)
painted from life in 1824, when Jackson was a U.S. senator and a presi-
dential candidate. The replica was completed shortly before Jackson’s
death in April 1845.
Four presidents kept Jackson on the wall during their time in the
Oval Office: Nixon, Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Clinton. Strange-
ly, perhaps, given that Jackson was a patron saint of the Democratic
Party, three of these Jackson enthusiasts were Republicans.

Abraham Lincoln
George Henry Story (1835–1922), as a young man in Washington in
1860, became a friend of Lincoln’s and posed the president for the first
official photograph taken in Washington. Story painted several Lincoln
portraits. “On three successive days,” Story wrote, “I quietly entered
the President’s office through Secretary Nicolay’s room and made pen-
cil notes of my subject and mental observations of the changes in his
countenance while he was in real life and under the influence of State
affairs in different interviews with his visitors.”
George W. Bush had this portrait in the Oval Office as well as a bust
of Lincoln by Augustus St. Gaudens. Clinton also had a Lincoln bust,
but it was his personal property.

Franklin D. Roosevelt
The only twentieth-century president whose portrait has hung in the
Oval Office is Franklin D. Roosevelt, although there have been busts of
Truman (George H. W. Bush and Clinton) and Eisenhower (George W.
Bush). The Roosevelt portrait, honored by Lyndon Johnson, is the one
that FDR was sitting for in his cottage at Warm Springs, Georgia, when
he was stricken and died, April 12, 1945. The artist was Elizabeth Shou-
matoff (1888–1980). She later painted the official portrait of President
Johnson after he angrily rejected one done by Peter Hurd.
You get a second chance to hang presidential portraits in the Cabi-
net Room, where there is space for up to four. Past selections have
tended to be predictable, although Reagan hung Coolidge and Taft

150  • What Do We Do Now?

 In 1996 I joined a group chosen by Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. to rate presi-
dents on a scale from “great” to “failure.” Nothing scientific; just for fun.
The results appeared in the New York Times Magazine. Our “greats” were
Lincoln, Washington, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. (Lincoln got all thirty-two
votes; Washington and FDR each received one “near great” vote—go fig-
ure!) Next in order were Jefferson, Jackson, and Theodore Roosevelt. Com-
paring this list to the portraits picked by presidents to hang in the Oval
Office, the only surprises are that Jackson did so well and that no one want-
ed Jefferson. (Most presidents put him in the Cabinet Room.)
In the far more sophisticated “rating game” of Alvin Stephen Felzenberg,
Jefferson and Jackson rank much lower on the measure of presidential
greatness. In his 2008 book The Leaders We Deserved (And a Few We
Didn’t) (Basic Books), Felzenberg devised separate categories for charac-
ter, vision, competence, economic policy, preserving and extending liberty,
and defense/foreign policy. Lincoln and Washington still came out on top,
but Jefferson (fourteenth of thirty-nine presidents) and Jackson (twenty-
seventh) ranked quite low. Perhaps the final word belongs to Schlesinger:
“There is force in the argument that only presidents can really understand
the presidency.”

there. President Johnson made perhaps the oddest choice—James

Buchanan.

Desks
In addition to deciding which portraits to hang in the Oval Office, you
will have to choose which desk you will use there. The options, how-
ever, are limited to four historic desks—the Resolute Desk, the Theo-
dore Roosevelt Desk, the Wilson Desk, and the C&O Desk—or bring-
ing your own.

The Resolute Desk

Its story, as explained by Betty C. Monkman in The White House: Its
Historic Furnishings and First Families (Abbeville Press, 2000), is that
a British ship of that name was sent out in 1852 to search for explorer

What Do We Do Now? • 151
 Sir John Franklin who was lost on a voyage to discover the Northwest
Passage. The Resolute was trapped in ice and abandoned in 1854, dis-
covered and extricated by an American whaler in 1855, refitted with a
$40,000 congressional appropriation, and sent back to England as a
gift to Queen Victoria. When the Resolute was decommissioned and
dismantled in 1879, timber from it was made into a desk as a gift for the
president of the United States.
The Resolute Desk is a partner’s desk, meaning it was designed to
accommodate a person sitting and working on either side. Franklin D.
Roosevelt, however, chose to add a center panel with a carved Seal of
the President in order to hide his iron leg braces from view and to
conceal a safe. While the desk has been used often by presidents since
1880, Kennedy was the first to put it in the Oval Office. Carter, Rea-
gan, Clinton, and George W. Bush also used the Resolute Desk in the
Oval Office.

The Resolute Desk

152  • What Do We Do Now?

Theodore Roosevelt Desk
This is the original West Wing desk, made in 1902 for Theodore
Roosevelt, used in the Oval Office by Taft, Wilson, Harding, Coolidge,
Hoover, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower. Nixon
chose this desk for his “working office,” Room 180 in the Eisenhower
Executive Office Building, and presumably the Watergate tapes were
made by an apparatus concealed in its drawer. Its practicality is that
it has a larger surface than the Resolute Desk.

The Wilson Desk

The Wilson Desk was used in the Oval Office by Presidents Nixon
and Ford. This was Nixon’s desk in the Capitol when he was vice
president, and he requested it for the White House. His attachment
stemmed from his belief that the desk once belonged to Woodrow
Wilson. He liked to make Wilsonian points, according to speechwrit-
er William Safire in his book Before the Fall, “about how Presidents

The Roosevelt Desk

What Do We Do Now? • 153
 can be misunderstood, how peaceful men find themselves with need
to do battle, how the distinction between men of thought and men of
action can no longer be drawn, etc.”
Unfortunately, Safire had to tell the president that the desk be-
longed to a less notable Wilson, causing the following “petulantly ac-
curate” footnote in the 1969 edition of Public Papers of the Presidents:
“Later research indicated that the desk had not been President
Woodrow Wilson’s as had long been assumed but was used by Vice
President Henry Wilson during President Grant’s administration.”

The Wilson Desk

154  • What Do We Do Now?

C&O Desk
The C&O Desk was used in the Oval Office by George H. W. Bush, who
moved it from his vice presidential office in the Capitol. It is a hand-
some reproduction of an eighteenth-century English double pedestal
desk, with a full set of drawers on each side, made around 1920 for the
owners of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway. It was later donated to the
White House and used by Ford, Carter, and Reagan in the West Wing
Study.

Your Own Desk

You can, of course, bring your own desk with you to the Oval Office,
as did Lyndon Johnson. The Johnson desk is now in the replica Oval
Office at the LBJ museum in Austin, and, I am reliably told, the re-
tired president sometimes sat at the desk to surprise unsuspecting
museum visitors.

The C&O Desk

What Do We Do Now? • 155
 Presidential
Transitions:
A Study Approach
Whether in a class or a study group, or simply quenching
one’s own curiosity, the transition can be an excellent fo-
cal point for examining how to construct a successful
presidency.
All the pieces are there for us to put together. Presidents
tell their own stories. Extensive media coverage is now
available on the Internet. A remarkable number of the par-
ticipants rush to write books. And there is a rich scholar-
ship on the subject.

What Do We Do Now? • 157
CHAPTER 7 Presidential Transitions
A Study Approach

If I were teaching the course, I think I might start at the end—the Inau-
gural Address—where the president-elect becomes the president and
states his ambitions for his presidency. My students, of course, would
have done their homework: they would have read the four greatest
speeches—Lincoln’s two, FDR’s first, and Kennedy’s—along with Wil-
liam Safire’s commentary in his Lend Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in
History (W. W. Norton, 2004).
Every course needs a spine, sometimes a textbook. The backbone of
my course would be Charles O. Jones, Passages to the Presidency: From
Campaigning to Governing (Brookings, 1998); and James P. Pfiffner, The
Strategic Presidency: Hitting the Ground Running (2nd edition, Univer-
sity Press of Kansas, 1996). And, as every teacher knows, it is necessary
to keep reading to stay ahead of your students. I would reread John P.
Burke’s two books, Presidential Transitions: From Politics to Practice
(Lynne Rienner, 2000) and Becoming President: The Bush Transition,
2000–2003 (Lynne Rienner, 2004).
Something that is special about transitions is that so many people
are giving advice to the president-elect. It would be interesting to re-
turn to the words of these advisers to judge their skill and merit. In this
category, I’d check on Richard Neustadt’s memos to Kennedy, Reagan,
and Clinton, as compiled by Charles O. Jones in Preparing to Be Presi-
dent (AEI Press, 2000); my own advice to Carter and Reagan, included
in Stephen Hess, with James P. Pfiffner, Organizing the Presidency (3rd
edition, Brookings, 2002); the advice to Clinton from William A. Gal-
ston and Elaine G. Kamarck in Will Marshall and Martin Schram, edi-
tors, Mandate for Change (Berkley Books, 1993); the George W. Bush
advisers in The Keys to a Successful Presidency (Heritage Foundation,
2000), edited by Alvin S. Felzenberg; and Madeleine Albright’s thoughts
for a generic president in Memo to the President Elect (HarperCollins,
2008).

158  • What Do We Do Now?

 For an overview of White House operations, the expert is my col-
league from the Eisenhower and Nixon staffs, Bradley H. Patterson Jr.,
who has now written his third book of virtually office-by-office decon-
struction: See To Serve the President: Continuity and Innovation in the
White House Staff (Brookings, 2008). An invaluable collection of stud-
ies by scholars is The White House World: Transitions, Organization,
and Office Operations (Texas A&M University Press, 2003), edited by
Martha Joynt Kumar and Terry Sullivan, whose contributors included
Maryanne Borrelli, George C. Edwards III, Karen Hult, Nancy Kassop,
Kathryn Dunn Tenpas, Charles E. Walcott, Shirley Anne Warshaw,
and Stephen Wayne.
To go into more detail, there are books on different aspects of the
White House. On speechwriting, there is Robert Schlesinger’s lively
White House Ghosts: Presidents and Their Speechwriters (Simon &
Schuster, 2008), and an interesting collection of scholarly pieces, Pres-
idential Speechwriting (Texas A&M University Press, 2003), edited by
Kurt Ritter and Martin J. Medhurst. On communications operations,
see Martha Joynt Kumar, Managing the President’s Message (Johns
Hopkins University Press, 2007), and John Anthony Maltese, Spin
Control (University of North Carolina Press, 1992).
Two important books that I read in manuscript, to be published in
2009, explain how presidents should maintain the delicate balance of
national security adviser/secretary of state/secretary of defense. They
are (with tentative titles): Ivo Daalder and I. M. Destler, In the Shadow
of the Oval Office: The President’s National Security Advisers and the
Making of American Foreign Policy (Simon & Schuster); and Peter W.
Rodman, Presidential Command (Alfred A. Knopf ).
If you wish to continue your study beyond the inauguration and
into “The First Hundred Days”—which you should!—interesting short
pieces on the experiences of past presidents by James MacGregor
Burns, Fred I. Greenstein, Charles Bartlett, Michael Beschloss, Lee
Huebner, Lou Cannon, and David Gergen can be found in Report to the
President-Elect 2000: Triumphs and Tragedies of the Modern Presiden-
cy (Washington: Center for the Study of the Presidency, 2000), edited
by David M. Abshire.

What Do We Do Now? • 159
 For Further Study
To understand the modern presidency, I recommend you try these
three books:
• Published in 1960, written by a young professor at Columbia, Rich-
ard E. Neustadt’s slim volume Presidential Power: The Politics of
Leadership (John L. Wiley, various editions) is a scholar’s immer-
sion into the real world of power politics. Rather than offering an
analysis of Article II of the Constitution or another “Great Men as
History” tome, Neustadt shows how presidents operate in a frag-
mented system of shared authority. This is about the “art” of leader-
ship and the “techniques” of persuasion.
• Irving L. Janis, the author of Victims of Groupthink: A Psychological
Study of Foreign-Policy Decisions and Fiascoes (Houghton Mifflin,
1972), was a professor of psychology at Yale whose research on
stress had centered on dieting and giving up smoking. But after
reading Arthur Schlesinger’s account of the Bay of Pigs invasion, he
puzzled: “How could bright, shrewd men like John F. Kennedy and
his advisers be taken in by the CIA’s stupid, patchwork plan?” From
this question he develops the theory of “groupthink,” an explana-
tion of the intense conformity pressures within groups making im-
portant foreign-policy decisions that limit the range of options con-
sidered, bias analysis of information, and promote simplistic
stereotypes.
• Princeton Professor Fred I. Greenstein asks why presidents succeed
or fail in The Presidential Difference: Leadership Style from FDR to
George W. Bush (Princeton University Press, 2004). He measures
the twelve most recent presidents on six scales: public communica-
tions, organizational capacity, political skill, vision, cognitive style,
and emotional intelligence. What is necessary is the proper mix. Po-
litical skills could not save Lyndon Johnson; organizational skills
did not do much for Jimmy Carter. Most important on Greenstein’s
list is emotional intelligence (or what I think of as “psychological
wellness”).

160  • What Do We Do Now?

White House Assistants
For a portrait of policymaking and politics inside the White House, try
these memoirs by these White House assistants:
Sherman Adams,* Firsthand Report: The Story of the Eisenhower Administra-
tion (Harper, 1961)
Martin Anderson, Revolution (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1988)
Joseph A. Califano Jr., Governing America: An Insider’s Report from the White
House and the Cabinet (Simon & Schuster, 1981)
Clark Clifford, Counsel to the President: A Memoir (Random House, 1991)
John Ehrlichman, Witness to Power: The Nixon Years (Simon & Schuster,
1982)
Chester E. Finn Jr., Education and the Presidency (Lexington Books, 1977)
Eric F. Goldman, The Tragedy of Lyndon Johnson (Knopf, 1969)
H.R. Haldeman,* The Ends of Power (Times Books, 1978)
James R. Killian Jr., Sputnik, Scientists, and Eisenhower: A Memoir of the First
Special Assistant to the President for Science and Technology (MIT Press,
1977)
Harry McPherson, A Political Education (Little, Brown, 1972)
Edwin Meese III, With Reagan: The Inside Story (Regnery Gateway, 1992)
Daniel P. Moynihan, The Politics of a Guaranteed Income: The Nixon Adminis-
tration and the Family Assistance Plan (Random House, 1973)
Roger B. Porter, Presidential Decision Making: The Economic Policy Board
(Cambridge University Press, 1980)
Donald T. Regan,* For the Record: From Wall Street to Washington (Harcourt
Brace Jovanovich, 1988)

* Denotes chief of staff

Press Secretaries
For an insider’s look at the job of press secretary, try these memoirs:
Marlin Fitzwater, Call the Briefing! Bush and Reagan, Sam and Helen:
A Decade with Presidents and the Press (Times Books, 1995)

What Do We Do Now? • 161
 Ari Fleischer, Taking Heat: The President, the Press, and My Years in the
White House (William Morrow, 2005)
Robert Ferrell, editor, The Diary of James C. Hagerty: Eisenhower in
Mid-Course, 1954–1955 (Indiana University, 1983)
Ron Nessen, It Sure Looks Different from the Inside (Playboy Press, 1978)
Jody Powell, The Other Side of the Story (William Morrow, 1984)
Pierre Salinger, With Kennedy (Doubleday, 1966)
Larry Speakes, Speaking Out: The Reagan Presidency from Inside the White
House (Scribner, 1988)

Speechwriters
For an examination of life as a presidential speechwriter, give these
memoirs a try:
David Frum, The Right Man: An Inside Account of the Bush White House
(Random House, 2003)
Robert T. Hartmann, Palace Politics: An Inside Account of the Ford Years
(McGraw-Hill, 1980)
Peggy Noonan, What I Saw at the Revolution: A Political Life in the Reagan Era
(Random House, 1990)
Raymond Price, With Nixon (Viking, 1977)
Samuel I. Rosenman, Working with Roosevelt (Harper, 1952)
William Safire, Before the Fall: An Inside View of the Pre-Watergate White
House (Doubleday, 1975)
Ted Sorensen, Counselor: A Life at the Edge of History (HarperCollins, 2008)
Michael Waldman, POTUS Speaks: Finding the Words That Defined the Clinton
Presidency (Simon & Schuster, 2001)

162  • What Do We Do Now?

Thanks

It’s been a lot of fun writing this book; or, perhaps just as accurately,
putting it together: a little book, but, as I hope you’ve noticed, compli-
cated, a bit like a jigsaw puzzle. And now there are a lot of people to
thank.
First, Strobe Talbott and Bill Antholis, president and managing di-
rector, respectively, at Brookings, for enthusiastically encouraging
such an un-Brookings type of book.
Next, my colleagues in Governance Studies, under the direction of
Pietro Nivola when this book was written, for creating an atmosphere
of goodwill and friendship that would be shocking in some university
departments; with added thanks to our support staff: Bethany Hase,
Erin Carter, and Gladys Arrisueño.
To the men and women of the Brookings Institution Press, Bob Fa-
herty, director: We have been together through books (12), revised edi-
tions (5), book chapters (6), and I continue to be amazed at the patience
and understanding they give to each nattering author. On this book, my
debt is to these skilled editors and designers: Janet Walker, Richard
Walker, Larry Converse, Vicky Macintyre, and Debra Naylor of Naylor
Design.
Three good friends, and leading presidency scholars, gave my man-
uscript their critical attention: Bill Galston, Chuck Jones, and Jim Pfiff-
ner. The remaining errors are not their fault.
I’m also grateful to my friends in the cartooning world who gener-
ously let me borrow their work: Tony Auth (and Marry Suggett at Unit-
ed Press Syndicate), KAL (aka Kevin Kallaugher), Jimmy Margulies,
Pat Oliphant, Ann Telnaes, and Frank Swoboda and Sarah Armstrong
of the Herbert Block Foundation.

What Do We Do Now? • 163
 The Brookings Library, led by Cy Behroozi, was, as always, wonder-
ful to me, with added thanks to research librarian Sarah Chilton.
I was blessed with four supercharged interns: Kahlie Dufresne
(Dartmouth), Paul Foreman (Pomona), the tireless Andy Hanna (North-
western and Georgetown) and Joe Berger (Catholic University).
Among the friends who answered some pointed questions along the
way were Mort Abramowitz, Ken Dam, Steve Friedman, Frank Gan-
non, Alan Greenspan, Lee Huebner, and Bill Safire.
My appreciation to Bill Allman, curator of the White House, and
thanks also to the White House Historical Association; to Mark Knoller,
the CBS Radio correspondent who shared his vast knowledge of the
White House press corps; the Senate Historical Office; and the many
kind people who responded to requests at the Bush, Carter, Clinton,
Eisenhower, Johnson, Kennedy, and Reagan libraries. The United
States is well served by those who staff the presidential libraries.


Stephen Hess
September 2008

164  • What Do We Do Now?

Index

Boxes are indicated by “b” following page numbers; illustrations, cases in point, worksheets, and
examples are indicated by page numbers in italics.

Abraham, Spencer, 67 Artwork: in author’s office, 56b; in Oval Office, 24, 42,
Abramowitz, Morton F., ix, 164 49, 76, 100, 118, 144–45, 146, 147–51, 151b; presiden-
Abshire, David J., 159 tial portraits in National Portrait Gallery, 147b
Activities, 95–125; contrariness principle, 101; federal Ashcroft, John, 73–74
employees, interaction with, 103–04; good press vs. Aspin, Les, 81, 84–85
bad press, 104–06; leaks, 110–11, 112–13b; mistakes Attorney general, nominees for, 63–64, 73, 78
and admissions, 116–18; pleasurable activities, Auth, Tony, 128, 163
119–21; press conferences, 106–10; removal of Avalon Project (Yale Law School), 130b
deadwood, 114–16; reorganizations, 98–100; task “Axis of evil” speech, 48b
forces, 97–98; transition teams, 96–97; White House
meeting with outgoing president, 102–03 Baird, Zoë, 64, 78–79
Adams, Brock, 75 Baker, Howard, 28
Adams, Sherman, 15, 27, 28, 111, 161 Baker, James, 17, 26, 27
African Americans in cabinet, 60–61, 64, 67 Balz, Dan, 140
Albright, Madeleine, ix, 16b, 20, 65, 66, 71b, 158 Bartlett, Charles, 159
Albright, Robert, 136 Battle of Mogadishu, 102
Akerson, George, 33b Bay of Pigs (1961), 2–3, 32, 116, 160
Allen, Richard, 20 Becoming President (Burke), 158
Allman, Bill, 164 Before the Fall (Safire), 153–54, 162
All Too Human (Stephanopoulos), 114 Bennett, Susan, 105
An American Life (Reagan), 88 Bentson, Lloyd, 105
Anderson, Marian, 126 Berger, Sandy, 102
Anderson, Martin, 161 Bernstein, Leonard, 120
Animus leak, 113b Beschloss, Michael, 159
Anything Goes (King), 106 Block, Herb (Herblock), 105, 163
Apple, R. W., Jr., 64 Bipartisanship and cabinet appointments, 71
Arrogance, 2 Borrelli, Mary Ann, 159

What Do We Do Now? • 165
Brady, James, 34, 36 Campaign promises, 6
Brock, Bill, viii, 10, 65 Camp David, 119
Brooke, Edward, 60 The Candidate (movie), 4b
Brookings Institution, viii, ix, 163, 164 C&O Desk, 155, 155
Brown, Harold, 69 Cannon, Lou, 138, 159
Brown, Jesse, 67 Card, Andrew, 17, 26, 27, 66
Brown, Lee P., 66 Carlucci, Frank C., ix
Brown, Michael, 20 Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, ix
Brown, Ronald, 67 Carter, Jimmy: cabinet, 60–61, 64, 69, 77, 79; campaign
Browner, Carol, 65, 66 promises of, 6; chief of staff under, 101; congressio-
Brzezinski, Zbigniew, 20, 53–54, 65 nal lobbyist under, 38, 39b; and contrariness
Buchanan, Patrick, 41 principle, 101; exposé article on, 113; inaugural
Budget for transition, 5b address of, 134, 137–38; inauguration, 126; on leaks,
Burke, John P., 19, 158 111; loyal workers, role in presidency of, 19;
Burns, Arthur, 50–51b, 65 organization of White House Office, 17; and Oval
Burns, James MacGregor, 159 Office, 152; personality conflicts of inner circle,
Bush, George H. W.: cabinet of, 65, 75, 78, 80; chief of 53–54; press secretary under, 32; removal of staff,
staff under, 26; inaugural address of, 139; “no new 115; transition planning, 4; transition to Reagan, 102
taxes” speech, 48b; and Oval Office, 145, 155; press Cartoons: cabinet selection, 91; good press of new
secretary under, 33b; and Somalia, 102 presidents, 105; inauguration, 128; Norton
Bush, George W.: “axis of evil” speech, 48b; cabinet, 16, appointment for Interior Secretary, 74; oil
61, 73, 77, 79, 89; exposé book on, 114; Hurricane dependence, 10; “ordeal by fire,” 96; president
Katrina and FEMA head under, 20; inaugural handing out orders, 94; press secretary, 32;
address of, 134, 141; organization of White House “someone you can’t fire,” 57
Office, 17; and Oval Office, 145, 152; PIP choice of, 26; Carville, James, 26
and presidential powers, 101; press conferences, 107 Casey, William J., 65
Caveat: Realism, Reagan and Foreign Policy (Haig), 52
Cabinet, 59–96; age, racial, ethnic, and gender Celebrezze, Anthony, 115
diversity in, 60–64, 67, 68; appointment of, 15–16; Chao, Elaine, 67, 78
beyond outer cabinet, 92; and bipartisanship, 71; Chavez, Linda, 77–78
business people as appointees, 70, 72; cartoon, 91; Checklist: for inauguration ceremony, 129; for
college and university presidents as appointees, president-elect, 122–23
69–70; confirmation hearings, 73–76; congressional Cheney, Dick, 19, 70, 79, 89
members as appointees, 70; expanding size of, 60b, Cheney, Tom, 91
64–66, 65–66; failure of appointment, 81–89; Chief of staff, 15, 16, 21; memoirs by, list of, 161
government officials as appointees, 72–73; CIA, Commission on Activities Within the United
governors as appointees, 70; original cabinets States, 9b
from Eisenhower to George W. Bush, 66, 67, 68; Cisneros, Henry, 67
personnel selection form, 90; political risks of Clergy at inauguration ceremony, 126–27
nominees, 78–79; seating around table, 58, 61; Clifford, Clark, 4b, 161
talent hunt for, 67–73; vetting process, 77–78 Clinton, Bill: cabinet, 16, 63–64, 65, 70, 77, 78, 88–89;
Califano, Joseph A., Jr., 161 chief of staff under, 26, 30–31, 79; and contrariness

166  • What Do We Do Now?

 principle, 101; exposé book on, 114; “gays in the East Wing, 21
military” issue, 6, 8–9; and good press, 105; inaugural Edwards, George C., 159
address of, 140; nonadmission of mistake by, 117; and Edwards, James, 70
Oval Office, 152; and press corps, 106; press secretary Ego leak, 112b
under, 33b; public appearances of, 43; scandal, 116; Ehrlichman, John, 50b, 101, 161
and Somalia, 102; task forces, 98; transition planning Eighteen Acres under Glass (Gray), 111
by, 4, 30–31; White House staff, 14 Eisenhower, Dwight: advice to incoming Kennedy, 99;
Clinton, Hillary Rodham, 21 assistant to the president under, 15; cabinet, 16, 60;
Coleman, William T., Jr., viii and Camp David, 119; exposé book on, 112–13; and
Colleges and universities: Commission on Campus golf, 119; inaugural address of, 135; “military-indus-
Unrest, 9b; presidents as cabinet appointees, 69–70 trial complex” speech, 46, 48b; and Oval Office, 144,
Confirmation hearings of cabinet nominations, 73–76 153; press secretary under, 33, 33b; removal of staff,
Congress: business people as cabinet appointees, 70, 115; State of the Union Address, 46–46
72; confirmation hearings on cabinet nominations, Eisenhower Executive Office Building, 20, 25, 144
73–76; members as cabinet appointees, 70; party Eizenstat, Stuart E., viii
margins in (chart), 39b Ellington, Duke, 120–21
Congressional lobbyist, 38–40 Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 93
Connally, John B., 115 Equivalency principle, 115
Conover, Willis, 120b Executive Office Building. See Eisenhower Executive
Contrariness principle, 101–03 Office Building
Coolidge, Calvin, 25 Export-Import Bank, 93
Cost-benefit analysis of transition team, 97 Exposé books, 112–14
Council for Excellence in Government, 92b
Cuba’s Bay of Pigs (1961), 2–3, 32, 116, 160 Fallows, James, 113–14
Family Assistance Plan (welfare proposal), 50b
Daalder, Ivo, 159 Federal Bureau of Investigation, 93
Dam, Kenneth, 164 Federal Communications Commission, 93
D’Andrea, Laura, 65, 66 Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., 93
Darman, Richard, 66, 97 Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), 20
Dawson, William, 60 Federal employees, 103–04
Deaver, Michael, 17, 27 Federal Reserve Board, 92
Demographics of U.S., 62 Felzenberg, Alvin S., 151b, 158
Desks for Oval Office, 151–55, 152–55 Feulner, Ed, viii
Destler, I. M., 159 Fielding, Fred F., viii
Dewey, Thomas, 33 Finch, Robert, 72
Dillon, Douglas, 71b Finn, Chester E., Jr., 161
“Dinner with Ike,” 45–46 First hundred days, 50–51
Dole, Bob, 9 First lady’s office, 21
Duberstein, Kenneth, ix, 28 Fitzwater, Marlin, 33b, 36, 161
Dulles, Allen, 16 Fixed term appointments, 93
Dulles, John Foster, vi, 88 Fleischer, Ari, 36, 162
Durkin, Martin, 60, 115

What Do We Do Now? • 167
Ford, Gerald: Commission on CIA Activities Within Hanna, Mark, viii
the United States, 9b; on leaks, 110; organization of Harlow, Bryce N., 38–40, 40b
White House Office, 17; and Oval Office desk, 153; Harris, Patricia R., 67
press secretary under, 33b, 34; speech after taking Harrison, William Henry, 130
office, 48b Hartmann, Robert T., 47, 48b, 162
Freeman, Orville, 70 Havens, Shirley Jean, 45–46
Friedman, Stephen, 164 Hayes, Rutherford B., 3b
Frenzel, William, ix Heritage Foundation, viii
Frum, David, 47b, 48b, 162 Hess, Stephen: advice to Carter and Reagan, 158; on
art choices in White House office, 56b; on Carter
Galston, William A., 98, 158, 163 White House staff, 19; on “Dinner with Ike,” 45–46;
Gannon, Frank, 163 on Eisenhower Executive Office Building office, 25;
Gardner, John W., 115 on Eisenhower speech using “gloomdoggle,” 44; on
Garment, Leonard, 121 Eisenhower State of the Union Address, 46–47; on
Gates, Thomas, 120 national park vacations, 56b; on Nixon redecoration
“Gays in the military” issue, 6 of Oval Office, 145b; on “tales out of school” in
General Services Administration (GSA), transition Eisenhower administration, 111; at White House
budget of, 5b evening entertainment, 119–20
Gergen, David, 159 Hickel, Walter, 70, 74
Gerson, Michael, 48b Hills, Carla A., 66
The Ghost Talks (Michelson), 43 Hobby, Oveta Culp, 60
“Gloomdoggle,” 44 Hoffman, David, 139
Goldman, Eric F., 161 Holbrooke, Richard C., ix
Golf, 119 Homosexuality in the military, 6, 8–9
Goodpaster, Andrew J., viii Hoover, Herbert, 43, 56b, 102, 129, 153
Good press vs. bad press, 104–06, 105 Hoover, J. Edgar, 16
Goodwill leak, 112b Horne, Marilyn, 126
Gore, Al, 99b, 128 Huebner, Lee, 159, 164
Governors as cabinet appointees, 70 Hughes, Emmet John, 112
Grade 15 of General Schedule, 104 Hughes, Karen, 17, 26, 27
Grant, Ulysses, inauguration of, 125 Hult, Karen, 159
Gray, C. Boyden, 97 Hume, Paul, 120
Gray, Robert, 111 Hurricane Katrina and FEMA head, 20
Great Seal of the United States, 3b
Greenstein, Alan, 9b, 163 Inauguration, 125–43; cartoon, 128; ceremony at the
Greenstein, Fred I., 159, 160 capitol, 126–29; checklist for ceremony, 129; details
Gronouski, John, 115 of ceremonies from Eisenhower to George W.
Guinier, Lani, 77 Bush, 130–31; events of Inauguration Day, 127;
famous passages from addresses, 133; move from
Hagerty, James, vi, 33, 33b, 34, 36, 106, 119, 162 March to January date, 1; speech, 129–34;
Haig, Alexander, 52, 81, 82–83, 88 summaries and reactions to speeches from
Haldeman, H. R. (Bob), 26, 27, 101, 145b, 161 Eisenhower to George W. Bush, 135–41; weather
at, 125, 126b

168  • What Do We Do Now?

In the Shadow of the Oval Office: The President’s Knowland, William, 128
National Security Advisers and the Making of Knowles, John, 78
American Foreign Policy (Daalder & Destler), 159 Kraft, Joseph, 137
Iranian hostage crisis, 102, 138–39 Krushchev, Nikita, 120
Kumar, Martha Joynt, 159
Jackson, Andrew, portrait of, 76, 149, 150
Jackson, Henry, 51b Laird, Mel, 70
James, Pendleton, 77 Lance, Bert, 38, 65
Janis, Irving L., 160 Larner, Jeremy, 4b
Jenkins, Walter, 28 Law of Propinquity, 55
Johnson, Haynes, 138 Lawrence, Jacob, 56b
Johnson, Lyndon: cabinet, 70; desk used by, 155; Leaks, 110–11, 112–13b
removal of deadwood by, 115; swearing in as vice The Leaders We Deserved (And a Few We Didn’t)
president, 128 (Felzenberg), 151b
Joint Chiefs of Staff, 93 Lend Me Your Ears: Greatest Speeches in History
Jones, Charles O., 19, 158 (Safire), 158
Jordan, Hamilton, 19, 26 Levi, Edward, 69
Judson Welliver Society, 132b Lewinsky, Monica, 116
Light, Paul C., ix
Kallaugher, Kevin (KAL), 8, 163 Lincoln, Abraham: inaugural addresses of, 131, 133;
Kamarck, Elaine G., 158 portrait of, 100, 149, 150
Kantor, Michael, 66 Locked in the Cabinet (Reich), 31
Kassop, Nancy, 159 Lockhart, Joe, 34b
Kennedy, David M., 115 Lodge, Henry Cabot, Jr., 45, 64, 65, 71b
Kennedy, John F.: admission of mistake by, 116; Lorenz, Lee, 96
cabinet, 16, 60, 65, 70; campaign promises of, 6; Loyal workers, role in presidency, 19
Commission on the Status of Women, 9b; and Lujan, Manuel, 67
contrariness principle, 101; and Cuba’s Bay of Pigs,
2–3, 32, 116, 160; inaugural address of, 48b, 131, 132, Mackenzie, G. Calvin, ix
133, 136; inauguration, 125, 126; and Oval Office, MacLeish, Archibald, 43
144–45, 146, 152; press secretary under, 32; public Macmillan, Harold, 119
appearances of, 43; and Resolute Desk, 152; special Maltese, John Anthony, 159
counsel under, 15; transition planning by, 4b Managing the President’s Message (Kumar), 159
Kernan, Michael, 125 Mandate for Change (Marshall & Schram, eds.), 158
Kettl, Donald F., 99b Manchester, William, vi
The Keys to a Successful Presidency (Felzenberg, ed.), Margulies, Jimmy, 10, 163
158 Marshall, Thurgood, 128
Killian, James, 48b, 161 Martinez, Mel, 67
King, Larry, 106 Maynor, Dorothy, 126
Kissinger, Henry, 16b, 52–53, 69m 88 McClellan, Scott, 114
Knoller, Mark, 164 McConnell, John, 48b
Kirkpatrick, Jeane J., 65 McCurry, Mike, 33b

What Do We Do Now? • 169
McLarty, Thomas F. (Mack), 14, 27, 29, 30–31, 66, mistake by, 117; office in Executive Office Building,
79, 101 144, 153; and Oval Office, 145b; pardon of, 34;
McNamara, Robert, 72, 115 personality conflicts of inner circle, 52–53; removal
McPherson, Harry, 161 of staff, 115; seal on inaugural invitation of, 3b; and
Medhurst, Martin, 112 speechwriting, 41, 46; swearing in as vice president,
Meese, Edwin, viii, 17, 27, 65, 161 128; and Theodore Roosevelt Desk, 153; view of
Memoirs, list of: press secretaries, 161–62; speechwrit- federal employees, 103
ers, 162; White House assistants, 161 Noonan, Peggy, 47, 48b, 162
Memo to the President Elect (Albright), 20, 158 Norris, John, 135
Michelson, Charles, 43 Norton, Gail, 73–74, 74
Military, homosexuality in, 6, 8–9 Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 93
Mineta, Norman, 67 Nunn, Sam, 8–9, 80
Missile gap, 6
Mistakes and admissions, 116–18 Oath of office, 129
Mitchell, James, 115 Office of Personnel Management (OPM), 92b
Moley, Raymond, 43 Office of Presidential Personnel, 15
Monkman, Betty C., 151 Oil dependence cartoon, 10
Moore, Frank, 38, 39b O’Connor, Sandra Day, 128
Moos, Malcolm (Mac), vi, 44, 46, 47, 48b O’Leary, Hazel, 67
The Mouse That Roared (movie), 119 Oliphant, Pat, 57, 163
Movies at White House, 119 O’Neill, Paul, ix, 19, 79, 81, 86–87, 89
Moynihan, Daniel Patrick, vii, 19, 50–51b, 56b, 75, 145b, O’Neill, Tip, 19, 38
161 Ordeal of Power (Hughes), 112
Multiple advocacy as management technique, 48, 51 Organizing the Presidency (Hess & Pfiffner), viii, 158
Music: entertainment at White House, 120–21; Osborne, John, vii
inauguration ceremony, 126 Oval Office, 142, 143–57, 146; art choices in, 24, 42, 49,
Myers, Dee Dee, 36, 106 76, 100, 118, 147–51, 151b; desks, 151–55, 152–55;
My Life (Clinton), 8 history of shape of, 144b; list of personal items to
keep in, 147; Nixon redecoration of, 145b
National Academy of Public Administration, viii
National Labor Relations Board, 93 Packard, David, 72
National park vacations, 56b Paige, Rod, 67, 87b
National Security Council, 101 Palace Politics (Hartmann), 48b
Nessen, Ron, 34b, 162 Panetta, Leon, 28, 31, 66
Neustadt, Richard E., vi, 2, 97, 158, 160 Passages to the Presidency: From Campaigning to
New York Times Magazine ratings of presidents, 151b Governing (Jones), 158
Nielson, Aksel, 45 Patterson, Bradley H., Jr., 159
Nivola, Pietro, 163 Peale, Charles Willson, portraits of Washington, 42,
Nixon, Richard M.: cabinet, 60, 69, 70, 72, 74, 78; 147, 148
Commission on Campus Unrest, 9b; and first Peale, Rembrandt, portraits of Washington, 49, 147,
hundred days, 50–51; and good press, 104, 105; 148, 148
inaugural address of, 136–37; nonadmission of Peña, Frederico, 67

170  • What Do We Do Now?

Pentagon papers, 112b secretary, 34b; memoirs by, list of, 161–62; “oath” of
Perks for White House staff, 56b office for candidates for, 35; rating of, 33b
Perry, William, 115 The Price of Loyalty (Suskind), 79
Personality conflicts of inner circle, 52–55 Price, Raymond, 41, 50, 162
Peterson Institute for International Economics, ix “The Prune Book,” 92b
Peterson, Peter G., ix Public Papers of the Presidents (1969 ed.), 154
Pfiffner, James P., 158
Pierce, Franklin, 129 Quayle, Dan, 128
Pierce, Samuel, 67
PIP (primus inter pares, or top assistant to the Race in cabinet appointments, 60–64, 67. See also
president), 15, 17, 26–29; chart of top assistants, 27; African Americans in cabinet
worksheet of questions for, 29 Ratings of U.S. presidents, 151b, 160
Pleasurable activities, 119–21 Rayburn, Sam, 128
Podesta, John, 34b Reagan, Nancy, 28
“The Plum Book,” 92b Reagan, Ronald: admission of mistake by, 117; cabinet,
Policy leak, 112b 16, 69, 70, 77, 88; campaign promises of, 6; chief of
Political risks of cabinet nominees, 78–79 staff under, 26, 28; Commission on Social Security
Porter, Roger B., 161 Reform, 9b; inaugural address of, 132; inauguration,
Powell, Colin, 8, 9, 64, 67, 85b 125, 126; organization of White House Office, 17;
Powell, Jody, 32, 36, 162 and Oval Office, 145, 152; personality conflicts of
Preparing to Be President (Jones), 158 inner circle, 54; press secretary under, 33b, 34;
Presidential Command (Rodman), 159 removal of staff, 115; secretary of state under, 52;
Presidential commissions, 9b transition planning, 4; transition team, 97
The Presidential Difference: Leadership Style from Recommendations of books for study, 158–62
FDR to George W. Bush (Greenstein), 160 Regan, Donald, 26, 28, 52, 115, 161
Presidential Power: The Politics of Leadership Reich, Robert, 31
(Neustadt), 160 Reinventing Government Project, 99b
Presidential Speechwriting (Ritter & Medhurst, eds.), Removal of deadwood, 114–16
159 Reno, Janet, 64
Presidential Succession Act of 1947, 16b Reorganizations, 98–100
Presidential transition. See Transition planning Report to the President-Elect 2000: Triumphs and
Presidential Transition Act, 5b Tragedies of the Modern Presidency (Abshire, ed.),
Presidential Transitions: From Politics to Practice 159
(Burke), 158 Resolute Desk, 151–52, 152
President’s Committee on Administrative Reston, James, 110, 135
Management, 1 Richardson, Elliot, ix, 72
Press conferences, 106–10 Riley, Richard, 70
Press Corps, White House, 108–09 Rockefeller, Nelson, 9b, 45, 46
Press coverage of transition, 104–06, 105 Rodman, Peter W., 159
Press leaks, 110–11, 112–13b Rogers, William, 52–53, 71b
Press secretary, 32–34; cartoon, 32; chart, initial press Roosevelt Desk, 153, 153
secretaries (1953–2009), 36–37; on job of press Roosevelt, Eleanor, 9b, 127b

What Do We Do Now? • 171
Roosevelt, Franklin: conflict among advisers of, 47; Sorensen, Theodore (Ted) C., ix, 15, 28, 47, 48b, 60, 77,
inaugural address of, 131, 133; Inauguration Day of 79, 162
first term, 1; organization of White House Office, 16; Sorkin, Aaron, 21b
and Oval Office, 152, 153; portrait of, 118, 149, 150–51; Speakes, Larry, 36, 162
and Resolute Desk, 152; speechwriters for, 43; Speeches at inaugurations, 129–34; famous passages
transition from Hoover to, 102; view of federal from, 133; length, 132; style, 134; summaries and
employees, 103 reactions from Eisenhower to George W. Bush,
Roosevelt, Theodore, desk of, 153, 153 135–41; theme, 134; tone, 134
Rosen, James, 88 Speechwriters, 41–47; memoirs by, list of, 162; quiz,
Rosenman, Samuel, 43, 162 47–48
Rove, Karl, 17, 26, 27 Spin Control (Maltese), 159
Rumsfeld, Donald, viii, 28 Staats, Elmer B., viii
Rusher, William, 107 State of the Union Address, 46–47, 132
Steiner, Peter, 32
Safire, William, 4b, 41, 48b, 130–31, 132b, 153–54, 158, Stephanopoulos, George, 36, 63, 106, 114
162, 164 Stevenson, Adlai, 65
Safire’s Political Dictionary, 48b Story, George Henry, portrait of Abraham Lincoln, 100,
Salinger, Pierre, 32, 36, 162 149, 150
Schlesinger, Arthur M., Jr., vi, 4b, 151b, 160 The Strategic Presidency: Hitting the Ground Running
Schlesinger, James, 69 (Pfiffner), 158
Schlesinger, Robert, 43, 159 Stuart, Gilbert, portrait of Washington, 24, 147, 148,
Schultze, Charles L., 65 148–49
Scowcroft, Brent, viii, 102 Student loan program, 98
Scranton, William, 9b Study approach to presidential transition, 157–64
Scully, Matthew, 47, 48b Succession to Office of President, 16b
Seal of the President, 3b Sullivan, Louis, 67, 75
Secretary of state in line of succession to presidency, Sullivan, Terry, 159
16b Sully, Thomas, portrait of Andrew Jackson, 76, 149, 150
Securities and Exchange Commission, 93 Sununu, John, 26, 27, 101
Senior Executive Service, 104 Surgeon General, 93
Shalala, Donna, 67, 70 Suskind, Ron, 79
Sharkey, Pete, 21b
Sherpas, 75 Task forces, 97–98
Sherwood, Robert, 43 Telnaes, Ann, 74, 163
Shoumatoff, Elizabeth, portrait of Franklin D. Tenpas, Kathryn Dunn, 159
Roosevelt, 118, 149, 150–51 TerHorst, Jerald, 34
Shriver, Sargent, 71b Theodore Roosevelt Desk, 153, 153
Shultz, George, 48, 54, 72–73 Thomas, Alma, 56b
Smith, Hedrick, 138–39 Thurmond, Strom, 78
Social Security, Commission on Reform, 9b To Serve the President: Continuity and Innovation in
Somalia, 102 the White House Staff (Patterson), 159
Tower, John, 78, 80

172  • What Do We Do Now?

Transition planning: budget, 5b; extract from What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and
transition memorandum, 10–11; message from, 35; Washington’s Culture of Deception (McClellan), 114
need for, 2–5; sources for advice on, 158; study Whistle-blower leak, 113b
approach to, 157–64 Whitaker, John, 56b
Transition teams, 96–97 White House, 13–57; compatibility of personalities in,
“Treaty of Fifth Avenue,” 46 52–55; conflict in, 47–51; congressional lobbyist,
Trial-balloon leak, 113b 38–40; East Wing, 21; perks for staff in, 56b; press
Truman, Harry S.: inaugural address of, 132; and Oval secretary, 32–34; sources on operations of, 159;
Office desk, 153; president’s seal, 3b; press speechwriters, 41–43; staffing for, 14–16; West Wing,
conference gaffe by, 107 20–23. See also White House Office (WHO)
The Truth of the Matter (Lance), 38 White House counsel, 15
White House Ghosts: Presidents and Their
UN ambassador, 64–65 Speechwriters (Schlesinger), 43, 159
Uniform Code of Military Justice, 8 The White House: Its Historic Furnishings and
“United States Government Policy and Supporting First Families (Monkman), 151
Positions,” 92b White House Office (WHO): organizational chart, 18;
Universities. See Colleges and universities organizing of, 16–19; staffing of, 14–15
White House Press Corps, 108–09
Valenti, Jack, 132b The White House World: Transitions, Organization, and
Vance, Cyrus, 53–54 Office Operations (Kumar & Sullivan, eds.), 159
Vetting process for cabinet, 77–78 Whitman, Christine Todd, 66, 87b
Vice president: office of, 21; swearing in, 128 Williams, Ralph, 46, 47, 48b
Victims of Groupthink: A Psychological Study of Wilson, Charles E., 72
Foreign-Policy Decisions and Fiascoes (Janis), 160 Wilson Desk, 153, 153–54
Wilson, Henry, 154
Walcott, Charles E., 159 Wilson, Woodrow, 33b, 153–54
Waldman, Michael, 162 Women: in Cabinet, 60, 63–64, 65; Commission on the
Wall Street Journal on Federal Reserve, 92 Status of Women, 9b
Waring, Fred, 120 Wood, Kimba, 64
Warnke, Paul, 69 Woods, Rose Mary, 119
Warshaw, Shirley Anne, 159 Woodward, Bob, 85b, 89
Washington, George: inaugural speech of, 132; and Worksheets: campaign promises, 6–7; reasons why
Oval Office history, 144b; portraits of, 24, 42, 49, 147 elected by voters, 6–7
Watergate, 116, 144, 153
Wayne, Stephen, 159 Yale Law School’s Avalon Project, 130b
Weinberger, Caspar, 48, 54 Young, Andrew, 61, 64, 65
West Wing, 20–21; C&O Desk in Study, 155; diagram Young, Whitney, 60
of, 22–23
West Wing (television show), 21b Ziegler, Ron, 36
Zoellick, Robert B., 66

What Do We Do Now? • 173
 Photo Credits

Page 24: Portrait of Washington, courtesy of White House Historical

Association (White House Collection)
Page 25: Executive Office Building, iStock Photo
Page 42: Portrait of Washington, courtesy of White House Historical
Association (White House Collection)
Page 49: Portrait of Washington, courtesy of White House Historical
Association (White House Collection)
Page 76: Portrait of Jackson, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, courtesy of
the Board of Directors, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Page 94: Library of Congress
Page 100: Portrait of Lincoln, courtesy of White House Historical
Association (White House Collection)
Page 118: Portrait of Roosevelt, courtesy of White House Historical
Association (White House Collection)
Page 124: Eisenhower inauguration envelope, iStock Photo
Page 142: Oval Office during the Reagan administration, photo courtesy
of White House Historical Association
Page 146: Oval Office during the Kennedy administration, photo courtesy
of White House Historical Association
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174  • What Do We Do Now?