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The morning often unfolds as a series of promotional events: a talk to the American Dairy Association may be followed by a photo opportunity with a championship athletic team. Once a week Reagan has lunch with the Vice President and once with the Secretary of State. During the afternoon there may be a briefing by the State Department, or a rundown of "talking points" for a meeting with a visiting head of state. For those encounters Reagan relies on index cards to remind him of what to say. On Wednesdays the President usually takes the afternoon off. On Fridays he packs up by three and departs by helicopter for Camp David. Otherwise he stays in the office until about five.
Reagan's reading is not heavy. He gets one- or two-page memos outlining the pluses and minuses of a policy decision. Foreign policy papers are usually kept to five pages. Old friends and conservative cronies have access to a special private White House post office box number and can send him clippings that they think might strike his fancy. That box number is the source of many of Reagan's familiar "factoids," snippets clipped from obscure publications.
Reagan is not notably curious. His aides say he rarely calls them with a question and that he knows in only a vague way what they actually do. He does not sit down with his advisers to hammer out policy decisions. He is happiest when his aides form a consensus, something they try awfully hard to do.
Only when it comes to his speeches is Reagan truly a hands-on President. His writers supply the substance; he adds the homespun parables. His attention to speeches reflects his own perception of his job: on many issues he sees himself less as an originator of policy than as the chief marketer of it.
Reagan's management style is a type that can be very effective, especially given the President's chronically sunny vision of what he wishes to accomplish, and it has helped redefine the public's ideal of political leadership. But it can work only if he is supported by a competent and active staff. During his first term, Chief of Staff James Baker protected Reagan from his woollier notions and helped put many of his ideals into practice. When Baker and Donald Regan pulled off their White House shuffle in January 1985, with a typically detached Reagan looking on like a bemused bystander, the new , chief of staff proclaimed that his primary goal was to let Reagan be Reagan. He has, and one consequence is that little attention seems to have been paid to what the President might consider nitty-gritty details -- at least until they add up to a crisis.