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If Bill Clinton wants everyone in the room to like him, and Al Gore wants everyone to think he's right, George Bush wants everyone to know who's boss. He mocks advisers who try to impress him with arcana, insisting that they "speak English," and he frequently cuts people off in midsentence, keeping control of the conversation. He earns the loyalty of his staff by giving them broad authority, but he doesn't hesitate to remind even his closest advisers that he's the big dog, something he usually does with a sarcastic remark. While Gore may view few of the people close to him as his true equals, he assumes everyone understands this; Bush rarely misses the chance to bring it up.
Voters skeptical about Bush often mention his cockiness--he called himself "President" at one early campaign stop--or a sense that he not only isn't ready to be President but doesn't even know he's not ready. Bush, if administered truth serum, would probably admit that he is not the most experienced or even qualified guy for the job, at least on paper. In an interview this week, he said his biggest hurdle in the next eight months was "convincing the American people that I've got the right judgment to be President, convincing the American people that I'm a sound decision maker." And yet he is just as confident that he is right for the presidency--that he is someone who possesses the mystical capacity to set a clear agenda and persuade others to follow it. It is in this respect that Bush most sees himself to be like Ronald Reagan: an optimist with a simple set of goals and the charm to sell it.
That is one reason the primary fight turned out to be so costly--and not just because it cost him most of that $70 million he had noisily raised. It's hard to run as a merry Reaganaut when you and your surrogates have barbecued John McCain, or talked about uniting people and then courted those who'd rather not. Both men emerge with plenty of scars--but since Gore is trying to sell himself as a fighter, the scars are more natural accessories in his wardrobe.
Already last week Bush was trying to carve up Gore's character, charging on Friday that he had misled federal investigators into the White House fund-raising practices of 1996. Bush's advisers believe that going on the offensive against Gore will fix that stature gap, the sense, even among a sizable minority of Republicans, that Bush simply doesn't have the know-how to be President. "The best way to demonstrate that he is the right guy for the party is to get in a fight with Gore," says a top Bush adviser. "That way you become the standard bearer. Fighting the enemy is the classic way you fix that in a hurry." It's also the classic way to get killed.
--Reported by James Carney and Karen Tumulty/Washington