Listen Up, Mr. President: Everything You Always Wanted Your President to Know and Do - Hardcover

Thomas, Helen; Crawford, Craig

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1439148155 ISBN 13: 9781439148150

Publisher: Scribner, 2009

Synopsis

Helen Thomas has covered the administrations of ten presidents in a career spanning nearly sixty years. She is known for her famous press conference closing line, "Thank you, Mr. President," but here she trades deference for directness. Thomas and veteran journalist Craig Crawford hold nothing back as they use former occupants of the White House to provide a witty, history-rich lesson plan of what it takes to be a good president.

Combining sharp observation and dozens of examples from the fi rst presidency through the forty-fourth, the authors outline the qualities, attitudes, and political and personal choices that make for the most successful leaders, and the least. Calvin Coolidge, who hired the fi rst professional speechwriter in the White House, illuminates the importance of choosing words wisely. William Howard Taft, notorious for being so fat he broke his White House bathtub, shows how not to cultivate a strong public image. John F. Kennedy, who could handle the press corps and their questions with aplomb, shows how to establish a rapport with the press and open oneself up to the public. Ronald Reagan, who acknowledged the Iran-Contra affair in a television address, demonstrates how telling hard truths can earn forgiveness and even public trust.

By gleaning lessons from past leaders, Thomas and Crawford not only highlight those that future presidents should follow but also pinpoint what Americans should look for and expect in their president. Part history lesson, part presidential primer, Listen Up, Mr. President is smart, entertaining, and exceedingly edifying.

About this title

About the Author:

Helen Thomas is the dean of the White House press corps. The recipient of more than forty honorary degrees, she was honored in 1998 with the inaugural Helen Thomas Lifetime Achievement Award, established by the White House Correspondents' Association. The author of Thanks for the Memories, Mr. President; Front Row at the White House; and Dateline: White House, she lives in Washington, D.C., where she writes a syndicated column for Hearst.

Craig Crawford is a columnist for Congressional Quarterly’s CQ Politics and his writing appears regularly in newspapers throughout the country. He is the former editor-in-chief of The Hotline and was previously a reporter for the Orlando Sentinel.  He is the author of Attack the Messenger and The Politics of Life.  He lives in Washington, D.C., and blogs daily at craigcrawford.com.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

Seven

Give Us Vision: It's Your Legacy

*

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

When it comes to laying out a vision, some presidents get it and some don't.

Get it, Mr. President. Your job is not only a to-do list for making appointments, passing laws, and negotiating treaties. To succeed you must also inspire us to the future -- with words and deeds.

A good president, wrote nineteenth-century historian Henry Adams, "resembles the commander of a ship at sea. He must have a helm to grasp, a course to steer, a port to seek."

The port you seek, Mr. President, is your vision. Those who take this lightly do so at their peril.

George H. W. Bush clearly did not get it in 1987 as he prepared to run for the presidency.

Bush benefited from the popularity of the man he had served as vice president for two terms. If anything, Ronald Reagan was all about vision. "Less government and more freedom was his mantra."

Lofty words and thoughts did not come easily to Bush. Ideas and ideologies did not move him. Essentially, he was a lifelong bureaucrat more stirred by practical evaluations of tangible problems followed by pragmatic solutions.

"A man of action rather than reflection" was how Time magazine described Bush in a profile coinciding with the launch of his campaign. Whenever asked what he would do as president, Bush typically responded that he would pick the best people and run an efficient government.

Bush's lack of interest in the big-picture rhetoric worried friends and advisers as he gathered steam for a White House run. To many, his idea of an argument for his candidacy could be summed up in three words: It's my turn.

After all, as a dutiful vice president, he had attended all the meetings he was called to, seldom took notes that could get him or anyone else in trouble, and rarely asked a question or tipped his hand in a way that proved whose side he was on in a difficult debate.

This ultimate bureaucrat had a problem, however -- one that dogged him throughout the campaign and into his presidency. Conservative columnist George Will bluntly described Bush's limitation in those days: "He does not say why he wants to be there, so the public does not know why it should care if he gets his way."

"Oh, the Vision Thing"

Bush himself gave his critics the words that came to symbolize his lack of appreciation for a president's overarching purpose in our politics. The story got out early in the 1988 campaign about a session with advisers when he asked for a list of expected issues in the upcoming race.

Instead of the to-do list he asked for, the vice president was given an earful about his need to inspire voters. He should go to Camp David, the advisers said, and think about where he wanted to take the country.

"Oh, the vision thing," Bush said.

To Bush, the "vision thing" was just another item on the checklist, something you could always hire speechwriters to craft. He never did internalize a clarity of ideas and principles that could shape public opinion and influence Congress. It could be the biggest reason that Bush lost reelection four years later.

Bush could not live down his "vision thing" comment. No matter how hard he tried to demonstrate his hopes and dreams for the nation, it always seemed phony and awkward because most observers believed that his originally dismissive attitude of the concept reflected his true self.

In the presidential game, there is no vision without the right words. Indeed, it is your words that convey your vision, Mr. President.

That is why accomplished speechwriters have become a fixture at the White House, although they are expected to stay behind the scenes. Although it is an open secret that presidents generally read aloud words written for them, they naturally prefer that everyone pretend otherwise. Aides often go to great lengths to stress how much input the boss gave, but it can be difficult to pin them down on the details of which words the president actually wrote.

A standard line is that the speechwriters meet in advance with the president and receive his wisdom about what should be included as if he were some sort of oracle and they are merely the stenographers. Not likely.

If the speech turns out to be a great one, ambitious speechwriters find a way to leak the truth of their authorship. Particularly successful words or phrases from presidential speeches become trademarks for the once anonymous authors. Some even come to be identified by these words for the rest of their careers. Occasionally, disputes arise between former speechwriters about who actually authored a famous phrase.

Of course, if the speech is a flop, the writers are only too happy to continue giving the president all the credit. Beware of this little game, Mr. President. If you have not yet learned how to write some nifty language for a speech, get started. Otherwise, credit for some of your best moments will one day be given to someone else. And if you do craft some powerful words, make sure there is proof that you wrote them.

Elements of a Good Presidential Speech

The elements of successful presidential addresses are fairly basic, but take different forms. Sometimes there is an identifiable foe to denounce. The more identifiable, the easier it will be to nail the speech.

Barack Obama was in a sense lucky that the nation was gripped by hard economic times when he took office. When Americans are squeezing their wallets, they are most likely to pay attention to the president.

Or, as the saying goes in politics, the best way to reach the voters' hearts is through their wallets.

Whatever the dilemma of the day might be, a good presidential speech needs to stick to a central theme. This is your vision, Mr. President. Give it plenty of thought, even if others write the actual words.

Often, presidential speeches are written by committee, and you can tell. They ramble from one theme to the next. State of the Union addresses are particularly susceptible to this, as members of Congress lobby the White House to include their pet themes or projects. The result is that most State of the Union addresses become a mishmash, a laundry list of proposals that lack a greater theme.

A few memorable phrases are essential. Again, dramatic events make that easier. Who can forget Franklin Roosevelt's words to Congress urging war against Japan: "Yesterday, December 7, 1941 -- a date which will live in infamy -- the United States was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Japanese empire...."

Modern presidential speechwriters do their best to keep the beginning and end as cohesive and thematic as possible, knowing that any number of items will be inserted by the various aides and officials (including the president). Writers try to stuff those things in the middle, jealously protecting the opening and closing remarks.

Presidents differ in how they interact with their writers. Clinton, himself a decent writer, loved to fiddle with wording all the way through to the final draft. For one State of the Union address he was still rewriting in the limousine on the way to Capitol Hill, causing confusion among staff aides charged with installing the speech in the machinery for his TelePrompTer. As a result, the wrong text appeared on the screen as Clinton spoke.

Thanks, however, to Clinton's personal involvement in the drafting, he knew the wording well enough to wing it until the correct text appeared. No one knew anything was wrong.

Some presidents would rely on an ultimate authority figure who could change the final language. Harry Truman turned over the final versions of speeches to his wife, Bess. His speechwriters claimed that she nearly always added a human touch that improved the wording.

Nixon sought ideological balance among his speechwriters, including conservatives, moderates, and, for him, somewhat left-leaning wordsmiths.

Eisenhower was unusual in that he had actually been a speechwriter during his military service -- he crafted words for General MacArthur. As a result of this background, Eisenhower was known for putting his writers through as many as a dozen drafts for a single speech.

Calvin Coolidge hired the first professional speechwriter in the White House, and they have been there ever since. Coolidge's wordsmith was a Republican politician named Judson Welliver. Today, a society of speechwriters in Washington is named after him.

It would be nice if presidents took more time to hone their thoughts and vision into words. They could probably deliver them more effectively, giving the language a more authentic sound. But the usual response to such a suggestion is the president does not have time.

Make time, Mr. President. Do not let words be put into your mouth on every occasion. When setting forth your vision for the country's future it is especially vital that you at least put some of the words together.

There was a time, believe it or not, when presidents actually wrote their own speeches. Most political figures did so during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries when strong oratory was the principal skill required to be elected. Being able to speak in public for hours with few notes was a prerequisite for office.

George Washington was an exception. He rose to fame as a general and not as a career politician, so he was unskilled in the speech arts. Alexander Hamilton sometimes helped Washington with his speechwriting. Historians believe that Hamilton was the principal author of Washington's famous farewell address.

Abraham Lincoln was probably one of the best speechwriters ever to serve in the White House. If for nothing else, the Gettysburg Address earned him that title.

A Heap of Vision in Ten Sentences

What is so remarkable about the Gettysburg Address is that in...

About this edition

• Publisher: Scribner
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 1439148155
• ISBN 13: 9781439148150
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224