Laura Bush's cover story

Has Laura Bush hired a publicist?

A close look at the coverage of the first lady this week shows the signs of it.

On Monday, USA Today ran a gushing piece about Mrs. Bush "pursuing her own second-term agenda" and "ascending the global stage."

Mrs. Bush has already made eleven solo foreign trips and there's certainly nothing new about a first lady traveling and giving speeches on issues of interest to her. USA Today's story has the unmistakable sound of a publicity campaign.

In fact, Mrs. Bush did give USA Today an exclusive interview, without which, one suspects, USA Today would not have found the first lady's calendar entries so compelling.

Then there's the latest front-page splash in the Globe tabloid.

Mrs. Bush has been knocking Britney and Jessica and Angelina off the cover on a regular basis with stories of marital discord in the White House. This week's story contends that Mrs. Bush is so upset over "Death of a President," the fictionalized film about the assassination of her husband, that she fears she's having a nervous breakdown, and she's thinking of moving back to Texas.

Publicists don't just disseminate good news. They also manage bad news.

The Globe says the "59-year-old Texas-born beauty" "bravely accompanied" the president to New Orleans recently where, "as usual, she carried out her duties with class." The Globe says the president has returned to drinking and is attracted to Condoleezza Rice.

So we can guess whose side of the king-size bed is the source for this story.

The Globe goes on at some length to describe the "crushing pressures" Laura Bush is under as she battles "to hold her marriage together in the face of George's close relationship with his Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice."

Then there's a lot of copy about the TV movie depicting the fictional assassination.

Then there's this: "Now, she desperately wants to leave Washington and get back to a normal life in Texas and split time between the ranch and a condo in Houston or Dallas....She'd like to spend the next year commuting to Washington every couple of weeks."

It seems unlikely that a woman who was strong in the face of terrorist attacks that saw her family hustled into underground rooms would collapse in a weeping heap over a TV movie.

It seems more likely that the first lady is seeking a cover story for a separation from the president.

The suggestion that she wants to "split time between the ranch and a condo in Houston or Dallas" neatly slips in the idea that Mrs. Bush is about to establish a new residence, separate from the home she shares with her husband.

Maybe she just wanted free calendars from the local real estate brokers.

Then again, Texas residency is a useful thing if you're planning to run for the United States House of Representatives or Senate.

The easiest route for Mrs. Bush to get into the Senate would be a Supreme Court appointment for U.S. Senator John Cornyn. The senator from Texas is a former justice of the Texas Supreme Court, and his appointment to the federal bench would create an immediate job opening in the first lady's home state.

Voters in Texas would likely support Mrs. Bush for any office without hesitation, but a good publicist can make sure people know that the first lady is traveling the world and talking seriously about serious issues, not just reading from cards like some cupcake beauty pageant contestant.

The USA Today story says Mrs. Bush "is putting the finishing touches on a conference to improve reading skills in the world's most illiterate countries, a roundtable discussion on Burma to press for the release of democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, and a speech on health problems facing women worldwide."

Not a cupcake in sight.

Without a skilled publicist, people might one day read this in a real newspaper: Laura Bush walks out on the president, accusing him of drinking and infidelity, and moves into an apartment in Texas.

With a skilled publicist, they would read this instead: Movie-making idiots frighten the first lady, president sends her to Texas for some well-deserved R&R away from the Washington spotlight.

Hmmm. Maybe he's the one who hired the publicist.


Copyright 2006

Editor's note: Catch up on your light reading with the earlier post, "All right, let's dish."

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