Posted on 03/28/2006 9:38:48 PM PST by Aussie Dasher
On the day that longtime White House Chief of Staff Andy Card took a bullet for an incompetent White House operation – more on that in a moment – another former White House staffer has also departed.
Lyn Nofziger, longtime aide to Ronald Reagan and a personal friend and adviser of mine, died of bladder cancer Monday at the age of 81.
Lyn had been a newspaper reporter when then-candidate Ronald Reagan's kitchen cabinet asked him in the 1966 race for governor to become press secretary to the campaign. From that day forward – with a few temporary postings elsewhere – Lyn was one of Dutch's closest and most loyal aides.
I had the privilege of working for Lyn in 1974, when he oversaw the campaign of Leo K. Thorsness, a just-returned U.S. POW in North Vietnam, who was running for the U.S. Senate against George McGovern in South Dakota. I was the National Finance Chairman and moved to Sioux Falls in June 1974. It was there that I met Lyn and immediately became a Nofziger disciple.
(It was the same week that I first talked to John McCain, a one-time cellmate of Leo Thorsness in a Hanoi prison camp. McCain, I would learn, is one mean, rotten fellow – not the jovial personality he uses to enthrall the gullible mainstream media lapdogs who feel guilty about their own use of college deferments to stay out of Vietnam.)
Lyn Nozfiger was by that time a campaign consultant who oversaw a campaign and worked with the candidate and the campaign manager to run the entire enterprise.
Four years later, when I ran for the House, I hired Lyn as my consultant. A few months later he left my paltry little campaign to rejoin his destiny: Ronald Reagan's campaign. A year later the best president of our lifetime was elected and, on that same wonderful night, I was elected as a proud Reagan loyalist in the House. In the next two years I had the strongest pro-Reagan voting record of any congressman from New York state (tied with Jack Kemp).
Lyn Nofziger was the political director in the early years of the Reagan White House and he never changed. In 1982 he brought me down to the Oval Office to be lobbied on the TEFRA bill – Tax Equification and Fairness in Reporting Act. (What a memory I have if I can remember that bill 24 years later!) As the president and I sat on those two famous chairs in front of the fireplace in the Oval Office, Lyn Nofziger – tie never properly tied and hanging loose – was lying down on the sofa in his stockinged feet as if he were watching the NFL on a Sunday afternoon! In the Oval Office!!!
Lyn was funny, clever – a great punster, which can come only from a quick mind and great vocabulary – and a loyal Reaganite and a true-blue libertarian conservative.
We will all miss him.
Andy Card's departure today will do nothing to change the downward spiral of G.W. Bush's presidency. Why not? Because the problem in this administration is not the staff; it is that the president and the vice president have bad judgment. Period.
Instead of listening to other opinions, they think they know best. Iraq is the perfect example, where they have been wrong about virtually every single pronouncement and statement they have made – and yet they never admit they were wrong and never adjust.
This arrogance is destroying the Bush presidency – and may be ripping apart the GOP, too.
What a contrast with Ronald Reagan – and to Lyn Nofziger. Reagan and his staff were not arrogant; they treated us on the Hill as the co-equals we were in the government. Team Bush walks all over their own supporters on the Hill – and the result now is that the pent-up anger over that treatment is coming back to haunt the administration.
Andy Card is not to blame. He is a loyal Bush aide but not the architect of the now-failing policies in Iraq, Dubai ports, immigration and Katrina; he was merely following Bush's orders.
The fish rots from the head down. And in this White House the orders indeed come from the Oval Office.
Good point. There's always the unexpected wild cards.
The author is the OWNER of NewsMax and is a documented Bush hater.
Wow. Surprised that him owning Newsmax isn't part of his biography on Newsmax. They say he's just a pundit...
http://www.newsmax.com/articles/?a=2000/2/14/190256
Biography of John LeBoutillier
NewsMax.com
John LeBoutillier, a NewsMax.com pundit, is a former U.S. congressman and a nationally recognized political commentator. Mr. LeBoutillier rose to national prominence in 1974 when, as a college student at Harvard, he raised over a quarter-million dollars for a former Republican challenger against South Dakota Senator George McGovern.
Mr. LeBoutillier's efforts caught the notice of President Ford's re-election campaign and in 1976 he was appointed regional coordinator, responsible for all field activities in New Jersey.
After graduating Magna Cum Laude from Harvard College, Mr. LeBoutillier completed a master's degree at Harvard Business School.
Mr. LeBoutillier has been a prolific writer, beginning with his best-selling book Harvard Hates America (October 1978). Later he authored Vietnam Now (September 1989) and co-authored Primary, a novel (September 1979). He has contributed to many major newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times, New York Post and The Wall Street Journal.
In 1980, Mr. LeBoutillier was elected to represent New York's 6th District. He defeated a 16-year Democrat incumbent and became the youngest member of the 97th Congress. In the House, Congressman LeBoutillier served on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and as a member of the Special House POW/MIA Task Force.
After leaving Congress, Mr. LeBoutillier continued to be active in POW/MIA affairs. He currently runs "Sky Hook II Project," dedicated to recovering living American POWs in Southeast Asia.
He also has been a frequent commentator and host of several media programs. He is a frequent guest on radio and television shows. In 1981 he conducted an exclusive interview with Alexander Solzhenitsyn for NBC's Tomorrow show. He has hosted radio talk show programs on WMCA radio and WABC radio. In 1984, Mr. LeBoutillier interviewed Richard M. Nixon for the ABC Network radio in his first live network radio appearance since leaving the White House.
He has been a frequent guest on many national talk show programs, including the Today show, ABC's 20/20 and Nightline and CNN's Crossfire.
Excuse me; I mispoke.
He's still a Bush hater.
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