Bush's big guns: Barbara and Laura


10/19/00 - Updated 01:46 PM ET
By Judy Keen
USA TODAY

SOUTHFIELD, Mich. — As the presidential campaign enters its final phase, Texas Gov. George W. Bush is deploying his secret weapon.

She's 75 years old, blunt as ever and still wearing that familiar four-strand pearl necklace. And even though she had back surgery just three weeks ago, she's combat-ready.

Barbara Bush began her first high-profile campaign swing for her oldest son Wednesday, starring in a ''W. Stands for Women'' bus tour across this battleground state. Her job was to introduce her daughter-in-law, Laura Bush, as a team of women - including Lynne Cheney, wife of Republican vice-presidential nominee Dick Cheney, and Bush foreign policy adviser Condoleezza Rice - talked about the Texas governor's commitment to education, health reform and other issues that matter to female voters.

The former first lady, who said she was fed up with politics after her husband lost his re-election campaign in 1992 and who couldn't bear to watch her son's first debate with Vice President Gore, is plenty fired up.

Why? ''I don't like lying,'' she said tersely in an interview as her bus rolled east on Interstate 96 between Grand Rapids and Lansing.

She didn't elaborate, but she left no doubt that she doesn't think much of Gore. ''I really don't want to be negative, but I think it's sort of shocking to have a man who is three different people in three different debates,'' she said.

Early in the third debate, when Gore marched toward Bush until he was right at his elbow, she said, ''I thought he was going to hit him,'' she said. ''I really did.''

Laura Bush also criticized Gore's physical aggressiveness. ''I don't think it's effective as a debating technique, and I certainly don't think it's effective for somebody who wants to be the president,'' she said.

Her mother-in-law chimed in, ''He had a couple of things he just was going to say over and over again: 'middle class.' To heck with the rest of the world. I prefer somebody who wants to give everybody a hand up.''

And another thing: Gore's scholastic record at Vanderbilt and Harvard ''wasn't half as good as George W.'s record, and I feel very offended by that,'' she said. ''They've spread this rumor that George is not smart. He's dumb like a fox. And what's more, besides being intellectually smart and very well read, he's got 'card sense.' He's bright.''

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