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Marlin Fitzwater 1992 [OA 8483]
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Marlin Fitzwater 1992 [OA 8483]
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Records of the White House Office of Speechwriting (George H. W. Bush Administration)
Speech Backup Alphabetical Files
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Originally Processed With FOIA(s):
FOIA Number:
S
S
FOIA
MARKER
This is not a textual record. This is used as an
administrative marker by the George Bush Presidential
Library Staff.
Record Group/Collection:
George H.W. Bush Presidential Records
Collection/Office of Origin:
Speechwriting, White House Office of
Series:
Speech File Backup Files
Subseries:
Alpha File, 1987-1991
OA/ID Number:
13844
Folder ID Number:
13844-004
Folder Title:
Marlin Fitzwater, 1992
Stack:
Row:
Section:
Shelf:
Position:
G
26
23
3
1
PAGE
1
FOCUS - 1 OF 4 STORIES
Copyright 1992 States News Service
States News Service
December 2, 1992, Wednesday
LENGTH: 1185 words
HEADLINE: KANSAS FARM BOY MARLIN FITZWATER READY TO LEAVE WHITE HOUSE
BYLINE: By Polly Basore Elliott, States News Service
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
KEYWORD: FITZWATER
BODY:
In 1965, a Kansas farm boy moved to the nation's capital hoping to land a job
as a reporter on a big city newspaper. When no editor would hire Marlin
Fitzwater, the Abilene native went to work for the federal government.
A 28-year career that began as a second choice will end next month for
Fitzwater, 50, who has gone from writing press releases at the Appalachian
Regional Commission to serving as spokesman for two Republican presidents.
"There will be a psychological letdown I am going to have to deal with," said
Fitzwater, whose words have carried the weight of the White House and presidents
Ronald Reagan and George Bush.
The Jan. 20 inauguration of President-elect Bill Clinton will end
Fitzwater's job as presidential spokesman and begin a tour of the lecture
circuits, publishing houses and corporate personnel offices.
In an interview Wednesday, Fitzwater discussed the unlikely turns of fate
that brought him from a Kansas farm to a west wing office on the first floor of
the White House.
Fitzwater didn't imagine he'd be speaking for presidents. "I don't know very
many people who when they are 21 say they want to be president -- except maybe
Bill Clinton," said a reflective Fitzwater, recalling when he came to Washington
decades ago, never expecting he would end up at the White House.
Sitting behind a neat, circular desk that wraps the earthy, robust Kansan,
Fitzwater spoke of a fondness for life in Washington that has never eclipsed a
love of his hometown.
His words are evidenced by an office clock marking time in Abilene, where
his parents and brother still live. It hangs alongside clocks that show the
time in Moscow, Paris, Beijing and Washington.
Born in 1942 in a hospital in Salina, Kansas, because snow blocked the road
to the Abilene hospital, Fitzwater's life detoured from the family farm south
of Abilene where his family raised wheat, corn and alfalfa, plus a few head of
cattle, 100 chickens and 25 pigs.
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States News Service, December 2, 1992
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To pay tuition at Kansas State University, Fitzwater took a series of
newspaper jobs that spurred a lifetime love of news.
After working for the Manhattan Mercury, Topeka Capitol-Journal, the
Lindsberg News-Record and the Abilene Reflector-Chronicle - all while working
toward a journalism degree in 1965 - Fitzwater thought he was ready to leave
home for the big time.
Unfortunately, he says, Washington editors took a different view.
"I like to remind all those editors today that they turned me down 30 years
ago and said, 'Go back to Kansas and get some experience, kid. You're too young
for Washington, Fitzwater recalled with a hearty chuckle.
Undaunted by defeat, Fitzwater searched for government work. Spotting a
small newspaper article about the newly created Appalachian Regional Commission
in Washington, he went to the public affairs director and asked for a job.
The director gave him a copy of the act that created the commission and told
him to write a 250-word story that said what the commission would do.
"I'd never read a law before with all the 'therefores' and 'be enacted
thats. I was scared to death," said Fitzwater who nonetheless clanked out the
story on a portable manual typewriter at home at the kitchen table to get the
job that launched his career as a federal government spokesman.
Soon realizing he preferred "being on the inside" to life as a reporter,
Fitzwater stayed with government, working a series of public relations jobs for
the secretary of transportation, the Environmental Protection Agency, the
Treasury Department and the White House. He became Reagan spokesman in 1987.
It was as Bush's spokesman that Fitzwater made his most memorable statement:
"The liberation of Kuwait has begun," he said on Jan. 16, 1990, declaring to
the world the entrance of the United States into the Persian Gulf war.
Fitzwater recalled: "That was probably the most famous line I've ever uttered
because it's historic and it was the first word to America and to Kuwait, Iran
and the Middle East that we were indeed going to attack Iraq in defense of
Kuwait."
Speaking on military actions has been the most difficult part of the
spokesman's job, Fitzwater said, "because it's (my) job to explain it to the
public who have sons and daughters directly involved."
While most people think of Fitzwater issuing statements from behind a podium
against the blue backdrop in the White House press briefing room, his job has
been one of round-the-clock demands that follows him into his office and home to
bed.
"It's a 24-hour-a-day problem," Fitzwater said.
"Somewhere in the world it is daylight and there is always a reporter
working, and they have no qualms about calling me from Japan or Europe or Africa
to get a response on world events," he said with mixed emotion, noting the
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States News Service, December 2, 1992
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shock he expects when the phones stop ringing next month.
"I will miss the information flow. 1 have in the White House within arm's
reach the experts on almost every world problem. When that is cut off, it will
be traumatic," Fitzwater said.
On the good side, Fitzwater looks forward to the chance to read newspapers
leisurely, rather than professionally.
"My reading habits have been dictated by my job," he said. "I come in and
read all the big stories I know I am going to have to respond to, and read them
critically in terms of what are the issues, what is our position, what is our
opponent's position and what do I have to say about it.
"I've gotten so I can go through a lot of stories pretty fast that way. So I
look forward to being able to read (news) for what I am I interested in," he
said with a measure of optimism and enthusiasm for a future that remains
uncertain.
When his $125, 100 annual salary ceases, Fitzwater hopes to cash in on his
experiences on the speaker circuit. Phone calls from potential clients kept his
phone busy Wednesday.
The framed photos of Fitzwater with Bush, former Soviet leader Mikhail
Gorbachev and troops in the desert that line the spokesman's office wall offer a
clue to what the spokesman will talk about.
"I hope to make some speeches, talking very in-depth about things like
Iran-Contra, the summits to the Soviet Union, the end of the Cold War, the
Yeltsin government and what that means to the rest of the world, and the New
World Order, the role of the United Nations as well as the economy and Reagan
and Bush economic policy."
And for those who don't get to hear him: "I may write a book, as well."
That should keep him busy until the job offers start rolling in, he joked,
explaining that his ideal job would be as vice president of communications for a
major corporation.
Pondering his desire to return to Abilene, where he visits each August for
the county fair ("You can't keep a good farm boy out of the COW barn, you
know."), Fitzwater offers the perfect solution:
"My dream job would be to move IBM headquarters to Abilene, Kansas," he
said with a grin.
A spokesman for IBM headquarters which at press time was still based in
Armonk, N.Y., - when told of Fitzwater's wishes, laughed and replied, "Knock
yourself out, Marlin."
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FOCUS - 2 OF 4 STORIES
Proprietary to the United Press International 1988
November 28, 1988, Monday, BC cycle
SECTION: Washington News
LENGTH: 745 words
HEADLINE: Personality Spotlight :Marlin Fitzwater, White House spokesman
KEYWORD:
Transition-Fitzwater-
BODY:
Marlin Fitzwater, a warm and witty veteran bureaucrat, will have the unusual
but not unprecedented role of serving two masters in the Oval Office.
President Reagan's chief spokesman was tapped Monday by President-elect
George Bush to remain in his high-profile job, this time with the title of press
secretary that he has lacked for the past two years as he served officially as a
deputy to James Brady, crippled in the 1981 assassination attempt on Reagan.
Fitzwater was praised by Bush as a trusted friend who will bring immediate
experience to the task -- and indeed, Fitzwater is a veteran government media
officer who spent two years as Bush's vice presidential spokesman before moving
to the White House amid the Iran-Contra scandal Jan. 12, 1987.
Nonetheless, in the thoroughly modern era of ''press secretaries,
Fitzwater's retention is comparable only to Pierre Salinger's brief service with
President Lyndon Johnson after the president who hired him, John Kennedy, was
killed.
Fitzwater clearly had expected to follow tradition by leaving the White House
when Reagan steps down Jan. 20. Monday's news, therefore, was received almost as
a belated gift for his 46th birthday, which he celebrated Thanksgiving Day.
''I think the job has been a wonderful experience,' he told reporters with a
broad smile. ''I'll run as long as I can and as fast as I can.
The challenge is certainly different from when the portly, personable
Fitzwater took over his White House duties from Larry Speakes, who took refuge
in Wall Street's Merrill Lynch investment firm as the Iran-Contra scandal ponded
away at the White House.
Fitzwater inherited not only the task of coping with continuing disclosures
in Reagan's worst crisis but also with the deep public skepticism that damaged
Reagan's most valuable political asset -- his credibility.
Fitzwater acknowledged the administration faced ''difficult times'' during
the revelations of secret U.S. arms sales to Iran and the diversion of profits
to Nicaraguan Contra rebels.
But he told reporters then: ''I have served in the government for the last 20
years. And every day in that job, I have tried to keep one thought in mind --
that we are doing the people's business here and WE should be able to explain
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Proprietary to the United Press International, November 28, 1988
FOCUS
what we're doing.'
Fitzwater became ''assistant to the president for press relations'' at an
annual salary of $77,400. He declined to answer when asked one of his first
tough questions whether he thought a news spokesman had the right to lie --
but he later told United Press International the answer was ''no.''
In April 1988, Speakes published his memoirs. The book, ''Speaking Out,
contained the admission that he had fabricated presidential quotes and passed
them on to reporters on at least two significant occasions.
Fitzwater responded to that disclosure angrily, saying Speakes 'casts
aspersions on the presidency and on my position.
It's a damn outrage.'
The balding former journalist has been far more popular with reporters than
Speakes, frequently using humor to skirt questions he does not particularly want
to answer. Fitzwater's favorite jokes involve his latest diet - or his
inability to stick to one.
He has struggled with his personal battle of the bulge since joining the vice
president's staff in 1985. This year, he put himself on a boiled-egg-and-water
regime but the rigors of the campaign caused him to stray. Aboard Air Force One
Nov. 5, he planned the dinner menu -- to include beef Wellington and apple pie
--- and told reporters he would go back on his diet after the election.
Fitzwater was born Nov. 24, 1942, in Salina, Kan., and grew up in Abilene,
the hometown of Dwight Eisenhower. He received a bachelor's degree in journalism
from Kansas State University in 1965 and worked for several local newspapers,
including the Topeka Capital-Journal, Manhattan Mercury and Abilene
Reflector-Chronicle.
He served in the Air Force from 1968 to 1970 and then became a speechwriter
for John Volpe, the transportation secretary, from 1970 to 1972. He directed the
Environmental Protection Agency's press office until 1981, when he left to
become the deputy assistant treasury secretary for public affairs.
Fitzwater moved to the White House in 1983, serving as special assistant to
Reagan and deputy press secretary for domestic affairs until April 1985, when he
became Bush's spokesman.
He is divorced and has two teenage children, Bradley and Courtney.
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FOCUS - 3 OF 4 STORIES
Proprietary to the United Press International 1987
January 12, 1987, Monday, AM cycle
SECTION: Washington News
LENGTH: 603 words
HEADLINE: Reagan decides Marlin 'Fitz' as chief spokesman
BYLINE: By HELEN THOMAS, UPI White House Reporter
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
KEYWORD:
Fitzwater
BODY:
President Reagan tapped veteran government press officer Marlin Fitzwater as
chief White House spokesman Monday, prompting a hearty round of applause from
reporters.
'Don't expect it to last, quipped a reporter as the smiling Fitzwater, 44,
stood beside White House spokesman Larry Speakes, who made the announcement.
Fitzwater has been press secretary to Vice President George Bush since April
1985. He is expected to assume his new post in February when Speakes leaves for
his new six-figure public relations job with Merrill Lynch investment company on
Wall Street.
''I welcome Marlin Fitzwater as chief spokesman for the administration,
Reagan said in a statement read by Speakes. ''He is an outstanding individual of
the deepest integrity, whose 22 years of service in Washington have earned him
the respect of the press and of the public.
Speakes, who served six years in the White House, called Fitzwater ''the
ideal choice.
James Brady, who was shot and wounded in the 1981 assassination attempt on
Reagan, retains the title of press secretary.
Fitzwater will become 'assistant to the president for press relations'' at a
salary of $77,400 a year.
Before the announcement, Speakes was asked about the possibility that the
stocky, balding Fitzwater would succeed him.
''If it's Marlin I'll put his shiny head right out here,' Speakes grinned,
hastily adding that the description 'wouldn't bother him at all.
No slouch himself, Fitzwater wisecracked, "II think it's obvious the
president wanted an anchorman type.'
Fitzwater declined to answer when asked whether he thought a press spokesman
had the right to lie, but he later told United Press International the answer
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Proprietary to the United Press International, January 12, 1987
FOCUS
is ''no.
Fitzwater said he had been assured of direct access to the president, but
expects to report through White House chief of staff Donald Regan, for whom he
worked at the Treasury Department.
He said the president ''assured me I would have direct access and report to
him. And I assured him of my personal commitment to him, the first lady and the
administration.
Fitzwater acknowledged the administration faces ''difficult times'' because
of the Iran arms scandal, but said, 'They will not erase the indelible marks of
pride and affection that Americans feel for our president and for our country.
' ' In the broader sense,' Fitzwater said, ' ' I have served in the government
for the last 20 years. And every day in that job, I have tried to keep one
thought in mind: That we are doing the people's business here and we should be
able to explain what we're doing.'
Fitzwater was born Nov. 24, 1942, in Salina, Kan. He graduated from Kansas
State University in 1965 with a bachelor's degree in journalism.
He served in the Air Force 1968 to 1970, and worked for several newspapers
in Kansas, including the Topeka Capital-Journal, Manhattan Mercury and Abilene
Reflector-Chronicle.
In government service, he was a writer-editor for the Appalachian Regional
Commission from 1965 to 1968, and a speech writer for John Volpe, the secretary
of transportation, from 1970 to 1972.
He was the director of the press office at the Environmental Protection
Agency from 1972 to 1981, when he left to become the Treasury Department's
deputy assistant secretary for public affairs.
He moved to the White House in 1983, serving as special assistant to
president and deputy press secretary for domestic affairs, Sept. 1, 1983, to
April 1985, when he became the vice president's press secretary.
Fitzwater said his two children, Bradley and Courtney, were ''very excited
about the appointment.
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5TH DOCUMENT of Level 1 printed in FULL format.
Public Papers of the Presidents
White House Office
Appointment of Marlin Fitzwater as Assistant to the
President for Press Relations.
23 Weekly Comp. Pres. Doc. 21
January 12, 1987
LENGTH: 251 words
The President today announced his intention to appoint Marlin Fitzwater to be
Assistant to the President for Press Relations effective upon the departure of
Larry Speakes. He will serve as spokesman for the President.
Mr. Fitzwater has been Press Secretary and Assistant to Vice President Bush
since April 1, 1985. Before joining the Vice President, Mr. Fitzwater was
Special Assistant to President Reagan and Deputy Press Secretary for Domestic
Affairs from September 1, 1983, to April 1985. Mr. Fitzwater served as Deputy
Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at the Department of the Treasury from
1981 to 1983. In recognition of his service he was awarded the Meritorious
Executive Award by President Reagan in 1982. Previously he served in the Office
of Public Affairs at the Environmental Protection Agency in 1972-1981. He
served in the Office of the Secretary of Transportation in 1970-1972 as
speechwriter for Secretary John Volpe and at the Appalachian Regional Commission
in 1965-1967. Mr. Fitzwater was an advertising executive with the Manhattan (
Kansas) Mercury and correspondent for the Topeka ( Kansas) Capitol-Journal in
1962-1965. He was editor of the Lindsburg ( Kansas) News-Record in 1962 and
worked for the Abilene ( Kansas) Reflector-Chronicle.
He graduated from Kansas State University (B.A., journalism, 1965) and
served in the U.S. Air Force. He was born November 24, 1942, in Salina, KS. He
has two children, Bradley and Courtney, and resides in Alexandria, VA.
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7TH DOCUMENT of Level 1 printed in FULL format.
Public Papers of the Presidents
White House Staff
Appointment of Marlin Fitzwater as Special Assistant to
the President and Deputy Press Secretary for Domestic
Affairs.
19 Weekly Comp. Pres. Doc. 1097
August 5, 1983
LENGTH: 218 words
The President today announced his intention to appoint Marlin Fitzwater to be
Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Press Secretary for Domestic
Affairs. He will assume his duties on September 1, 1983.
Mr. Fitzwater has extensive government public affairs experience, serving
as key spokesman in various departments over a period of 13 years. Since 1981
Mr. Fitzwater has served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at
the Department of the Treasury. In that position he served as press spokesman
for Secretary Donald T. Regan and the Department of the Treasury. In
recognition of his service he was awarded the Meritorious Executive Award by
President Reagan in 1982. Previously he served in the Office of Public Affairs
at the Environmental Protection Agency in 1972-81. During that time he served
as spokesman for three Administrators. He served in the Office of the Secretary
of Transportation in 1970-72, as speechwriter for Secretary John Volpe.
Mr. Fitzwater was an advertising executive with the Manhattan ( Kansas)
Mercury and correspondent for the Topeka ( Kansas) Capitol-Journal in 1962-65.
He graduated from Kansas State University (B.A., journalism, 1965). He was
born November 24, 1942, in Salina, Kans. He has two children and resides in
Arlington, Va.
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7TH STORY of Level 1 printed in FULL format.
Copyright 1992 The Washington Post
The Washington Post
August 1, 1992, Saturday, Final Edition
NAME: MARLIN FITZWATER
SECTION: STYLE; PAGE C1
LENGTH: 1458 words
HEADLINE: Attack Of the President's Flack;
Marlin Fitzwater, Spokesman With Spin
SERIES: Occasional
BYLINE: Howard Kurtz, Washington Post Staff Writer
BODY:
Marlin Fitzwater was a bit surprised when his verbal mugging of Al Gore
became big news.
He was standing around chatting with some wire service reporters who were
looking for an 8 a.m. story just some "filler" to hold them until the daily
briefing, the White House press secretary says. So Fitzwater obliged by
opining that the Democratic vice presidential nominee is an "environmental
extremist" and, for good measure, "Mr. Sellout America."
"I've used that many times in the past," Fitzwater says. "For some reason,
the press chose to play it up."
After 5 1/2 years as the man on the presidential podium - - first for Ronald
Reagan, then for George Bush - the portly Kansas native is well aware that an
ill-chosen phrase can instantly reverberate around the world. But this is his
first presidential campaign --- Reagan was a lame duck in '88 - and Fitzwater
is finding that his partisan blasts explode with much greater force than he
might have anticipated.
"I pay his salary," snaps Paul Begala, an adviser to the Clinton-Gore
campaign. "He's supposed to be the official flack of the president of the United
States, not the official attack dog."
A wisecracking former bureaucrat who is popular with the White House press
corps, Fitzwater, 49, has a knack - some would say a weakness -- for the
highly personal dig. This is the man who called Mikhail Gorbachev a "drugstore
cowboy. = Who declared that Pat Buchanan had gone "Looney Tunes.' Who ripped into
Ross Perot as "a dangerous and destructive personality" and a "monster."
Fitzwater was at it again this week, accusing Bill Clinton (whom he has
described as "Slippery Bill") of being "reckless" in calling for a more
aggressive approach to halting the violence in the disintegrating Yugoslavia.
Fitzwater later admitted he had reacted to an "incomplete" report of Clinton's
remarks -- which weresimilar to the position of leading Republicans but he
did not withdraw the recklessness charge.
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The Washington Post, August 1, 1992
Many of these rhetorical slaps are not coordinated with campaign officials,
who are left shaking their heads in bewilderment.
At campaign time, says Jody Powell, the former spinmeister for Jimmy Carter,
"there is a tendency to become more partisan, and I probably did it a little
more than most. You want to be careful not to become the presidential hatchet
guy. It undermines your effectiveness on more serious matters. There's a tension
there that I suspect Fitzwater is aware of. He doesn't want to become the Dan
Quayle of the campaign."
Fitzwater concedes that he sometimes goes too far. "I try not to be
partisan, but when the president is being attacked by Mr. Clinton, Mr. Gore or
anyone else, I feel I have to respond," he says. "Sometimes that is partisan. I
don't know any way to avoid that.
"I do try as the president's spokesman to stay out in front in terms of
making the political points he wants to make. That's the traditional role of a
spokesman, going back to Pierre Salinger [under President Kennedy]. It is a fine
line between being a spokesman and becoming a political operative. In a
political campaign, that line gets raised pretty high."
As for calling Gore "Mr. Sellout America" last week, he says: "I probably
wouldn't use it again and I certainly regret any suggestion I was questioning
his patriotism. However, I will make the argument again that he's an
environmental extremist and cares more about the environment than protecting
jobs."
Bush, for his part, has shown no signs of dissatisfaction with his chief
spokesman. "The president is very understanding of my problems,' Fitzwater
says. "A couple of times he will say, 'You might be a little ahead of my
position there,' or 'I'm not sure I'd use exactly that language. 11
Begala sees the relationship differently. "Mr. Fitzwater is clearly
following the president's directives,' he says. "I don't fault him for saying
hysterical and ridiculous things. Bush says, 'Okay, Marlin, it's time for you to
look stupid so I can look good. =
The balding, ruddy-faced Fitzwater has become a familiar television sight,
ambling into the briefing room with his leather-bound notebook. He enjoys
bantering with the press, and generally exhibits great patience with obnoxious
reporters whose main goal is to provoke him into saying something outrageous.
Although he meets with campaign strategists twice a day, Fitzwater
sometimes seems to be singing from a different sheet of music. After the Los
Angeles riots, Fitzwater blamed the Great Society programs of the 1960s for
the conditions that produced the violence, prompting days of White House
backpedaling. And when critics were assailing Vice President Quayle for his slap
at Murphy Brown, Fitzwater veered off course by offering to marry the
already-married Candice Bergen.
Staffers sometimes try to save Fitzwater from himself. "A lot of times he
would say, 'I'm going to go out and say this,' and the deputies would say,
'Don't even think about it,'" an administration official says.
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The Washington Post, August 1, 1992
The long campaign year has taken its toll on Fitzwater. In March, he grew
50 upset about negative coverage of Bush's campaign appearances that he lashed
out at the beat reporters as "lazy bastards." A few weeks later, Fitzwater
told associates he was exasperated enough to quit and abruptly left for a
Bermuda vacation.
"It totally frustrates him when decisions aren't made, when the direction
isn't clear," the administration official says. "He hands in these
communications strategies that don't get implemented because nobody's making
decisions."
A divorced father of two teenagers, the cigar-smoking Fitzwater has come a
long way since he was running the News-Record in Lindsborg, Kan., where he took
his own pictures. He arrived in Washington in 1965 as a $ ,300-a-year speech
writer for the Appalachian Regional Commission, later moving to the
Transportation Department, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Treasury
Department and the White House.
"He's very helpful because he really knows what's going on," says Timothy
McNulty, who covers the White House for the Chicago Tribune. "He's often, if not
usually, in the room when decisions are made."
"He's been able to walk the line between loyalty to the president and
maintaining enough credibility with reporters to be effective," says Ann Devroy,
a White House reporter for The Washington Post.
Others accuse Fitzwater of favoring a select group of reporters. "He seems
to be enormously helpful to some people and not at all to others," says Michel
McQueen of the Wall Street Journal. "At his best, he's sort of ideal as a press
secretary. At his worst, he may make decisions that have less to do with stories
than how he feels about a particular reporter that day. There are times you
cannot get him on the phone for days."
Some of Fitzwater's most important work takes place off the podium. "He
talks to the four networks every night around 6," the administration official
says. "Every Wednesday he sits down with the newsmagazines. He spins these
people hard."
When discussing matters of state, as he did during the latest U.S.
confrontation with Iraq, Fitzwater employs the careful language of the
diplomatic spokesman. He may have learned his lesson after calling Gorbachev a
"drugstore cowboy," meaning a man who makes promises he can't keep. Fitzwater
thought that about described the Soviet leader's diplomatic performance.
"Unfortunately, I miscalculated the personal quality of the term, and I was
roundly criticized in the press for calling him a name. It was my worst
mistake," he says.
Marlin Fitzwater can bob and weave with the best of them. Pressed last week
about reports that Secretary of State James Baker would take charge of the Bush
campaign, Fitzwater told reporters that "it's all speculation, no decisions
have been made." This led to the following exchanges:
Q. Are the stories about Baker perhaps more credible than the ones about the
vice president [leaving the ticket]? Are you willing to give us that much?"
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The Washington Post, August 1, 1992
A. I don't do comparisons.
Q. Would you acknowledge that might be one scenario?
A. I acknowledge nothing.
"Marlin knows that Baker's coming back," an associate says. "He looks like a
jerk standing there denying it when his entire clientele knows he knows. That's
the farce you've got to play along with."
Fitzwater's fame would be even greater if, like State Department
spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler or Pentagon PR man Pete Williams, he allowed his
briefings to be taped for television. But Fitzwater has continued the White
House tradition of allowing the networks only a brief bit of silent footage each
day.
"I don't want to give them a sound bite they can play over and over again
when you say something dumb," he says.
GRAPHIC: PHOTO, WHITE HOUSE SPOKESMAN FITZWATER: SPINNING, OCCASIONALLY
SNAPPING. MARGARET THOMAS
TYPE: BIOGRAPHY, NATIONAL NEWS
SUBJECT: PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS; GOVERNMENT - PRESS RELATIONS
NAMED-PERSONS: MARLIN FITZWATER
ENHANCEMENT: AGE
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