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[Economy-Letters to President, 1991]
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[Economy-Letters to President, 1991]
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Records of the White House Office of Speechwriting (George H. W. Bush Administration)
Tony Snow Subject Files
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Originally Processed With FOIA(s):
foia Number:
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:
Snow, Tony, Files
Subseries:
Subject File, 1988-1993
OA/ID Number:
13894
Folder ID Number:
13894-006
Folder Title:
[Economy-Letters to President, 1991]
Stack:
Row:
Section:
Shelf:
Position:
G
18
29
2
2
speech writers
PITCAIRN
OLDSMOBILE
HONDA
VOLVO
VW
ISUZU
1862 &1908 E. LINCOLN HWY.
LANGHORNE, PA 19047
(215) 741-4100
(NY/NJ) 1-800-343-2748
November 4, 1991
President George Bush
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President,
In response to your letter of October 28, 1991, the most
important thing to do before your "decision whether or not to
seek the Presidency for a second term" is tell the American
people you are very concerned about the economy. The American
people would welcome the news that you and Secretary Baker are
so concerned about the economy that you are postponing work on
all International problems for the time being and concentrating
all your efforts on our economic recovery. I have talked to
good, loyal Republicans across our country and, without
exception, we all sense that the International situation is
more important to you and Mr. Baker than our economy. Millions
of Americans are really hurting. We were thrilled with your
leadership in the Desert Storm victory, but that victory is
fast fading because of the blinding hurt of our economic lives.
My family and I have been loyal supporters of the G.O.P.
all our lives. My Father played an active part in persuading
General Eisenhower to run for the Presidency. In 1966, Mrs.
Eisenhower and Mr. and Mrs. Richard M. Nixon attended my
Father's funeral.
When the cabin loses pressure in a commercial airplane and
the oxygen masks drop down, the recommendation is to put on
your mask first so you can better help your wife and family.
The U.S. economic pressure is seriously low. We have to tell
the world that it is time for us to put on our own economic
mask now so that we will be able to help the world later. If
we don't hurry up and get some economic oxygen, we could all
die in the process of trying to help the world now. Then who
is left to bail out the world? I remember the Great
Depression.
Four weeks ago I was in Reno for Honda's New Car Show.
Except for those from a few pockets of economic stability, the
dealers across the country say that their customers have little
or no confidence in our recovery. Many are afraid things are
getting worse. Three weeks ago in Orlando, at Volvo's New Car
President George Bush
-2-
November 4, 1991
Show, dealers were even more depressed at the lack of
confidence the American people have in our recovery.
Even though I hate to even associate your good name with
FDR, Mr. President, we need you to give some fireside chats on
T.V. Forget the International situation and show us that you
are putting all your efforts into a speedy economic recovery.
Rebuild your credibility with the American people and the World
by letting everyone know how concerned you are about our
stalled economy. Don't worry about what the Democrats will
say. All types of Americans are looking to you for leadership.
We want to hear that you know that millions of Americans are
really hurting, and that, starting today, you and Secretary
Baker are going to put all your efforts into energizing our
economy. Give us your plan.
Talk to Ross Pereau. He may tell you some things you
don't want to hear and that your advisors are unwilling to tell
you, but they are the truth and are the things that must be
tackled if we don't want to slip into a depression.
As one of thousands of GM Dealers, I believe that if only
General Motors had fired Roger Smith and made Ross its
President, GM wouldn't have lost one billion dollars last
quarter and our economy would be better off.
In your letter you write, "I am happy with the progress
we've made." If someone has lost their job, their home, and
their business, they don't see any progress. If there isn't an
up-turn in the economy in the next three months, hundreds of
thousands of us will go bankrupt and that will mean millions of
more unemployed people. Obviously you have no idea how many
businesses are on the verge of folding, and, yet you are asking
us for contributions. Mr. President, go out in the streets and
byways. Talk to people. They don't see "the progress we've
made." They are scared to death.
Pesident Nixon wasn't willing to admit there was a
problem. The rest is history. Lee Iacocca admitted the
odometer mistake, apologized to the American public, did
something about it, and the American public admired him for it.
Mr. President please admit to the American public our economy
is in trouble. A year ago you were able to lead the country to
forget party politics and make sacrifices to win a stirring
Desert Storm victory. Now this same type of leadership is
needed for quick economic recovery. This leadership and
recovery will give you credibility to lead the rest of the
world out of its recession.
president George Bush
-3-
November 4, 1991
Unless the American people have some hope and confidence
and go out and buy Christmas presents, many companies will go
bankrupt before the end of the year. Our Country is in real
trouble. If you don't believe me, go out and talk to almost
anybody and you will hear there is vanishing faith in you and
our Country.
Bite the bullet. Tell the people you know we're in
trouble. Give us a plan, and if we all work together without
politics, as we did in Desert Storm, we can build a strong
economy that will be an example for the whole world to follow.
Just making these statements will stop your sliding popularity
and when people are sure you mean what you say, your popularity
will reach higher plateaus than those after Desert Storm.
Your first fireside TV chat must be before Thanksgiving.
I have great faith in you and soon all America and the World
will too.
Very truly yours,
Garth Pitcairn
GP/wjr
CC: Vice President D. Quayle
18
speechwriters
5mg.191-N
Sylvia L. Ramsey
QC
Route 2 Box 381
Poplar Bluff, MO 63901
October 14, 1991
11-5-91
George Bush
President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington D.C. 20500
Dear Mr. President:
encl As a teacher, I am very aware that education is in the
maelstrom of a crisis in our country. As a response to what
is occurring at this time, I wrote a short story titled "The
Little Red Schoolhouse: A Fable?". It is currently being
circulated in Missouri. It will appear in the December issue
of the Missouri Peer Helpers Magazine and a variety of
newspapers.
I am enclosing a copy of this short story in hopes that it
will help to open the eyes of the people who refuse to remove
their blinders. If you feel that it may be helpful, please
feel free to use it.
Sincerely,
Sylvia L. Ramsey
Sylvia L. Ramsey
The Little Red Schoolhouse
A Fable?
Once upon a time, there was a little red schoolhouse
that was filled with children and had only one teacher. This
little red schoolhouse was located in the middle of a small
community. The people who lived in this community believed
that what happened in the little red schoolhouse was an
important part of their lives, and the lives of their
children. They felt that this was so important, that each
member of the community had a responsibility to share in the
role of seeing that it was the best it could be. The purpose
for the little red schoolhouse was to educate children. The
reason was to provide a better life for all of the people.
The children were expected to learn all they could while
they were in school. Parents kept in contact with the
teacher to know how their child was progressing. If Johnny
and Jane were not trying their best, the parents helped to
correct the problem. When things for the little red
schoolhouse were needed and money wasn't available : the
community pulled together to get it. If repairs or
improvements were needed, the people of the community pitched
in and helped. Money was not always spent to make repairs or
improvements because the people would often gather at the
school on a Saturday and do whatever was needed.
Good manners, respect, and work ethic were the order of
the day, and these things were taught at home. Children were
expected to behave properly at home and at school. Parents
gave children responsibilities at home to teach them basic
life skills. They taught their children morals, values, and
self-respect. Parents saw that children did their school
assignments before they played. It was understood and
believed that an education was a privilege, and a valuable
possession. Children were taught by role models that man had
a responsibility to his fellowman, his community, and his
nation.
The children reflected the beliefs of this community.
They knew that obtaining an education was work, but a
worthwhile pursuit. They understood that obtaining the best
education they could get would be the key that would open
doors to a better life for all.
Then one day, the values of the community began to
change. The people became complacent because life was good.
The investment they had made in their children had paid great
Fable 2
dividends. The children had become inventors, scientists,
and doctors. The children created new technologies that had
made jobs plentiful and had raised the standard of living for
everyone. Life began to change and everyone wanted the
things that the new technology had created. There was an
increased demand for products and services provided by those
who did not necessarily have a higher education. Soon these
people were receiving a larger paycheck than the people with
higher levels of education. However, the people with the
higher levels of education were expected to continue main-
taining and improving the life style that everyone else took
for granted.
The people quickly forgot why life was SO good. They
became more self-centered, and wanted the little red
schoolhouse to take on more and more of the responsibilities
that had once been theirs. Finally, the little red
schoolhouse was expected to provide almost all the needs of
the children that had at one time been provided by the
parents and the community. They wanted to reap the rewards
of a skilled and educated society without investing any money
or effort. They happily lived for the moment enjoying the
fruits of their ancestors' earlier investments. They ceased
to make an investment in their children's future at the
little red schoolhouse.
The number of people who depended on rewards of previous
investments in education had increased. The number of
educated people had decreased. The little red schoolhouse
was sad because the people no longer believed in it or
supported it. The "good" life began to disappear.
The children stopped believing in the little red
schoolhouse. The children had too few role-models and the
little red schoolhouse could not do everything without help
and support. The children's behavior began to reflect what
was happening. They no longer used good manners, showed
respect for themselves or others, or believed in the work
ethic. They no longer believed it was important to get an
education. They began to drop-out of school at an earlier
and earlier age. Society began to show symptoms of decay as
the instances of drug abuse, violence, and multitude of other
problems with the youth increased. The people began to get
upset.
The people blamed their leaders, they blamed the little
red schoolhouse, they blamed the school board, and the
government. They behaved like drowning men grasping at
straws in the water by grasping at any solution that was
available except the one that would save them. They refused
to believe that what happened at the little red schoolhouse
relied on their support, on their being directly involved,
and investing in education to improve what was started long
ago. They refused to believe that they were also responsible
Fable 3
for what was happening to the children. Because the people
were not willing to do what was necessary to correct the
situation, the problems increased.
One day the little red schoolhouse closed its doors
because no one believed in it anymore. Teachers became an
extinct species. Time passed and the people begin to have
less money to buy the things that made life easier. The
number of people who had jobs decreased. The number of
people who lived in poverty increased. More and more people
became homeless. The world as the people had known it began
to change.
Machines that made their life easier began to break
down, but no one knew how to fix them. New ones were needed,
but no one knew how to design or build them. People were ill
and needed doctors, but they were a vanishing breed. Only a
few wise men were left, but they had been so ridiculed for
their preoccupation with learning that they had gone into
isolation, and no one knew where they had gone. Various
individuals of the community tried to solve the problem, but
without success because there was no one was left who knew
how.
The "good life" became a myth, a fairy tale, that all
the people longed for again. However, because the people had
waited too long and did not take the steps required to change
the course in which they were headed, life did not get
better. Eventually mankind returned to the dark ages. The
"good life" existed only in the stories told to the children
around open fires. These stories were about a time when the
world was full of wonderful magical, mysterious things, when
man lived in beautiful houses, had machines that did menial
work, traveled through the air, and even walked in space.
The how and why such a wondrous world had ever existed
were gone forever. The only thing left to remind man of a
time that had existed was an odd little red building that had
been called a schoolhouse. No one remembered that magic had
occurred in this little red building. No one remembered that
in the "middle age" of man on earth the people had believed
in the little red schoolhouse. No one remembered that the
magic was the people, the community, and the little red
school house working together to create it. No one
remembered that it took all the people working together to
produce the magic of an educated society. The magic was
gone. only the flicker of the open firelight and the memory
of a better time remained.
* This was the last entry in a journal found in a cave in the
mid-western region of a country once called the United
States.
POLYCONOMICS, INC.
I
Political and Economic Communications
FYI: LETTER TO CUOMO
November 7, 1991
The Hon. Mario Cuomo
Governor of New York
Executive Chamber
Albany, N.Y. 12224
Dear Governor:
I watched your hour-long call-in program last night and then called a few of my Republican
friends in Washington to tell them you were soon going to announce your candidacy. Once you made
the observation that the problems of the cities and states were not caused in the cities or states by
Republican or Democratic mayors or governors, but was a national problem, I concluded you were
not going to sit helplessly in Albany and watch our country go down the drain.
The Republican leaders I spoke to last night asked me if I thought your candidacy would make
a positive contribution. I said I have always thought so, which is why I was disappointed when you
did not run in 1988, although I now don't know for sure if I would have been rooting for you part
of the way or all of the way. The American people will know who in the field of possibilities will
make the best President. What the people need are options. As I've argued with you before, you should
not have to confront that question yourself, except insofar as you are a citizen and you must be able
to sense that when you enter the ballot box next November, you will vote for yourself. As long as you
can imagine that happening, you owe it to your fellow citizens to offer them that option. Democracy
cannot work if those who know they can be better leaders than those already in the field choose to
sit out elections.
In the same way, I am now trying to persuade at least one serious Republican political leader
to think about entering the contest for the nomination, by challenging George Bush. The Republican
electorate now needs an option to the President, who can only revive if he feels sufficiently
challenged to make necessary personnel changes in his Cabinet, most especially at Treasury. The
chance of the President firing Nick Brady, his best friend in government, cuts against everything we
know about George Bush. He can't win re-election with Brady as his finance minister, any more than
it was possible for Hoover to win in '32 with Ogden Mills, the Treasury Secretary who presided over
the '31-'32 tax increases that turned recession into depression. (Andrew Mellon was Treasury
Secretary in 1929-30, a holdover from Harding and Coolidge. Mills was the Deputy, as Hoover did
not like Mellon and listened to him no more than Bush has to Jack Kemp, the only growth-oriented
holdover from the Reagan years.)
President Bush was the best man to preside over the dissolution of the Soviet empire. Kemp
was unprepared for that role, which is the chief reason I think he got nowhere in the GOP primaries
of 1988 running against Gorbachev. With foreign policy now a slight consideration in the demands
of the national electorate, the probability is extremely high the voters will turn to a governor in 1992.
Someone outside the Beltway, with administrative skills built around domestic, economic concerns.
The only seasoned governors who fit that need, at least by my estimate, are you and Jerry Brown on
the Democratic side. On the Republican side, the only two governors I know who could make it work
are Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin and William Weld of Massachusetts, although neither are seasoned
86 Maple Avenue
Morristown, N.J. 07960
(201) 267-4640
FAX (201) 539-4025
enough at this point. In the Congress, the only two men I think could seriously contest you are Sen.
Trent Lott of Mississippi or Rep. Vin Weber of Minnesota, i.e., I'd vote for either of them over you
at this point if they were running, but I may have more confidence in them than they have in
themselves.
What the country needs is implied in the term "New Deal." The New Deal of FDR, though,
had its intellectual roots in the state corporatism of Mussolini's experiment in Italy. Italy in 1932, after
all, was the only major nation still seemingly thriving amidst the wreckage of the Depression. The
"Big Government" approach, termed "fascism" in 1919, as Mussolini bolted the socialist cause in favor
of state capitalism, underpinned the New Deal's "national industrial planning," the NRA and all the
other alphabet agencies that grew into what we now call "The Beltway."
The new deal we need now might be called "The New Capitalism," a capitalism that tends to
the have nots rather than the haves. Jesse Jackson says "Capitalism without capital is just an ism." Of
course. For capitalism to succeed there has to be capital; the willingness of those who have, to invest
in those who don't; a mixture of private and public investment. Your presentation last night, the
several answers to the questions posed to you, easily fit into the general ballpark of this idea. You
understand the essence of the supply model and I think you get the drift of my arguments about the
crisis in entrepreneurial capitalism. Yes we need public works. Lots and lots of public works. But they
can only be financed with a great outburst of private economic enterprise.
You told Maureen Dowd of The New York Times the other day that you wish making up your
mind was as easy as it was for St. Paul, who got hit in the tush with a lightning bolt, as you put it. You
are clearly on the right road to conversion, but you are not going to get hit with the persuasive
lightning bolt of insight unless you get in the middle of the road, where it can get a clear shot at your
tush. I've been pleased and encouraged to have these long conversations and communications with you
through your aides. At least I can say that in the process I converted Brad Johnson, if not Vince Tese
or Lee Smith. Third-party evangelism is not as effective as one on one, however. When you are ready
for instructions, just let me know, and I will show up with my Baltimore supply-side catechism.
In any event, I was very happy to watch your presentation last night. I actually tried to call
in with a question, but the lines were clogged, perhaps by the Forces of Darkness.
Sincerely, as always,
cc: Clients of Polyconomics, Inc.
Jule