although hardly critical, were not uniformly laudatory either. But in the case of Bush, all the public
could turn to was Bush's old 1980 cof them a tissue of lies. ampaign biography and a newer campaign autobiography, both
Early in the course of our research for the present volume it became apparent that all books and
most longer articles dealing with the life of George Bush had been generated from a single print-out
of thoroughllearned that during 1979-1980, Busy sanitized, approved and canonically admitted "facts" about Bush and his family. Weh aide Pete Roussel attempted to recruit biographers to prepare a (^)
life of Bush based on a collection of press releases, news summaries, and similar pre-digested
material. Most biographical writing about Bush consists merely of the points from this printout,
strung out chronologically and made into a narrative through the interpretation of comments,
anecdotes, embellishments, or special stylistic devices. The canonical Bush-approved printout isreadily identified. One dead giveaway that became a joke among the authors of the present study (^)
was the inevitability with which the hacks out to cover up the substance of Bush's life refer to a
1947 red Studebaker which George Bush allegedly drove into Odessa, Texas in 1948. This is the
sort of detail with which such hacks attempt to humanize their subject, in the same way that
horseshoes, pork ria deliberate and deceptive attempt to humanize his image. It has been our experience that any textnds, and country and western music have been introduced into Bush's real life in
that features a reference to Bush's red Studebaker has probably been derived from Bush's list of
approved facts, and is therefore practically worthless for serious research into Bush's life. We
therefore assign such texts to the "red Studebaker school" of cover-up and falsification.
Some examples? This is from Bush's campaign autobiography, Looking Forward, ghost-written by
his aide Vic Gold: Heading into Texas in my Studebaker, all I knew about the state's landscape was
what I'd seen from the cockpit of a Vultee Vibrator during my training days in the Navy. [fn 1]
Here is the same moment as recaptured by Busfinancier Russell Train, in his George Bush: An Intimate Portrait, published after Bush had won theh's crony Fitzhugh Green, a friend of the Malthusian (^)
presidency:
He [Bush] gassed up his 1948 Studebaker, arranged for his wife and son to follow, and headed for
Odessa, Texas. [fn 2]
Harry Hurt III wrote the following lines in a 1983 Texas magazine article that was even decorated
with a drawing of what apparently is supposed to be a Studebaker, but which does not look like a
Studebaker of that vintage at all: When George Herbert Walker Bush drove his battered red
Studebaker into Odessa in the summer of 1948, twith newly-arrived oil field hands, was still under 30,000. [fn 3]he town's population, though constantly increasing
We see that Harry Hurt has more imagination than many Bush biographers, and his article does
provide a few useful facts. More degraded is the version offered by Richard Ben Kramer, whose
biography of Buscampaign biography to pave the way for Bush is expected to be published during 1992, ah's second election victory. God help us. Cramer wasnd is thus intended to serve as the (^)
given the unenviable task of breathing life once more into the same tired old printout. But the very
fact that the Bush team feels that they require another biography indicates that they still feel that
they have a potential vulnerability here. Cramer has attempted to solve his problem by recasting the
same old garbage into a frenetic and hypefollowing is from an excerpt of this forthcoming book trkinetic, we would almost say hyperthyroid style. Thehat was published in Esquire in June, 1991:
In June, after the College World Series and graduation day in New Haven, Poppy packed up his
new red Studebaker (a graduation gift from Pres), and started driving south. [fn 4]