wanted to accept, he insist that he continue as a member of the Nixon cabinet, where, it should be
recalled, he had been sitting since he was named to the UN. Pennsylvania Senator Hugh Scott, oneof the Republican Congressional leaders, also advised Bush to demand to continue on in the
cabinet: "Insist on it," Bush recalls him saying. Bush also consulted Barbara. The story goes that
Bar had demanded that George pledge that the one job he would never take was the RNC post. But
now he wanted to take precisely that post, which appeared to be a political graveyard, George
explained his wimpish obedience to Nixon: "Boy, you cthen told Ehrlichman that he would accept provided he could stay on in the cabinet. Nixon approvedan't turn a President down." [fn 5] Bush (^)
this condition, and the era of Chairman George had begun.
Of course, making the chairman of the Republican Party an ex- officio member of the president's
cabinet seems to imply something resembling a one-party state. But George was not deterred bysuch difficulties.
While he was at the UN, Bush had kept his eyes open for the next post on the way up his personal
cursus honorum. In November of 1971 there was a boomlet for Bush among Texas Republican
leaders who were looking for athe RNC was announced on December 11, 1972. T candidate to run for govehe outgoing RNC Chariman was Senator Bobrnor. [fn 6] Nixon's choice of Bush to head
Dole of Kansas, an asset of the grain cartel but, in that period, not totally devoid of human qualities.
According to press reports, Nixon palace guard heavies like Haldeman and Charles W. Colson, later
a central Watergate figure, were not happy with Dole because he would not take orders from the
White House. Dole also tended to function as a conduit for grass roots complaints and resistance toWhite House directives from the GOP rank and file. In the context of the 1972 campaign, "White
House" means specifically Clark MacGregor's Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP), one
of the collective protagonists of the Watergate scandal. [fn 7] Dole was considered remarkable for
his "irreverence" for Nixon: "he joked about the Watergate issue, about the White House staff and
about the management of the Republican convention with its `spontaneous demonstrations that willlast precisely ten minutes.'" [ fn 8] Bush's own account of how he got the RNC post ignores Dole,
who was Bush's most serious rival for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination. According to
Dole's version, he conferred with Nixon about the RNC post on November 28, and told the
president that he would have to quit the RNC in 1973 in order to get ready to run for re-election in
1974. Agone to New York to convince Bush to accept the post. Dole sought to remove any implication thatccording to Dole, it was he who recommended Bush to Nixon. Dole even said that he had (^)
he had been fired by Nixon, and contradicted "speculation that I went to the mountaintop to be
pushed off," for "that was not the case." What was clear was that Nixon and retainers had chosen a
replacement for Dole whom they expected to be more obedient to the commands of the White
House palace guard. Bush assumed his new post in January, 1973, iWatergate burglars. He sought at once to convey the image of a pragmatic technocrat on the lookoutn the midst of the trial of the (^)
for Republican candidates who could win, rather than an ideologue. "There's kind of a narrow line
between standing for nothing and imposing one's views," Bush told the press. He stressed that the
RNC would have a lot of money to spend for recruiting candidates, and that he would personally
control this money. "The White House is simply not going to control the budget," said Bush. "Ibelieve in the importance of this job and I have confidence I can do it," he added. "I couldn't do it if (^)
I were some reluctant dragon being dragged away from a three-wine luncheon." [fn 9] Bush
appointed Tom Lias as his principal political assistant. Harry Dent, the former chief counsel to
Nixon, was named the chief counsel to the GOP. Dent had been one of the ideologues of the party's
southern strategy. D.K. "Pat" Wilson became the party finance chairman, and Rep. William Steigerof Wisconsin became the leader of a special committee that was supposed to broaden the electoral
base of the party. Steiger was immediately attacked by the right-wing Human Events magazine as
"very much a part of the defeated liberal reform movement" in the party. [fn 10] Richard Thaxton
was the RNC patronage director. John Lofton, the editor of the GOP weekly journal called Monday,
was eased out, and went to join Howard Phillips in the task of liquidating the Office of Economic