issues were that his travel obsession had been denied, and that he did not want to brook increasing
criticism. Bush "complained bitterly" that he had been forced to abandon his prized trip to Asiaowing to "some carping by people that don't understand" his awesome responsibilities as world (^)
leader. Bush angrily maintained that to be "driven away" from an Asia trip "by people holding up
silly T-shirts is ridiculous." As one journalist saw the scene, "Bush, his voice rising and eyelids
narrowing, talked at length about a president's responsibilities in foreign policy and the importance
of Japan to American jobs. His passionate response contained an undercurrent of regret that heapproved the cancellation that some Republicans said this week was precipitous and too reactive to (^)
the Democrats." Had calling off the trip somehow interfered with Bush's plans for unleashing the
next war? Bush reverted to his favorite theme of his war leadership: "If I had had to listen to
advice" of Congressional Democrats "to do something about the Persian Gulf, we'd have still been
sitting there in the United States, fat, dumb, and happy, with Saddam Hussein maybe in SaudiArabia." Bush also continued to deny the depression: "I'm not prepared to say we're in recession." (^)
For him, an alleged growth rate of 2.4% "is not recession. It does not fit the definition of recession."
[fn 72]
November 12: Bush's countenance was once more a mask of rage, venom, and hatred as hestumbled through another $1000-a-plate Republican fundraising dinner in Manhattan. He appeared (^)
thin and drawn. The take for Bush's campaign was estimated at $2.2 million, but press reports
indicated that Bush's enraged monologue "prompted little applause or enthusiasm as the president
moved from one topic to another, rarely devoting more than a few seconds to any theme." Bush's
delivery was halting and confused, with signs of evident dissociation and a truncated attention span.The essence of the speech was a paranoid, self-righteous defense against critics named and
unnamed. Bush labelled his tormentors as "tawdry," "phony," and "second- guessers." He pounded
the lectern as he ranted, "I'm not going to be the javelin-catcher for the liberals in Congress
anymore." "I am not going to apologize for one minute that I devote to advancing our economic
principles aborad or working for world peace," postured the president of two wars and counting.
November 12: Bush, speaking in New York and fumbling for bits of demagogy on the economic
situation, expressed a vague desire to see lower interest rates for credit card holders. Many
observers say that the two sentences on this topic uttered by Bush that day had been interpolated by
chief of staff Sununu; Sununu later accused Bush of having ad-libbed the pronouncown initiative. One day later, the Senate overwhelmingly approved a bill to cap credit card interestement on his (^)
rates. With this, the secondary market in credit card debt collapsed, threatening to blow off the
coverup of the bankruptcy of the largest US banks. On Friday, November 15, the Dow Jones
Industrial Average lost 4% of its value within a few hours, the biggest collapse since October 13,
- Businterest cap as "wacky." It was yet another impulsive volte-face by the erratic and unstable Bush. h, running for cover, hastily despatched Treasury Secretary Brady to denounce the
November 20: With Bush scheduled to sign a civil rights bill containing provisions which Bush had
stigmatized as quotas and sworn he would resist to the death, the White House circulated a directive
to federal agencies mandating the termination of all hiring policies designed to favor minoritygroups or women. Bush had not wanted any civil rights bill to be passed, preferring to keep the race (^)
issue in his quiver for the 1992 election, but he had been intimidated by the threat that Sen.
Danforth and other Republicans would support a Democrat-sponsored bill, leaving Bush painfully
isolated. That had already been an impulsive decision.
Now Bush's attempted sleight of hand, signing a bill and simultaneously removing the hiring
policies, caused a furore. "The president would have to lose his mind to make this statement," said
Kerry Scanlon, a lawyer for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Within hours, the
offending directive had been withdrawn, and blamed exclusively on Boy Gray, the White House
resident racist who had indeed drafted the directive, but on instructions from Bush. It was yet