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Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating opened the event by describing the group's focus on reducing crime and reforming education. "This is a solution revolution," Keating said. "These are solution leaders."

All the governors who came to the dais, including Engler, Hull, Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore and Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, extolled Bush's virtues and preached his mantra of compassionate conservatism. "We're sometimes accused of not caring," Huckabee said. "We have to destroy some of the myths that keep us from articulating the American dream to the American people. We are accused of supporting tax breaks for the rich, but the truth is we want working mothers and fathers to keep more of what they earn."

Hull touted her state's faith-based organizations, which she said "have taken up the slack" in helping welfare reform succeed. Engler praised Bush for his "pledge to the proposition of getting more power" returned to the states.

Gilmore thanked Bush and his family for campaigning to win Republican majorities in both houses of the Virginia state Legislature, the first time Republicans have held a majority in the nation's history. "With Bush in the White House," Huckabee said, "we won't have to fight our own president to fight to make life better."

Bush himself is not at the meeting; he's putting the finishing touches on a major foreign policy address scheduled for Friday at the Reagan Library, and preparing for a fund-raiser in nearby Del Mar set for Saturday. But his proximity has been noted, and rumors of a surprise George W. drop-in have some attendees buzzing like girls at a junior high school slumber party expecting a surprise visit from the boys.

The only name evoked more than Bush is that of another Republican governor who went on to be elected president: Ronald Reagan, who served as president of the organization in 1969, parlaying the role of Washington outsider into a successful run for the White House. On a day when members of the GOP congressional leadership once again had their hats handed to them in budget negotiations with President Clinton, the difference, if not tensions, between the governors and their counterparts in Congress loomed as subtext for the conference.

Keating was diplomatic when asked about the job of the Republican leadership during the budget negotiations, but acknowledged that "we might have had slightly different priorities. The Republican leadership had a challenge. They were dealing with an administration that is completely consumed by politics, not policy. I think under the circumstances, you get what you can get and go home, and focus on electing a Republican president who is not intent on dictating everything from Washington."

But the bad budget news didn't dampen spirits at the governors' fest, because they know they're the rising stars of the party.

"The only Washington guy in the [Republican race] is appealing to voters because he beats up on congressional leadership," said one governor, referring to McCain. "And a big part of John McCain's appeal is that he is hated by people like Mitch McConnell in his own party," he said. McConnell, who runs the soft-money arm of the Senate election effort, butted heads with McCain recently during the debate over McCain's campaign-finance reform bill.

The conference will continue through Friday, culminating in a roundtable discussion on Republican prospects in the 2000 elections.
salon.com | Nov. 19, 1999

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