Bush Barbara - I call him Mr. President: stories of golf, fishing, and life with my friend George H.W. Bush

Copyright 2017 by Ken Raynor and Michael Patrick Shiels

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Brian Peterson

Front cover photo credit White House photo/David Valdez

Back cover photo credit White House photo/Susan Biddle

ISBN: 978-1-5107-2464-8

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-2465-5

Printed in the United States of America

Note: Author Ken Raynors proceeds from the sale of this book will be donated to the Kennebunkport Conservation Trust and Portland Mercy Hospitals Garys House via the Gary Pike George H. W. Bush Cape Arundel Golf Classic.

To the people who already know the details without reading this story cover to cover: my wife Anne and son Kyle. Together, side by side, we have experienced nights at the White House, eighteen holes, or simple, quiet dinners at the Raynors or Bushes homes. Its this bond and love that our families share that have made these experiences so special. Simply, we did it together!

Contents

Foreword

By Barbara Bush

W hen our dear friend Ken asked me to write this forewordfor a book about fishing and golf, of all thingsto be perfectly honest I thought he had lost his mind. After all, I know absolutely nothing about fishing except that it usually takes a long time.

And as for golf, I think I maybe shot under 100 one time, and that was thanks to Kens patient tutoring. So no expertise there either.

But then I realized something. This is really not a book about golf and fishing so much as it is, for George and me at least, a story about friendship.

Its about two men who love being out on the water, even in the roughest of seas, if the fish are bitingand even when they are not.

Its about two men who love to battle it out on the course, even in a driving rainstorm.

And its about two men who love Maine, and their families, and their legions of friends.

Put in that light, I am happy for Kenand for you as the readerbecause he truly has been a good friend during a remarkable period of Georges life. The time they spent together, especially during Georges presidency, was a welcome relief from the pressures of the job.

Along the way, Ken has become a part of our family, and both he and his wonderful wife Anne have made life before, during, and after the White House a joy for George and me. So even if I cannot confirm the accuracy of the fish tales that adorn these pages, I can attest that Ken Raynor is, in Georges words, a good man and a treasured friend.

PREFACE:
Meet George Bush

by Michael Patrick Shiels

Michael Patrick Shiels collaborated with Ken Raynor to author I Call Him Mr. President and was an advance volunteer for George H. W. Bushs two presidential campaigns.

T he lifestyle of former US president seems like the best gig in the world, based on what Ive seen during my visits to Kennebunkport and in writing the tales Ken Raynor shared for this book.

George H. W. Bush deserves a rewarding post-presidency more than anyone. If you look at his long career in public service, he always seemed willing to take the tougher road. He enlisted in the Navy before the bombs stopped dropping on Pearl Harbor and was shot down in the Second World War.

After earning a degree at Yale, he moved his family from the elite Northeast to the decidedly unglamorous Midland, Texas, to prospect in the oil business.

Give up a safe congressional seat to try to defeat a powerful Senate incumbent? Count him in and after an election loss, out. But never down, because President Nixon rewarded his loyalty by appointing him ambassador to the United Nations.

Then Nixon came calling, asking Bush to take what was a comparatively dirty job: running the Republican National Committee. When the president asks you, your answer should be yes, he loyally insisted. In time, Bush would have no choice, in his RNC role, but to write a letter to that same president, advising Nixon to resign.

Bush was then reportedly offered his pick of cushy ambassadorships by President Ford. Can you say Paris? Rome? The Maldives? I would have! But not George H. W. Bushhe chose Beijing to be envoy to China.

The CIA was the next challenge George H. W. Bush was asked to fixwith the catch that he be removed from consideration to be President Gerald Fords vice presidential running mate in 1976. Duty called though, and he accepted the CIA role, since it was the president asking.

After giving Ronald Reagan the run for his life in the presidential primary, he may not have been Reagans first choice to be his vice president, but he nevertheless served as veep with dignity and complete and utter loyalty, even refusing to land on the South Lawn in a helicopter in the hours after Reagan had been shot and was incapacitated in the hospital. He demanded to be driven from Andrews Air Force Base, instead, insisting Only the president lands on the South Lawn.

As president he asked America to be a kinder, gentler nation, and then, due to the respect the world had for his loyalty, was able to build a multi-national coalition, including some strange bedfellows, to free Kuwait after the Iraqi invasion.

When Bill Clintons election win denied President Bush a second term, he left a letter in the Oval Office desk for Clinton to find which read, in part, Ill be rooting for you.

Even in retirement, though he certainly didnt have to, President Bush continued to earn it through random kindnesses, humility, and insisting on giving back to anyone he met, and countless others by association, in a ripple effect of friendship that reached from sea to shining sea.

I have taken various people to Kennebunkport to participate in the George H. W. Bush Celebrity Golf Classic, a fundraiser organized with such professional passion by my friend Lana Wescott and her event planning company. My mother Gladys was as nervous as a cat to meet Mrs. Bush. She lives in Trenton, Michigan, so she brought a gift for the former first lady: a history book about the Naval Air Station at which President Bush learned to fly in neighboring Grosse Ile. The young Bush couple had also lived where she lives, in Trenton, during the war in 1945 before the president was sent to the Pacific.

When I introduced my nervous mother to Mrs. Bush, Bar was so sincere and enthusiastic that she put my mother at ease.

Your pearls are beautiful, my mother told her.

Oh these? These are fakes, dear, said Mrs. Bush. I could never have real pearls like these.

As my mother laughed, Mrs. Bush continued, Come to think of it, there are a lot of fake things on this ninety-one-year-old body. When I get to heaven God wont even recognize me.