George W. Bush in The Wall Street Journal

On Government Reform: Regulatory style: like Reagan, get government out of the way

The next president won't just command the armed forces; he also will lead an army of bureaucrats. As Top Regulator, Bush or Gore would take fundamentally different approaches: It is an area that strongly reflects their basic dispute about the role of government.

Bush, a frequent critic of heavy-handedness in government, would take a less-is-better stance through his appointees, stressing flexibility and voluntary actions by industry and the states. Gore, while touting the importance of a "smaller, smarter government," would push for more muscular regulation.

Critics worry that each man, in his own way, would go too far. Bush's "notion that government should get out of the way is the Ronald Reagan mantra," says one analyst, referring to Reagan's aggressively antiregulatory stance. For his part, Gore "shows an instinct to intervene in the marketplace," says another economist, who insists such intervention only makes problems worse.

Source: Laurie Mcginley, The Wall Street Journal Oct 31, 2000

On Homeland Security: Post-Cold War: remove weapons & high-alert; build SDI

Two weeks before President Clinton travels to Moscow for a US-Russia summit, Bush called for unilateral reductions in America's nuclear arsenal at the same time as the US moves ahead with a robust national missile-defense system. Bush refused to say how many more weapons he would cut; nor did he say what the US could do to calm Russia's fears of a new multibillion-dollar race to build anti-missile systems.

Bush accused Clinton and Gore of being "locked in a Cold War mentality." Bush said, "The premises of Cold War nuclear targeting should no longer dictate the size of our arsenal." He also said the US should "remove as many weapons as possible from high-alert, hair-trigger status."

Bush was hesitant to use the politically-charged word "unilateral" when calling for reductions, saying instead that the US should "lead by example," and that he would "work closely with the Russians to convince them to do the same."

Source: Carla Anne Robbins, Wall Street Journal, p. A4 May 24, 2000

On Homeland Security: Russia: jointly reduce missiles; but no joint SDI

Bush offered as a precedent [for "leading by example" in nuclear diarmament] his father's 1991 decision to unilaterally pull back all US short-range nuclear weapons from Europe and Asia, a move that was quickly matched and raised by then-Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.

Notably, Bush shied away from another of his father's 1991 proposals: that Russia join the US and its allies in building missile defenses, a move intended to overcome Moscow's fierce objections to the program. Bush said yesterday that his willingness to share technology would "depend on how Russia behaves."

Bush's proposal is still a significant break with many in his own party's leadership, who argue that the US can have missile defenses and maintain large numbers of nuclear weapons. It was a clear attempt to rebut recent charges by Clinton & Gore that Bush is trapped in Cold War thinking.

Source: Carla Anne Robbins, Wall Street Journal, p. A4 May 24, 2000

The above quotations are from Columns and news articles on NY politics in The Wall Street Journal. Click here for other excerpts from Columns and news articles on NY politics in The Wall Street Journal. Click here for other excerpts by George W. Bush. Click here for a profile of George W. Bush.
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