"Your father thinks he's funny.", said my wife.
"Hey, it worked for Bill Clinton."
"Keep it up! Your arms will be black and blue by the time we land!"
"I'm not worried. You all hit like girls, anyway." At that, all three started punching me, so I escaped down the aisle and went back to the press section on the plane. Most of the questions were about the coming election, and who was going to be running against me.
There were at least a dozen candidates on the Democratic side. The front runner seemed to be John Kerry, who had run against me as Vice President with Al Gore, but had not been a factor in the race. The race last time had been George against Al, and me against Bill Clinton. Everybody had ignored John. Also in the running was Joe Lieberman, one of the senators from Connecticut, Senator John Edwards of North Carolina, former Governor of Vermont Howard Dean, and even Dick Gephardt, the former Congressman and a perennial favorite in the Midwest. At least another half dozen names were tossed out, but nobody thought any of them had a snowball's chance in hell.
It was an interesting field, and my entrance into history had probably changed the calculus. Kerry was a certified hero, and one of the few Dems with military experience. The historical perception was that the Democrats were weak on defense, so Kerry countered that. He was also better looking than me, and had blue blood credentials. Joe Lieberman also had foreign policy experience and was very conservative, but looked and talked like Droopy the Hound Dog. John Edwards, on the other hand, was devastatingly handsome, a smooth talking southern boy with solid liberal credentials and big supporters in the unions. Even Howard Dean came off well, with a youthful appeal and a freshness about him. Which of them would self-destruct first?
I refused to allow myself to be baited into saying something I shouldn't. Instead, I parried a few questions about using my own personal fortune to bankroll my reelection. "It's more complicated than that. It's not just about the money. When people donate to a campaign, they aren't just donating their money, they are donating their time and their interest. It's not just the cash you get; you get to hear what they have to say, they can tell you what is important to them. I won't lie to you and say the money isn't important, because we all know it is, but even more important is to make that donor want to work for you. More important than their money is their time!"
"And you think you can do that."
I shrugged and smiled. "I think so. The Maryland Ninth thought so, and they're not so different from people everywhere else. They have local concerns, but they love this country just as much as the people everywhere else. No reason I can't deliver the message that we are all in this together, and that I'm the guy to lead them."
"Will your family be campaigning for you?", came up.
"Maybe. Marilyn will be helping me out, I know that already, and that's good. Even the people who don't like me, they love Marilyn!" That got a few chuckles. "The girls are in school, so they might not be able to help until the summer. We'll have to ask them. I'm not sure about Charlie, though. He missed out the last campaign, and doesn't seem too thrilled about the idea. Besides, he has his own life now."
"What is he doing? Is he out of the Marines?"
"Yes, he is a civilian again. He and a friend of his are putting together a motorcycle racing team. Charlie was a nationally ranked motocross racer when he was a teenager, and wants to give the pros a shot." There were a couple of questions related to that. "You'll have to ask Charlie about that sort of thing. His mother and I don't know which is worse, him getting shot up in the Marines, or him racing motorcycles!"
Afterwards, I went back up front, and sat down next to my son. "Don't be surprised if you get some reporters asking you questions about going back into motocross. Some of them were asking and I told them you were getting back into the pros."
"Works for me. Bucky was hoping to line up some sponsors. Maybe somebody will read about us." He waited a moment, and then asked, "Is the fact that I saw a counselor going to come out?"
I sighed and nodded. "Yes, eventually. It won't be from me, but sooner or later, some reporter is going to find the right person to pay off and it will come out. Trust me on this, but if you have any deep and dark secrets, they won't be secret much longer."
"Is that going to hurt you? I mean, in the election?"
I shrugged and smiled. "Don't sweat it. I'm a big boy. If the biggest secret to come out of this family is that my son doesn't like to kill people, I can handle that real easy. You'll get the worst of it."
"What do you mean?"
"Wait until a picture of you shows up on the cover of The National Enquirer, wrapped up in a straight jacket, with the headline, 'The Buckman Family Curse Strikes The Next Generation!'"
"Jesus Christ!", he exclaimed.
"Welcome to my life, Charlie!", I laughed. "You think being called crazy is bad? They call your mother and sisters sluts and bimbos!" He looked shocked at that, so he must not have heard about some of the stuff that had happened. "Just do me a favor, and try not to get into too much trouble on the tour circuit. Don't get drunk in public and keep your pecker wrapped if you pick up a girl. Can you at least do that?!"
He laughed at me and said, "Yes."
You don't end up in the White House, at any position, unless you are a hard core political junkie. Watching the Democratic Follies, otherwise known as the primaries, was vastly amusing for us, and left me perpetually thankful I didn't have to go through with it! We stayed out of it, biding our time and building a war chest. With the sole exception of Joe Lieberman, every Democrat running was considerably more liberal than I was. One of the big strengths I had was that I didn't really need to pander to the Republican base, since I didn't have a primary challenge and all the Democrats were too liberal for the base. We didn't have a Tea Party movement yet, and if I did my job right, we wouldn't.
This was just guesswork on my part. I believed the Tea Party was ultimately a judgment on the economy. Lots of people got totally screwed over when the economy entered the Great Recession. So far that hadn't happened, and in fact the economy looked healthy. The 2001-2002 recession had been painful, but it was behind us, and jobs and wages were both rising. The nation also had a lot of structural problems, like jobs going overseas and the overall loss of manufacturing, but right now, the good economy was papering over these issues. During the Great Recession, which was far deeper and longer than anything since the Depression, those angry and screwed over people took their outrage out on their elected politicians, and sent a new batch to Washington. We weren't there yet.
Would we get to that point? That I wasn't at all sure of. This job was a lot like riding a tiger. You hang on for dear life and hope not to get eaten. Actually getting the tiger to go in a direction you want him to go is simply icing on the cake!
Currently things were good, but the housing markets and financial markets were both bubbles growing bigger and bigger. We needed to pop the balloons. My plan, which was not popular in all corners, was to increase financial regulation. I can remember being in the housing business with Lefleur Homes on my first trip. We would see these loans where you didn't need any money down, and you didn't even have to pay the principal, only the interest, and then had a balloon payment to pay off the principal when you flipped the property. I remember talking to a couple of bankers at the time and asking them who in their right mind thought these were good loans! These were disasters waiting to happen, which is precisely what happened.