Bush Meets Bill, Then Al

For the first time since the election and all that followed, President-elect George W. Bush met with the man he'll succeed and with the man he defeated.

The Texas governor called his Tuesday afternoon White House visit with President Clinton, "a high-energy moment."

Bush later met with Vice President Al Gore, who strode through falling snow outside his official home at the Naval Observatory to greet his former rival with a prolonged handshake and pat on the back.

"We're going to have a private discussion," Gore said when asked about his advice for the president-elect.

Lasting less than 20 minutes, the meeting took place almost a week after Democrat Gore conceded the White House to Republican Bush in the disputed presidential election.

Earlier, the Texas governor met with the man he will replace as the nation's leader on January 20. Bush and Mr. Clinton met first in the Oval Office for an hour and then walked over to the residence where they talked over lunch in the family dining room for about 70 minutes. They were alone most of the time.

"The president told me that they covered primarily foreign policy," White House spokesman Jake Siewert said. "He talked about some of the hot spots around the world and some of the challenges the new administration will face and the state of play in some of those places that make headlines in the news here in America."

The Bush-Clinton meeting brought together the incoming chief executive, who has pledged to restore "honor and dignity" to the White House with the man whose two terms in office gave that pledge traction among many voters.

"I'm grateful and I'm looking forward to the discussion. I'm here to listen, and if the president is kind enough to offer some advice ... I will take it in," Bush told reporters inside.

"I just told him, my only advice to anybody in this is get a good team and do what you think is right," Mr. Clinton said.

The president seemed more relaxed than his successor. Mr. Clinton sat back in his chair, elbow propped on one arm, his legs crossed and gesturing smoothly with his hands. Bush sat very straight, both feet planted firmly on the floor, his hands in his lap, looking straight ahead rather than at the president.

Bush, the first son of a president to follow in his father's footsteps since John Quincy Adams in 1825, is certainly no stranger to the White House, but Tuesday's visit was his first as president-elect. The meeting comes eight years after Bush's father, President George Bush, showed Mr. Clinton - then the president-elect - around the place, shortly after Mr. Clinton defeated the elder Bush.

In response to a foreign policy question, Mr. Clinton said that no decision had yet been made on whether he will make a trip to North Korea in the closing days of his term.

"This is something that I want to consult with the president-elect and his team about, and we'll see what the facts ar. And I'll try to do what's best for the country," he said.

Mr. Clinton added he still sees North Korea's missile program as the biggest current threat.

"We may have a chance to put an end to it. And if we can, I think we should," he said.

After two days of meetings in Washington and interviews with prospective Cabinet members, Bush flew back to Texas.

On the Cabinet front, Republican officials speaking on the condition of anonymity said that Bush will nominate Don Evans as commerce secretary and Florida official Mel Martinez for housing secretary on Wednesday.

A longtime friend of the president-elect and chairman of Bush's campaign, Evans was the one who told somber Bush supporters on Election Night that Gore had retracted his concession, opening a 36-day fight for the White House. Evans' selection was not unexpected. Aides have been saying for weeks they expected he would land at commerce.

Martinez is the elected chief executive of Orange County, Fla., which encompasses Orlando. He co-chaired Bush's campaign in Florida and is a close ally of his brother Jeb, the state's GOP governor. A Cuban refugee, Martinez fled to the United States in 1962 when he was 15 years old.

Besides these names, Bush may make other Cabinet announcements on Wednesday, sources said.

On Monday, the president-elect had private sessions with former Sen. Dan Coats, R-Ind., the current frontrunner for defense secretary; Paul O'Neill, chairman of aluminum maker Alcoa, a prospect for treasury secretary; and Ann Veneman, former California agriculture director, a candidate for secretary of agriculture.

New Jersey Gov. Christie Whitman was also in town. She has been mentioned for U.S. trade representative or director of the Environmental Protection Agency.

On the eve of hosting his Republican successor, Mr. Clinton said he was not surprised that the justices of the U.S. Supreme Court had decided, by a 5-4 margin, to block a recount of votes in Florida that could have given Gore the victory. He said that "they had the power to do it and they did it."

"I think most lawyers, or a lot of them, were surprised they took the case," the president said in an interview with CBS News' Dan Rather on Tuesday night's 60 Minutes II. "Even those (who) were surprised they took the case were shocked when the vote count was stopped."

Asked whether he had been surprised, he said: "No, not after eight years in Washington, I wasn't. ... it's done and we should accept it because the country ... has to go on."