Dubya In The City
Texas Gov. George Bush said Saturday he hopes to find common ground with defeated presidential rival John McCain in a meeting McCain almost canceled because of disagreements over the agenda.
“I look forward to discussing a wide range of issues with John” at the planned May 9 talk, Bush said during a brief visit to a gathering of radio talk show hosts in Manhattan.
“I'm going to remind him he knows this, I know it that there's a lot we agree on, like Social Security reform, governmental reform, education reform,” Bush said. “And I'm going to talk to him about the general election, hopefully he'll campaign with me.”
Bush would like to gain the support of his defeated but still popular primary opponent, who has not endorsed the presumptive Republican nominee.
“He's supporting me, and I appreciate that,” Bush said. “He's a straightforward person. When he says he wants me to be the president, I'm confident he does want me to be the president.”
But relations between the men's camps have been strained since McCain suspended his campaign last month.
McCain and his advisers were irritated by Bush's announcement that he would ask the Arizona senator in their first face-to-face meeting since the primaries whether he was willing to serve as vice president.
McCain has said repeatedly that he doesn't want the job, and told aides to cancel the meeting unless they could be assured that Bush wanted to hold substantial talks on a variety of topics.
An agenda agreed upon by the two campaigns on Friday was said to include McCain's signature issue of campaign finance overhaul along with military reform, Social Security, education, health care, making the GOP more inclusive and McCain's role in the fall campaign and the Republican National Convention.
The meeting, to be held in Pittsburgh, will be important to the political fortunes of both Republicans.
Bush wants to unify the party and appeal to the independent-minded voters galvanized by McCain's campaign. McCain, who still has presidential ambitions, wants to show Republicans he is a party man.
Bush's comments came in an interview with WOR-AM radio, shortly after the Texas governor spoke at the National Association of Radio Talk Show Hosts convention on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
He joked with the hosts about seeking advice on his speech from radio personalities Dr. Laura Schlessinger, G. Gordon Liddy and Don Imus, and the raucous group greeted him warmly.
“I'm looking forward to the conversation with America over the radio airwaves,” Bush said. “You're talking to a lot of folks. ... It's a good way to communicate.”
Several hosts in the audience said that while Bush's 10-minute speech had been entertaining, they didn't learn anything of substance about his candidacy, and the address probably wouldn't affect what radio jocks said about his campaign on thair.
“When I go on the show Monday, I'll be able to say he's funny, he's charming and he's well prepared,” said Dan Yorke, of WPRO radio in Providence, R.I.