[Mb-civic] Bringing Evolution, Not Revolution - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

Bringing Evolution, Not Revolution
New White House Chief of Staff Defined by Efficiency Rather Than Ideology

By Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, March 29, 2006; A04

Joshua B. Bolten doesn't find it fun to say no. He once called himself a 
"softer person" than his predecessor as White House budget chief.

But he has found his own ways to make a point. He shows up at policy 
meetings with a giant calculator to add up the cost of anyone's 
ambitious ideas. And when someone strays off course, he throws a yellow 
penalty flag onto the conference table like a football referee.

Now it has fallen on this dry-witted Washington native to get the White 
House itself back on course. Tapped by President Bush yesterday to 
replace White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr., Bolten will take 
over a political operation gone astray -- mired in an overseas war, 
stalled in its domestic agenda, sagging in the polls and alienated from 
congressional Republican allies.

Like Card, Bolten is a Bush loyalist, known as self-effacing and 
efficient, not especially ideological, not a promoter of his own agenda, 
a quiet professional in a town filled with vast egos. Yet this 
workaholic bachelor and self-described "policy geek" in glasses is the 
picture of contradictions. Bolten, 51, spends his few off-hours racing 
down the highway on his prized Harley-Davidson Fat Boy or bowling in the 
White House alley or banging out tunes in a rock band he named Deficit 
Attention Disorder.

His office in the Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building 
adjacent to the White House attests to his personality. Rather than 
stock it with pictures of Bush, as many aides do, Bolten hung a large 
portrait of Eisenhower in military uniform above the fireplace and put a 
Harley-Davidson book on the mantle. Nearby is a motorcycle menorah. Not 
one to take himself too seriously, Bolten even hung a drawing by a niece 
that a visitor recalled was titled "Uncle Josh's Poop Calendar."

"He is very funny, he always kept the staff laughing," said Assistant 
Secretary of State Kristen Silverberg, who worked for Bolten during the 
2000 presidential campaign and Bush's first term. At the same time, she 
said, "Josh has a great moral core" and a passion for bold ideas. "If 
you had to pick one person who was the architect of all the big 
first-term domestic policy initiatives," it would be Bolten.

Karl Rove, Bush's political adviser, said Bolten will reinvigorate the 
White House.

"People get energized -- new leadership has a way of doing that," Rove 
said. "He has strong views, but he is very adept at not allowing them to 
short-circuit a robust policy process." Bolten encourages aides to 
propose ideas he disagrees with, Rove added. "He would challenge them to 
think outside the box."

Yet Bolten was hardly an outside-the-box choice. He is not the 
Washington graybeard many Republicans urged Bush to recruit. By most 
accounts, Bolten will bring evolution, not revolution. Within hours of 
his appointment, talking points distributed among Democrats described 
his selection as rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

"He strikes me as pretty much cut from the same bolt as Andy Card, so I 
don't see this as a shift by the White House, replacing one insider with 
another," said Rep. John Spratt (S.C.), ranking Democrat on the House 
Budget Committee. But Spratt expressed "high regard" for Bolten: "He's 
bright, a quick study, yet cool and unflappable."

The son of a career CIA officer and a George Washington University 
teacher, Joshua Brewster Bolten grew up in Washington, attending public 
schools until enrolling at St. Albans for high school. After earning 
degrees at Princeton University and Stanford Law School, Bolten returned 
to Washington to work as a lawyer at the State Department and the Senate 
Finance Committee.

"He has this ethic of public service in his bones," said Daniel Price, a 
longtime friend.

Bolten joined the Bush team in 1989, working as general counsel of the 
U.S. trade representative and then as a White House lobbyist under 
President George H.W. Bush. He spent five years in London for Goldman 
Sachs International before being recruited at Christmas 1998 to go to 
Texas for the next Bush campaign. "I fell in love with the governor and 
the whole operation, the whole spirit of the operation," Bolten told 
C-SPAN last year.

Giving up the Goldman Sachs money, Bolten developed the campaign's 
policy platform, then helped enact it as deputy White House chief of 
staff in President Bush's first term. He was instrumental in pushing 
through tax cuts and the education plan known as No Child Left Behind. 
He also spearheaded a $15 billion plan to fight AIDS around the world, 
battling with Mitchell E. Daniels Jr., the director of the Office of 
Management and Budget, who objected to the cost.

When Daniels resigned in 2003, Bush tapped Bolten to take over OMB and 
the annual $2.8 trillion federal budget.

Bolten produced two consecutive budgets that cut discretionary, 
nonsecurity spending, but the cost of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as 
well as soaring Medicare expenses have pumped up deficits.

Within the administration, Bolten earned a reputation as tight-fisted 
and more "overtly demanding" than Card, as one colleague put it, while 
making few enemies. "He's well-liked by all who know him, even if they 
don't agree with every decision that he makes," said former commerce 
secretary Donald L. Evans. "You can't help but say Josh Bolten is a fair 
and good man."

And Bolten repaired some relations on Capitol Hill frayed under Daniels, 
who was seen as less deferential to congressional egos. Bolten stroked 
the likes of Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens 
(R-Alaska), terming him the "Incredible Hulk" of lawmakers. Bolten "is 
respected as a straight shooter and good listener," said Rob Portman, a 
member of the House leadership before becoming U.S trade representative 
last year.

Bolten views himself as an honest broker and eschews public attention. 
"It's best that you keep yourself out of the equation," he told C-SPAN, 
"and in that way make sure that others have confidence that you're not 
running your own agenda -- you're just running the president's agenda, 
which was my objective. Still is."

Still, he will not bring fresh legs to the assignment. Many Republicans 
around Washington attributed at least some of Bush's political problems 
to a tired White House staff that has remained largely intact since the 
beginning of his presidency. Card served longer than any other chief of 
staff in half a century.

Bolten has been with Bush since the start, as well, working as many if 
not more hours than Card. Although he gets into the office later than 
Card, just in time for the 7:30 a.m. senior staff meeting, Bolten is 
regularly seen at the office until 10 or 11 at night before climbing 
into his 12-year-old Ford pickup to drive home. (After long resistance, 
Bolten recently accepted the car and driver service entitled to 
high-ranking White House officials, according to colleagues.)

Nonetheless, some believe Bolten offers enough change to make a 
difference. "It's a significant change because he brings a different 
skill set than Andy did," said Cesar Conda, a former aide to Vice 
President Cheney. "Josh will bring some energy to the policymaking 
apparatus at the White House. And he'll bring good relations with the Hill."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/28/AR2006032801804.html?nav=hcmodule
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