Stephen Hess
Stephen Hess
Stephen H. Hessis a senior fellow emeritus in the Governance Studies program at the Brookings Institution. He studies media, the U.S. presidency, political dynasties and the U.S. government. He first joined Brookings in 1972 and was distinguished research professor of media and public affairs at the George Washington University. He served on Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Richard Nixon's White House staff and as an adviser to Presidents Gerald R. Ford and Jimmy Carter...
capital designed hourglass life major next picked political quite run sand social war work worse wrong
But life did not work quite as he designed it in the next year. He picked the wrong major item, Social Security. And then the war got worse and he had the hurricane. So now it's not only the sand that has run out of the hourglass but also the political capital has run out of the bank.
deviate early lose sound work
Very early on, she will work out her sound bite, and that will be her sound bite. And she will not deviate from that, so after a while, that will lose its sting.
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I think as we become more and more of a celebrity culture -- as we expect to learn more and more about the people who we elect president or make movie stars -- we are intrigued by their families.
agenda came last robust state
Last year, he came out with a very robust agenda in the State of the Union.
agenda katrina stops
Katrina pretty much stops his legislative agenda cold.
certainly domestic effect immediate money
It certainly has some effect on his immediate domestic agenda. He has no money for anything but Katrina.
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Suddenly the campaign is over, they wake up and the press is not seeking their opinion. There's no more entourage, no Secret Service. It's very, very difficult.
main
That's the main thing he's got going for him,
change nature
It doesn't change the nature of the court.
presidency president
The president was still Ike, and the presidency went on.
across cabinet case looks president reason table vice
The president looks across the cabinet table at the vice president and has to realize, 'The only reason he's there is in case I die.
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The party needs him and, for all I know, the nation needs him. There hasn't been an African-American Democrat who has had an appeal broadly beyond his ethnic group.
bad good heard
We need to know how bad it is — but we want a little good news, too. We've heard a lot about how bad Americans are, or some Americans were in Katrina, but we're not a bad people.
good ordinary second simple sort year
If it were an ordinary year, a traditional year, sort of a simple first year of a president's second term, you would have to say he had a pretty good year.