James Addison Baker III was President Reagan's first Chief of Staff, despite having run the campaign of Reagan's primary opponent, George H.W. Bush. It may well have been Baker who supplied the term "voodoo economics" to describe Reagan's fiscal policies. But the affable former actor, unlike our current reality tv star, was not one to hold grudges: he selected Bush as his running mate and named Baker his Chief of Staff and, later, Secretary of the Treasury. When Bush the Elder became president in 1989, Baker reversed the order of his high-level appointments, serving first as a cabinet secretary (Secretary of State) and then as White House Chief of Staff. By 2000, he was past retirement age, but was called into service to manage George W. Bush's legal team during the Florida recount after that year's presidential election. Baker turned 90 last month.
Someone has said that the poem title "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is reductive, since the name would seem to belong to someone too well dressed to sing love songs. In a similar vein, doesn't the name James Addison Baker III just sound like a Republican? It's the opposite of reductive. A Republican named James Addison Baker III should be taken seriously. Trump would say the name is out of central casting. I have no idea why Addison Mitchell McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader, goes by Mitch. He looks like an Addison to me—the horn rimmed glasses, the rich second wife, the Vietnam deferments: Addison.
It's fun to go through the Wikipedia article on Baker and extract the parts that tend to confirm one's prejudices:
Baker's first wife, the former Mary Stuart McHenry, was active in the Republican Party, working on the Congressional campaigns of George H. W. Bush. Originally, Baker had been a Democrat but too busy trying to succeed in a competitive law firm to worry about politics, and considered himself apolitical. His wife's influence led Baker to politics and the Republican Party. He was a regular tennis partner of George H. W. Bush at the Houston County Club in the late 1950s . . . .
Baker met his first wife, the former Mary Stuart McHenry, of Dayton, Ohio, while on spring break in Bermuda with the Princeton University rugby team. They married in 1953 . . . .
On June 15, 2002, Virginia Graeme Baker, the seven-year-old granddaughter of Baker, daughter of Nancy and James Baker IV, was victim of lethal suction-pump entrapment in an in-ground spa. To promote greater safety in pools and spas, Nancy Baker gave testimony to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, and James Baker helped form an advocacy group, which led to the Virginia Graeme Baker Pool and Safety Act. Another granddaughter is Rosebud Baker, a stand-up comedian.
On this last, it's probably too cynical to complain about niche activism after a family tragedy, but I'm up to the job. Don't spread the benefits too liberally! Preserved from the threat posed by pools and spas, the children of Flint will next want to drink water right from the tap. Here's Rosebud, proof that the effects of a so-so family environment may be overcome:
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