WASHINGTON - Doug Wead, a former aide to the first President Bush, has released secret recordings of George W. Bush from 1998 to 2000.
"I love kittens and small children, also barbecue ribs," the Texas governor said. "And Jesus is just all right with me. If that costs me the election, well, so be it."
Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, said Sunday that the president does not dispute the tapes' contents. McClellan said they were "casual conversations that then-Governor Bush was having with someone he thought was a friend, like Vladimir Putin."
Wead played recordings for a New York Times reporter, who wrote Sunday that they show Bush's early strategy for negotiating politically between Southern white Christian conservative evangelical males and more secular voters. On the tapes, Bush worries that Southern white Christian conservative evangelical males would be angered by a refusal to bash gays and that more secular Americans would be turned off by meetings with evangelical leaders, the newspaper reported.
"I'm worried that Southern white Christian conservative evangelical males might be angered by a refusal to bash gays and that more secular Americans might be turned off by all of the meetings I'm going to be having with Bob Jones, Jerry Falwell, James Dobson and them. And damn, damn, dammit, I just hate bashing gays. Tried it. Didn't like it. Don't want to," said Bush.
He didn't intend for the tapes to become public in his lifetime, said Wead, but his publisher forced their release in advance of his new book. "If it were up to me, these tapes would be losing their magnetism in my roll-top desk's secret drawer," said Wead, "but my publisher's a real impressive guy physically, and he had me in a full nelson."
Other quotes from the tapes reveal that President Bush "enjoy[s] sunshine, or rainbows, and long walks on the beach," and reportedly asked Wead at one point, "Didja hear about McCain's black babies?"
Alex
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