Word: buren
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COPY DESK: Judith Anne Paul, Shirley Barden Zimmerman (Deputies); Barbara Dudley Davis, Evelyn Hannon, Jill Ward (Copy Coordinators); Minda Bikman, Doug Bradley, Robert Braine, Bruce Christopher Carr, Barbara Collier, Julia Van Buren Dickey, Dora Fairchild, Judith Kales, Sharon Kapnick, Claire Knopf, Melinda J. McAdams, M.M. Merwin, Anna F. Monardo, Maria A. Paul, Jane Rigney, Elyse Segelken, Terry Stoller, Amelia Weiss (Copy Editors...
Bush was, after all, a sitting vice president, and no sitting vice president had captured the Oval Office since Martin van Buren did it in 1836. Plus, he was facing a Democratic Boston-Austin ticket of Michael Dukakis and Lloyd Bentsen. In 1960, this same geographical combination--John F. Kennedy '41 and Lyndon Baines Johnson--defeated Richard Nixon, the last sitting vice president to lose a presidential election. That seemed like a crippling amount of historical baggage to carry in a campaign...
This precedent may seem like a toss-up, but two key facts have been ignored. The first is that Clinton, like Truman, has only one daughter, while Bush, like Martin van Buren, has four sons (and a daughter as well). That gives Clinton an edge on the Truman claim and makes Bush more like van Buren--who, by the way, lost his bid for a second term...
...hell to win outright. That's because none of America's 41 presidents have been named H. Ross (or even just plain Ross). There are precedents, however, for George (as in Washington) and variations on the Bill theme (as in William Henry Harrison, who--not coincidentally--defeated van Buren in his re-election bid back...
...context of this election, these precedents are less weighty than Bush's problems--with van Buren, his family, his education and his Southerness. For these reasons, my money's on Clinton tomorrow...