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Saturday, Jul 4, 2009
Don't hate George W. Bush's nephew just because he's a political prop. What his college friends say about him may surprise you.
Jul 22, 2000 | When George P. Bush -- or just "P.," as his family calls him -- showed up at an Arlington, Va., barbecue joint this week to talk with members of a local chapter of the Young Hispanic Republican Association -- many wearing pins that read: "Viva Bush!" -- he was met by a team of eight TV cameras.
"That's more than Steve Forbes got at any major event," cracked one reporter.
P. has one obvious factor in his favor that Forbes never will: He's eye candy. Salsa-sexy, lean and disconcertingly smooth is P. And what he's offering this day, complementing the pulled pork, is a diet of nice, soothing rhetoric.
The media lobs a few softballs. "George, can you tell us what your message is for young Hispanics?" is one. He handles it like a pro: He fills the air with words, throws in a statistic and avoids really saying much.
"I think that our generation definitely has a label of being apathetic, but I think a lot of younger people would disagree with that," he says. "One statistic that I found very interesting is that young Americans, more so than before, are devoting time to their communities, volunteering their time. I think it goes to show that our generation is socially conscious, but I think campaigns -- especially my uncle's campaign -- is trying to reach out more and channel that enthusiasm, channel that energy, so that they do register, they do vote, get involved."
P. is the son of Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Columba, the nephew of George W. Bush and grandson of former President George Bush, who once famously referred to him and his two siblings, while pointing out his grandchildren to Ronald and Nancy Reagan, as "the little brown ones." That P.'s a Spanish-speaking Latino (his mother was born in Mexico) adds to his value for his uncle's campaign.
Even more valuable is his performance: P.'s a natural on the stump, and will reach his first national audience during the GOP's national convention, beginning July 31. Generally, the media greets him with a pool of drool. P. even hit No. 4 on People magazine's list of the "Top 100 Eligible Bachelors."
As his profile has increased, there's still a lot about P. nobody knows much about, aside from the standard political aphorisms he so pleasantly spouts. But a group of his close college friends from Rice University, where P. graduated in 1998, describe a mellow, charming guy savvy enough to tell when people were sidling up to him because of his famous last name. A guy who introduced himself as "George," and never as "George Bush."
They also describe someone who is definitely an independent thinker, and much less conservative than the uncle he's campaigning for.
But even though P. will serve as youth chairman of the GOP convention, his friend Chris Fide says that in recent e-mails, P. still insists he's not sure that politics is for him. "He keeps stating, 'I'm not sure I want to go into politics,'" Fide says. "Meanwhile, he just told me that he's 'taken off on a three-week barnstorming tour where I'm going to try to make a speech, defend it, then make a difference, which is what I love doing.' Then three sentences later he's saying that he's not going to run for anything ever. The two ideas are butting against each other."
So far, P. isn't subjecting his newfound celebrity to much introspection and analysis. He's still "in the honeymoon period," Fide says. "The things he's saying are, one way or another, making it into print. And he's just happy that his name's out there" and that he's helping his uncle's candidacy.
"It's pretty crazy" to see him on TV, says another friend, Mike Donovan. "He always said he didn't want to get into the political racket, but he seems to be heading that way whether he wants to or not."
