his week Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush is dispatching his mother and wife to bring his case to American voters. It makes you wonder: Where's Poppy?
''The Revenge of all the Bushes'' was an early theme of George W.'s campaign for the presidency. But in the late, critical stages of Campaign 2000, the family patriarch is under wraps, while the Bush women are out closing the gender gap.
Whenever he does show up, the elder Bush does not help George W. He overshadows him. It happened during last summer's Republican National Convention. Remember? The former president got into a tiff with the incumbent president, detracting from his son, the would-be president.
George W.'s father may be out of sight. But if you listen to his son on the campaign trail, he is not out of mind. That was evident during last week's debate in Winston-Salem, N.C. Moderator Jim Lehrer directed each candidate to review a list of eight major actions involving the introduction of US ground, air, or naval forces over the last 20 years and then asked: ''If you had been president ... would any of those interventions not have happened?''
When it came to analyzing interventions with a Bush angle, the Texas governor said, ''Well, some of them I've got a conflict of interest on, if you know what I mean.''
Replied Lehrer: ''I do, I do.''
And so do we.
Like any good son, George W. is not going to challenge his father's decisions publicly, especially regarding foreign policy. Nor is it surprising that he would reach the same conclusions about their efficacy, given that his tutors are the same men who helped carry them out for his father. George W. Bush's running mate is former Bush Defense Secretary Richard Cheney, and his advisers include Generals Colin Powell and Norman Schwarzkopf of Desert Storm fame.
The psychoanalysts can speculate about the extent of the psychological baggage carried by a son of Bush, who has over time earned the less-than-flattering nickname ''Shrub.'' For voters, the more relevant issue is whether a President George W. Bush could stand up to former President George Bush, disagree with past decisions and reject advice on current affairs - in other words, be his own man, not just his father's son.
Take the outcome in the Persian Gulf War, which is emblematic of President Bush's foreign policy initiatives. The elder Bush was successful in assembling a 28-nation coalition that defeated Iraq after it invaded Kuwait. Yet, as Democrat Al Gore accurately noted at Wake Forest University, the war ''was not finished in a way that removed Saddam Hussein from power.''
Last week George W. refrained from comment on that particular point. But last December, during a primary season debate in New Hampshire, Bush said, ''I'm surprised he's still there,'' in reference to the Iraqi dictator. That must have been before the tutoring had a chance to sink in and he realized the outcome in Iraq was his father's call. (During that debate, Bush also sounded more cowboy than statesman when he declared, ''I'd take 'em all out,'' in reference to Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.)
The father's influence turns up in other comments issued by George W., with similar thoughts expressed in similar language.
For example, during the second presidential debate in 1988, Democrat Michael S. Dukakis and Republican George Bush were asked their philosophy concerning Supreme Court appointments.
Replied then-Vice President Bush: ''I don't have any litmus test. But what I would do is appoint people to the bench, that will not legislate from the bench, who will interpret the Constitution. I do not want to see us go to again - and I'm using this word advisedly - a liberal majority that is going to legislate from the bench.''
Asked the same question during this year's first presidential debate with Gore, Bush said: ''Voters should assume that I have no litmus test on that issue ... The voters will know I'll put competent judges on the bench, people who will strictly interpret the Constitution and will not use the bench to write social policy.'' Later, Bush said of Gore: ''He'll put liberal, activist judges who will use their bench to subvert the legislature. That's what he'll do.''
One more thing: In that debate of 1988, Vice President Bush also called Ronald Reagan's Supreme Court picks ''outstanding, outstanding appointments.'' When specifically asked if that description applied to Robert Bork, Bush answered ''Yes.''
Bork was the arch-conservative US Appeals Court judge appointed by President Reagan whose contentious nomination was rejected by the US Senate.
Hmmm. Like father, like son?
Joan Vennochi's e-mail address is vennochi@globe.com.
