RAND RAPIDS, Mich. - You know George W. Bush is pulling out all the stops when he lets the Silver Fox loose on the campaign trail.
Yesterday, the redoubtable Barbara Bush, known for a tart tongue, silver hair, and strong opinions, boarded a bus here in Grand Rapids, and, bounding along with daughter-in-law Laura, set out to convince undecided women voters from the west end to the east end of this battleground state that her oldest boy is presidential timber.
By the second stop, in the state capital of Lansing, the former first lady, who hasn't campaigned much since her husband lost to a Clinton-Gore ticket in 1992, was warmed up by gleeful crowds, a big media gaggle, and a gorgeous autumn day. During a visit to the Impression 5 C hildren's Museum, she met with reporters and said:
She had watched only the second and third presidential debates because she was afraid ''I might get sore.''
She doesn't give her son advice, except to tell him to ''be himself - and he has never veered from that course.''
She won't be campaigning nonstop, but she hopes to be on the road two to three days a week. After all, she said, she is a senior citizen. ''I am 75, and you can't be running all over town like you used to.''
She thinks her most famous quality is loyalty to her children, and when she hears or reads things about George W. that aren't true, ''I am really upset,'' she said, waving her arms as if to shoo the words away.
Wearing her signature multiple-strand of pearls and a royal blue suit that was almost identical in color to her daughter-in-law's, the former first lady drew big crowds that came out to see her and touch her and wave to her. That makes her a secret weapon on the campaign trail, but potentially a lethal one: As someone who once described Democrat Geraldine Ferraro as a woman who rhymes with witch, Barbara Bush certainly has been known to let loose, and sometimes it's with a zinger.
The Republican candidate's mother hasn't exactly been idle this campaign season. She has raised some money for her son and made a few appearances on his behalf, including a walk-on role at the GOP convention in Philadelphia. But yesterday's kickoff of a three-day ''W Stands for Women'' tour marked Barbara Bush's debut as a crowd-pleasing surrogate and something of a policy spokeswoman.
The mission is specific: The Bush women, joined on the tarmac at Grand Rapids's Gerald R. Ford International Airport yesterday morning by Lynne Cheney and Condoleezza Rice, Bush's top foreign-policy adviser, are unabashedly playing the gender card, strong women trying to close Bush's gap with women by touting what they say is his female-friendly record on education and his dedication to family values.
The route of the ''W'' tour was carefully planned: the tour takes the women to hotly contested Pennsylvania where they will do a breast-cancer awareness event and a visit to a community college in the Philadelphia area. Monday, Cindy McCain, wife of Arizona Senator John McCain, joins up with Laura Bush for a trip through Wisconsin, another Midwestern battleground state.
Yesterday the Bush women visited Grand Rapids, a Republican stronghold, to energize the party base and encourage GOP voters to get to the polls. The next stop was Lansing, a higher-education hub in a swing district that President Clinton carried in 1992 and 1996. By the time they got to Brighton, a village 40 miles from Detroit, the senior Mrs. Bush was acting anything but 75: She outpaced her daughter-in-law as she rambled down crowded Main Street, snuggling babies, signing autographs, and posing for photos with Girl Scouts and women shopkeepers.
''I'm not supposed to speak,'' she said with a wink, as she took the microphone and launched a spirited get-out-the-vote call.
They ended the day with a rally outside Detroit in Southfield, a booming suburban area full of soccer moms. Asked by a reporter how Bush could stand for women and oppose abortion rights, Barbara Bush snapped, ''I am very offended when I hear women's issues are just one issue.''
''We hope to have the opportunity to talk about George in a way that other people don't,'' Laura Bush told reporters in Grand Rapids. ''We know him in a very personal way. That gives us the opportunity to talk about him and about his heart and about how compassionate he is.''
Laura Bush said she was ''thrilled'' and seemed relaxed to have her mother-in-law in tow. The ''W'' tour came at the end of the tense debate season and as the campaign kicks into overdrive for the last three weeks.
''We are working very hard,'' Laura Bush said. ''A spouse feels the same amount of pressure as the candidate.''
She said she thought her husband's performance Tuesday night was ''terrific,'' but she admitted that debates are ''very high tension. They are very nerve-wracking.''
Barbara Bush, who reportedly never believed her son would be elected Texas governor, admitted it was ''agony'' being the mother of a presidential candidate. Her daughter-in-law suggested the elder Bushes were coming to understand the anxiety she and her husband felt as they watched people they loved come under fire and be put to the test every day.
Polls in Michigan show the presidential race in a dead heat. A Detroit News poll released over the weekend put Bush and Vice President Al Gore each at 42 percent of the vote. Bush leads among men, 48 to 38 percent. Gore leads with women, 47 to 37 percent.
The gender gap has been a persistent feature of presidential polls, but John Zogby, a pollster who is tracking the race closely, says Bush is gaining ground among married women and mothers who like his focus on education. The ''W'' tour is aimed precisely at that constituency, and it is targeted at undecided women, who outnumber undecided men.
''Bush's wife is not Hillary, and his mother is very popular,'' Zogby said. ''Barbara Bush has always been a secret weapon because she is likeable, honest, straightforward, and a role model in a sort of white-haired, traditional way that is almost lost in most campaigns.''
The venues for yesterday's events were selected to highlight the themes of education and economic opportunity for women. But the more subtle message was that Bush is a man imbued with the traditional values that would make you proud to have him as a son, love to have him as a husband, and admire him as the father of your children.
Condoleeza Rice, an African-American, called Bush ''wonderful to work for'' because he keeps his word and practices the policies of inclusion. Lynne Cheney, wife of Bush running mate Dick Cheney, called Bush an honest and decent person who would end the bickering and blame-casting in Washington and form ''a government you can be very, very proud of.''
At the Van Andel Museum Center - the cultural center that the Amway Corp. fortune built in Grand Rapids - a mostly female crowd filled the central hall. Those who weren't holding babies happily waved red, white, and blue pompoms to the beat of a high school marching band. Some said they were curious to see Laura; most said they most wanted to meet the beloved Bar.
''I respect Barbara Bush more than any first lady,'' said Deb Cheadle of Rockford, Mich. ''She stands for things that are real and familiar to American families, not something that is not attainable for the rest of us.''
Linda DiVall, a GOP pollster, says voters see Bush and his wife as individuals with stature - certainly a word that could describe the candidate's monied, well-mannered, and well-bred mother as well.
But Barbara Bush's breeding may not have prepared her for being a policy wonk on women's issues. In Grand Rapids, she told a joke about a new business owner who receives flowers with a card signed, ''rest in peace.'' Puzzled, he calls the florist. The florist is not only contrite, he's embarrassed about what the folks over at the funeral home must have thought when they received flowers bearing a card that said, ''give `em hell, big fella.''
''If I try to go into details, I might make a similar mistake,'' Barbara Bush quipped.
