The Man Who Ran Washington Quotes

“WASHINGTON LOVES the ones who grease its gears. But history only remembers the ones who shift them,” the late Washington Post writer Marjorie Williams wrote of Baker.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“He divided problems into three categories, according to David Gergen, a former adviser from his White House days: easy; hard but doable; and impossible. The first category he left to others, the last he wrote off, and the middle is where he focused his energies.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“Larry Speakes estimated that Baker spent as much as 50 percent of his time with reporters and editors, probably an exaggeration but a revealing one. The media, at least the part of it that really mattered, was still small enough that it could be managed; aside from ABC, CBS, and NBC, there were the wire services, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and the weekly newsmagazines Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News & World Report. Baker, as chief of staff, became an expert in their care and feeding.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“As he had demonstrated with the Soviets, Baker recognized that the person across the table had his or her own domestic politics to worry about and he made a point of looking for ways to satisfy those needs while still getting what he wanted.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“Baker had a talent for connection. He could be whatever he needed to be at the moment it was necessary. The young man who slid back and forth from Texas to Princeton, from the Ivy Club in the spring to the wildcatter's rig in the summer, now applied the same skills on Capitol Hill.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“He was impressed with the California governor’s political skills, but for years viewed Reagan warily. “We thought he was a nut,” Baker said later. “I didn’t necessarily think that,” he added, “but that was the line on him. Everybody said that he was.” Reagan’s bellicose rhetoric”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“Reagan inherited a prime interest rate of 20.5 percent, making it hard to start a new business or buy a new home or car. The top marginal income tax rate stood at 70 percent.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“All important business is always done in men’s rooms and smoking rooms,” Gorbachev joked.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“He met with people he trusted as well as political figures in the district to sound them out. Reactions were mixed—“ some pro, some con,” as he put it at the time. A couple other local Republicans were also considering the race and while Baker concluded that he could raise the money, he was warily watching the top of the ticket to see what impact it might have, most specifically whether Yarborough would draw a strong primary opponent, which Baker thought would bring out conservative voters.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“Theirs was the largest class in Princeton history and, while homogenous by later standards, it was more diverse than many of its predecessors, with the largest share of public high school students (37 percent)”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“When the prosecutor finally did issue his report in November 1995, he cleared the Baker team, saying some of them had acted stupidly but not illegally. Indeed, diGenova went on to say that Barr should never have sought his appointment in the first place.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“Barr had just requested the appointment of a prosecutor in the passport matter only hours before the deadline. He had acted on the recommendation of the head of the Justice Department’s criminal division, Robert S. Mueller III.”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III

“(Donald Trump, the media-hungry developer who had groused about Baker’s economic policies, sent word through Lee Atwater that he would be willing to serve as vice president, an offer that Bush dismissed as “strange and unbelievable.”)”
― Peter Baker, The Man Who Ran Washington: The Life and Times of James A. Baker III