George Bush Also Rode in a Tank in '88

"George Bush was in a tank three times during that campaign!"

                           - Michael Dukakis

Former Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis pointed this out to me in an interview 5 years ago while explaining how the imfamous "tank ad" that the Bush campaign ran against him - but I'd never been able to find any images, until now.

Here's an excerpt from our interview:

ME: Tell me about the--the tank advertisement.

DUKAKIS: It wasn’t an ad -- well, look; I was in a tank. George Bush was in a tank three times during that campaign! As I often say kidding these days, I’ve never thrown up all over the Japanese Prime Minister. I mean you know these things happen... But I didn’t lose because of the tanks; you know I lost because I didn’t run a very good final campaign.

DUKAKIS: I let myself be defined by my opponent rather than doing the kind of job you have to do--first to blunt those kinds of attacks...

DUKAKIS: If I had a nickel for everybody who has come up to me since 1988 and said you know you’re nothing like the guy we thought we were looking at in 1988--I’d be a millionaire.

Primary Season Tribute: 1976-2008

I cut a "greatest hits" montage of Primary Season Moments from the campaigns of 1976 - 2008 for The Chris Matthews Show and First Read at NBC. Featuring Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush, Teddy Kennedy, Walter Mondale, Gary Hart, Michael Dukakis, Bob Dole, Pat Buchanan, Al Gore, George Bush, John McCain, John Kerry, Howard Dean, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. A fun retrospective for political junkies, check it out here:

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George Bush, Meet the Barcode Scanner

The now infamous moment when George Bush appeared bewildered by a supermarket checkout scanner during his 1992 reelection campaign reinforced the caricature of the President as an out of touch politician, ensconced in the DC "bubble". 

 

"This is for checking out?" He asked, commenting that he was "Amazed by some of the technology." The trouble was that supermarket scanners had existed since the 1970's, revealing just how ignorant he was about Americans daily lives. One of his many gaffes of the 1992 campaign: 

"Not Nice": Geraldine Ferraro Speaks About Her 1984 VP Debate Against George H.W. Bush

Geraldine Ferraro passed away on Saturday March 26th, 2011. She was the first woman ever on a major party ticket and was known for speaking her mind and being unapologetic. While her selection was expected to breath new life into Walter Mondale's 1984 Presidential campaign, Mondale & Ferraro lost 49 states to incumbent Ronald Reagan. 

One of her most famous moments of the '84 campaign was her October 11th debate against then-VP George Herbert Walker Bush. When Bush appeared to be lecturing her on foreign policy, she called him out for speaking down to her, accusing him of having a patronizing attitude. I had the pleasure of sitting down with her in the spring of 2007, and she spoke about what happened -- she also points out that Bush even bragged about "kicking ass" after the debate, take a look below: