'Grateful' George W. calls on Clinton and Gore

By MARY DEJEVSKY

WASHINGTON - In two meetings yesterday laden with symbolism and suppressed emotion, the United States president-elect, George W Bush, both shook the hand of his defeated rival, Al Gore, and lunched with President Bill Clinton, the man he will succeed at the White House.

Reconciliation and an orderly handover of power were the stories the television pictures were intended to tell, but after this year's protracted and divisive election, they told much, much more.

The first snow of the winter fell as Mr Bush's motorcade drew up at the Naval Observatory – this is what the Vice-President's residence is called – half an hour behind schedule.

Mr Gore, a wan smile on his face, came out to shake his vanquisher's hand and pat him on the back before they disappeared inside.

Would he say anything? Mr Gore was asked by waiting reporters. No, he said briskly, referring to his much-praised concession speech last week, he had already had his say; the rest would be private.

A perfunctory 15 minutes later, Mr Bush and his entourage were whisked off to the airport, without a further word being said.

Mr Bush, who likes to be punctual, appeared to have been delayed by the incorrigibly unpunctual Mr Clinton with whom he had just had lunch.

It was a meeting whose potential for disaster was ample. Mr Bush had spent the entire election campaign impugning Mr Clinton's character by promising to "restore honour and dignity to the White House". What is more, in winning the presidency, Mr Bush had avenged his father's defeat by Mr Clinton eight years before.

Yesterday, though, Mr Bush was on best behaviour. He strolled side by side with Mr Clinton down the White House portico, in scenes that exactly paralleled the pictures of his father escorting a younger, less polished and more ebullientMr Clinton – then, like Mr Bush, a southern state governor.

The two men then sat down to a pre-lunch conversation, where Mr Clinton said he wanted to consult Mr Bush about whether he should make a presidential visit to North Korea, and Mr Bush repeatedly said how "humbled and honoured" and "grateful" he was to be at the White House.

"The President didn't have to invite us," he said of his own visit and that of his wife, Laura, who had tea with Hillary Clinton the previous day. And he said it twice, even though such pre-presidential visits have long been customary and even though this year's visit was seen as more necessary.

The stroll-by of the two men helped to confer an air of legitimacy on Mr Bush after an election result that almost one-third of the population has not fully accepted.

Mr Bush's careful way with his words and his deliberate, slightly puffed up bearing made him look more presidential than perhaps at any time since his election.

But he also deferred to Mr Clinton in a way that told everyone watching that, whatever he might have said or implied in the past, he accepted Mr Clinton's right to be President and he would bow (for the next five weeks, at least) to the incumbent's experience.

"I'm here to listen," Mr Bush said. "If he's kind enough to offer some advice, I'll listen."

Eight years ago, Mr Clinton was already the legitimate president-elect, having prevailed fair and square over George Bush Snr. But, as Mr Bush seemed tacitly to acknowledge yesterday, Mr Clinton's treatment by his father had fallen short of the respect now being accorded to the son.

The friction between the two presidents then was palpable. And Mr Bush Snr had not allowed in the cameras to record even the start of their meeting.

Mr Clinton, who saw his deputy defeated, seemed to bear Mr Bush no ill will. On the contrary, there had been signs during the election campaign – though not in its last bitter aftermath – that Mr Clinton nurtured some feeling for the challenger from Texas and admired his spontaneity and persistence in campaigning.

Mr Bush for his part appeared to have learnt much from Mr Clinton, whom he observed as an operative in his father's doomed campaign.

Throughout the political and legal manoeuvring that followed the election, Mr Clinton was punctiliously correct. While he heavily implied that he favoured recounting the votes in Florida, he gave the go-ahead for Mr Bush to be given the same intelligence briefings as the Vice-President and placed the services of the FBI at Mr Bush's disposal to start the process of clearing his nominees through security.

He also said that if it had been his call, he would have given both access to the public funds earmarked for the transition.

In fact, these were withheld by the agency concerned until the US Supreme Court ruled and Mr Gore conceded defeat.

By a quirk of fate, yesterday also marked two years since Mr Clinton's impeachment by the House of Representatives – a day that not only ensured that Mr Clinton would enter the history books as a tainted president, but may well have helped lose Mr Gore the presidency.

It was Mr Gore's lavish praise of Mr Clinton on the White House lawn that winter's day that was repeatedly cited as a grievous lapse in his judgement. Standing by the President in his predicament was one thing – and probably, as Mr Gore later explained it, his constitutional duty.

But to speak of Mr Clinton then as "one of our greatest presidents" was seen as inappropriate and was held up as evidence of Mr Gore's political insensitivity.

Without that exaggerated expression of loyalty, Mr Gore might have been able to separate himself more successfully from Mr Clinton's trangressions and claim joint credit for the achievements of his eight years in power.

That videoclip, however – which the Bush team never used against Mr Gore in the election campaign, but reportedly held in reserve – bound him inextricably to Mr Clinton's good and bad sides alike.

Seeing the same White House backdrop on yesterday's television news, with Mr Bush accompanying the outgoing President through the portico, Mr Gore must surely have remembered – and rued – that day.

Herald Online feature: Election aftermath

Map: final results across the USA

Bush-Cheney transition website

Transcript: The US Supreme Court decision

Transcript: The US Supreme Court oral arguments

Diary of a democracy in trouble

Electoral College