# Laura Bush vs Teresa Heinz Kerry **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 10, 2004, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889 "2004-09-10T07:22:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![sugaree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@sugaree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sugaree)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/21 "2004-09-11T14:49:06Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > Laura Bush is also the only one of the 4 NOT born rich. Thats got to count for SOMETHING. 🙂 I’ve heard her father described as either a contractor or a developer, and “successful.” That could mean anything from comfortably middle-class to multi-millionaire. ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/22 "2004-09-11T15:15:10Z")
I like Laura most of all the Bush principals, in part because she is probably the only one who hasn’t ridden through life entirely on a silver spoon and has actually experienced a real life tragedy (one that left her unable to speak for years) on the scale of the Edwards and Teresa. Sam Stone is right: Teresa is politically tone deaf, and indeed has no real heart for politics. But that’s exactly what’s so cool about her: you’d think that people who bitch about washington politicians would appreciate someone who is soooo not one. She isn’t a demure politicians’ wife, like Laura has become. And she isn’t a politician, like Hillary. She’s a fun, vivacious character, and as a first lady she’ll be a real treat. Her relationship with Kerry isn’t one of influence in a policy sense, but it is intensely humanizing. Whereas with the Bushes there is only a sense of cold calculation and political stewardship, the Kerrys seem to have an actual love affair, found late and still going. ---
**Author:** ![spingears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@spingears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spingears)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/23 "2004-09-11T15:37:34Z")
**Class vs Trash** No agreement on which one is in which group! Posts are mostly subjective political opinion vs. objective reason. ---
**Author:** ![Fiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/24 "2004-09-11T16:12:58Z")
What’s all this about Laura Bush having taken a life? ---
**Author:** ![Icarus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icarus/32/72_2.png) [@Icarus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icarus)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/25 "2004-09-11T17:11:24Z")
> [@Fiver](#): > > What’s all this about Laura Bush having taken a life? [Laura Bush in 1963 Car Accident](http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3910b26e685a.htm) It’s from the [FreeRepublic.com](http://FreeRepublic.com), a conservative news forum, so it’s not some liberal attack garbage. ---
**Author:** ![suezeekay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/839c29/32.png) [@suezeekay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suezeekay)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/26 "2004-09-11T17:45:58Z")
Just after 9/11 I seem to remember that Laura made some comment about her husband “acting like a cowboy” when he got up in front of the american people and said in so many words we were going to kick their ass. I also remember that it horribly embarassed GW and his handlers and you haven’t heard a peep out of her since then. Nice hairdo and makeup through for those family shots. I like THK just because she isn’t afraid to exhibit her political naiveity; we need more of that. I’m so sick of these artifical people who run for office having to consult a poll every time they take a piss. I also admire her for taking on the huge responsiblity of running the Heinz family trust and doing a good job. I just like her and that’s the bottom line: people vote for the candidate they like. I like her better than her husband. And about GW’s reserve service: he has admitted he was an alcholic so it isn’t a far stretch (given he has admitted to being an adictive personality) that he used drugs. Druggies and alcholics do have a tendency to be irresponsible and I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s all true about how he avoided training and just blew it all off. I don’t think I’m extrapolating; I think it’s a reasonable conclusion based on his psychological makeup. I would have voted for Howard Dean and I’m still not sure what went on behind the scenes to so throughly discredit him. But in this case his wife definitely hurt him by not campaigning with him and being such a no-show. A quote stays with me made by a former classmate of GWB (in a radio interview): “It amazes me that someone I thought so little of could become president.” ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/27 "2004-09-11T18:01:54Z")
I’d love to have lunch with THK. I think we’d be able to talk about a range of topics, and there would be a sense of humor shared between us. Plus, I think she’d be able to cuss someone out if need be. She would be entertaining. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/28 "2004-09-11T22:07:46Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Apparently you haven’t read **Living History** by Hillary Clinton. As you may know Hillary Clinton was the last person to speak to Vince Foster while he was alive. She never said what he said to her before, but I heard she would reveal it in this book. > > I bought it because I wanted to know what Vince Foster’s last words to Hillary Clinton were. > > Turns out they were “PLEASE! DON’T SHOOT!!” Oh please, tell me this post was a joke, **Scylla**. We’re here to FIGHT ignorance, not foster it. And to be fair, and lest I be accused of partisanship, **Diogenes** , can’t we let it go? It was an accident. Yes, she ran a stop sign. Yes, it was awful, but I don’t think it’s fair to keep harping on it. **Sam** , perhaps by “common man”, she meant the average guy on the street. And I think she’s right-around here, she’s never been seen as a “rich witch”. As for women speaking their minds and “wellness centers”, or whatever, did you read the links I gave? She’s involved in various philanthropies. It’s what she believes in. And I agree, Theresa will be loads more fun. Heaven forbid a woman be anything but retiring and demure. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/29 "2004-09-11T22:48:19Z")
> [@](#): > > Sam, perhaps by “common man”, she meant the average guy on the street. Perhaps she did. That wasn’t my point. My point is that someone who is trying to shake a reputation as a patrician snob should not be using phrases like “The common man” and calling people who disagree with her husband’s policy proposals ‘idiots’. It’s just not smart politics. I agree that she’d be lots of fun. I’m sure she’ll provide endless amounts of fodder for Letterman and the rest. ---
**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2004, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/30 "2004-09-11T23:48:49Z")
> [@](#): > > If the first lady is just too creepy or obnoxious, it’ll be a serious drag on the ticket. Theresa, with her, “If you don’t like it you’re an idiot” comment, is skirting that line. If a creepy first lady can be a drag on a ticket with a “you’re an idiot” comment, here’s to hoping that a creepy VP can be ten times more of a drag on his ticket with a “fuck you” comment. ---
**Author:** ![theR](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@theR](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/theR)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2004, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/31 "2004-09-12T01:35:30Z")
I think THK suffers from the double standard that a lot of women suffer from. Because she has a mind of her own, because she is outspoken, because she is a go-getter, she is considered by many to be a bitch or snob, or what have you. If she was a man and she was running for office or working in the private sector, she would receive much less criticism and many more compliments for her words, actions, and personality. I like her a lot, and in my eyes she is an asset to her husband, not in terms of getting him votes, but in terms of actual everyday life. In a perfect world, that would translate to more votes, but a lot of voters are probably put off by the fact that she is such an individual and a partner to J. Kerry, rather than being a subordinate that knows her role as a good little wife. Laura Bush is the classic political wife, and I don’t know why so many people like that about her. I know she has a mind of her own, yet she does very little to display it. This makes me like her much less. Although I think it helps the perception that most people have of her husband, it does not improve my perception of him, though I admit there is little that anyone besides Bush himself could do to change my opinion of him. In the interest of disclosure, I should say that my appreciation of THK may be influenced by the fact that my grandfather received a Heinz Award. I don’t think my opinion would be different if he had not, though. ---
**Author:** ![Mehitabel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Mehitabel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mehitabel)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2004, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889/32 "2004-09-12T03:21:46Z")
Heh. While sitting on the Christopher St. piers, waiting for the Towers of Light to go on a few hours ago (they’re beautiful and sad) I finished this week’s NY Observer, of which [THK](http://www.nyobserver.com/pages/frontpage5.asp) is the cover girl. Yes, they always do those kinds of drawings, you should have seen the one for the RNC! 😃 Anyway, some quotes from author Bauer: > [@](#): > > “There’s the feeling that you never know what’s gonna happen with Teresa,” Alice Bradley, a Park Slope writer and mother, told me. "Like at any moment a catfight could break out and there she’d be, pulling Maria Shriver’s hair. > [@](#): > > Mr. Kerry and Ms. Heinz Kerry resemble something out of Henry James—a complicated tangle of lives on multiple continents that won’t easily be adapted for the cameras. Instead of doing what most men do when they marry for the second time—marry someone young, malleable and financially needy—Mr. Kerry married a woman who was older, uncontrollable and rich. This, of course, makes him suspect among our middle-aged dads, our heartland lawn-mower men, our Promise Keepers and Donald Trump wannabes. Why on earth did he marry that woman? Could it be, men across America may wonder, that Mr. Kerry is our First Trophy Husband? > [@](#): > > Ms. Heinz Kerry’s largely uncensored persona can be interpreted, then, as one big “shove it” to sacred notions of womanhood—enacting a secret revenge fantasy of women confronted by magazines fixated on weddings and pregnancies, their hysterical headlines castigating Kate Hudson for her inability to drop her baby weight and Mary-Kate for not being able to pack some on. Ms. Heinz Kerry stands in opposition to all this: a 65-year-old woman who has popped out all the kids she’s ever going to have and who doesn’t care what you think about her hair, her Botox use, her accent, her loopy locutions—and who may not love him as much as the one who came before him. FWIW, I lived in MA half my life and you didn’t hear much from her–she stayed mostly in Pittsburgh and was known as a smart and loving wife who pretty much had her own life and was doing a lot of good down there. No scandals, nothing strange about her, just a matriarch like we in New England know and admire. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/laura-bush-vs-teresa-heinz-kerry/263889.md?page=1)