Burnishing an Image at the USA Corral (Western WH)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/latimests/20050829/ts_latimes/burnishinganimageattheusacorral;_ylt=ApaPcjhCwoCif5e4dzKJl8as0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b2NibDltBHNlYwM3MTY-

Burnishing an Image at the USA Corral

By Warren Vieth Times Staff Writer 48 minutes ago

CRAWFORD, Texas —
President Bush calls his Prairie Chapel Ranch "a slice of heaven," a special place where he can ride his mountain bike, fish his man-made pond and clear brush to his heart's content.

But is it really a ranch?

Here's a clue: The
Secret Service agents now outnumber the cows.

Bush's summer vacation at the 1,583-acre spread, which ends Friday after close to five weeks, allows him not only to relax, but to remind the nation that he's a Cowboy President. It's a tradition started by Teddy Roosevelt, and followed by Lyndon B. Johnson and
Ronald Reagan, that casts the chief executive as a plain-talking, outdoors-loving leader.

The president's supporters say that's the real Bush, and they say he would be spending time at the property he bought in 1999 even if he had not run for president a year later. Still, they acknowledge that Bush's image benefits from his time in Crawford.......

as soon as he can after vacating the white house.

buying in Dallas or Highland Park after this little stint. The Crawford ranch is a stage set. It was built specifically so * would have a Texas ranch to serve as his western White House.

that there are no photographs of the house itself?

They always show the rustic sheds and photo ops are by dirt roads and of brush cutting. I'm guessing that the house is either really garish or ostentatious and humongous or something.

If it was really truly ranch like, they'd use it in the photo ops constantly.

... IIRC, he really WAS an outdoorsman (wasn't TR the reason we have all those national parks?).