A Letter From The Publisher: Dec. 14, 1981

For correspondents assigned to cover the White House, press briefings and scheduled events constitute only a modest part of their daily duties. Much of their information comes from private conversations with officeholders, who often provide background or personal observations. For this week’s cover story on the inner workings of the Reagan Administration, White House Correspondents Laurence Barrett and Douglas Brew drew on knowledge built up over months of reporting on Reagan and his executive “troika”—Presidential Counsellor Edwin Meese, Chief of Staff James Baker and Deputy Chief of Staff Michael Deaver. Says Barrett: “To know how the minds of these men work it is necessary to spend time with them at meals, on the tennis court, in a fishing boat, or just hang out with them.”

Barrett is no newcomer to the lively exercise of White House watching. As a Washington reporter from 1962 to 1965 for the New York Herald Tribune, he assessed the first 18 months of the Administration of Lyndon B. Johnson. Thirteen years later, he covered the Jimmy Carter White House for eleven months. Barrett has found Reaganites are more accessible and more tolerant of press criticism than Johnson and Carter people. Says Barrett:

“During the Carter Administration, stories considered unfair or off base by the White House often resulted in ill-tempered lectures from a senior staffer. But Reagan usually takes this kind of thing in stride, and so do his subordinates. One way to measure an Administration’s sense of balance is to watch the way it reacts to criticism.”

Brew’s association with Reagan and his staff dates back to last year, when he occasionally pinch-hit for Barrett on the Reagan campaign trail. Brew stood watch outside Reagan’s Pacific Palisades home during the presidential transition period. Since then he has reported on the President’s Inauguration, the attempted assassination, and his Thanksgiving at the Reagan ranch near Santa Barbara. “Reagan keeps a civilized 9-to-5 schedule and doesn’t take off at the drop of a hat to strange places around the world,” says Brew. “His aides may have bloodshot eyes, drawn faces and jangled nerves, but Reagan always looks as if he just stepped out of a hot bath.”