Sununu Sr. keeping busy: still anxious watching son campaign

By Max Heuer

WASHINGTON, Oct. 02, 2002--John H. Sununu says watching one of his eight sons try to climb up the political ladder is a lot harder than when he was doing it himself.

Sununu did his climbing a long time ago, first in his three terms as governor of New Hampshire and then as chief of staff in the first Bush administration.

So the elder Sununu knows what it's like to work in positions that provide a white-hot national and state spotlight.

But Sununu also says it is tougher watching his son Rep. John E. Sununu (NH-01) campaign against Granite State Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen in one of the most closely watched contests for a seat in a narrowly divided Senate.

"It is ten times worse being the father of a candidate," he said in an interview Wednesday. "The anxiety level is much worse."

Though he's been in the private sector since 1992, the attention Sununu garnered while in office clearly still bothers him. He refers to the "talking heads of TV" as "biased" and "ignorant."

But the elder Sununu's worries haven't compelled him to interfere with his son's campaign, he said.

"I learned a long time ago the only advice ever taken is advice asked for," the former governor said. "There is some asking," he said, "but I wait until he calls."

In the meantime, he still isn't shy about offering his opinions on other issues.

Sununu has his own lobbying and consulting business, JHS Associates, sits on several boards and is a trustee for the George Bush Presidential Library Foundation.

Sununu says he is "loving it" in the private sector, and clearly his political connections have come in handy along the way.

This week, American International Airports - an airport concessions firm that currently manages 33 airports in Latin America and one in Armenia - announced that Sununu has been appointed its chairman.

AIA CEO John H. Tonelli, who attended a speech Sununu gave here Wednesday, said that former president George Bush referred Sununu.

Tonelli said Sununu understands the political systems of the Latin American countries the firm currently works with, and the Eastern European countries such as Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania where AIA is in negotiations.

Moreover, Tonelli said, Sununu "knows a lot of people" and "has a Rolodex of people he can call."

Tonelli said his original thought was that Sununu would serve mostly as an important "figurehead" for the company. But it turns out, he said, that the former governor wants to play an active role.

Tonelli added he chose Sununu, who is fluent in Spanish, over the likes of a former Secretary of State or a national security adviser - Henry A. Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft were two he had in mind - because of his "innovative ideas" and experience in the business world.

Sununu's background in business and management has served him well since leaving politics: He was once a partner in Trinity International Partners, a private financial firm.
Sununu also has a background in engineering - like his son, he attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology - and was associate dean and associate professor at Tufts University engineering school until 1973.

Despite his own work in the press - he co-hosted CNN's "Crossfire" after leaving the White House in 1992 until 1998 - Sununu reserved his harshest comments for the news media Wednesday while speaking at a Latin American investment summit that had partly coincided with the IMF and World Bank meetings.

He said the American "liberal press" was "dumb" and that it "miscommunicates" with the American public.

During his speech to the Latin American investors, Sununu reminisced about his days in the White House at the end of the Cold War.

"In 1991, when Gorbachev came to the White House and asked President Bush [to explain to him] the differences in governing in a democracy or a dictatorship, I had the CIA translate the Federalist Papers into Russian." Those 18th-century exchanges of views on the newly drafted U.S. Constitution were early evidence, he said, that "one of the greatest strengths of the [American] system…[is] called checks and balances."

Sununu said that the Bush administration's foreign policy had been "distracted" by the events of Sept. 11 and was focusing less on important economic issues in Latin America.

Outlining his prescription for societal success in Latin America, Sununu said "followership" was key. (Countries, he said need a "society that is confident enough in its leaders that they will… choose to follow its leaders when a decision is made," Sununu said.

He acknowledged in the interview after the speech that, for him, the responsibility for making those decisions had passed, and that he was "leaving the politics to the next generation."

Published in The Manchester Union Leader, in New Hampshire.