Federal Government Continues to Support a Bigoted Organization: Bush Admin. honors the BSA While Ignoring Its Discriminatory Policy Against Gay and Atheist youth and adults

Chief of staff talks values, job stories with Scouts
By Bill Cotterell
Posted on Wed, Jun. 01, 2005

DEMOCRAT POLITICAL EDITOR

The moral values taught by the Boy Scouts are vital in combatting terrorism, White House Chief of Staff
Andrew Card told a Tallahassee audience Monday night.

About 400 supporters of the Suwannee River Area Council of the Boy Scouts of America sat in rapt silence as Card told of "my most memorable day in the White House" - three days after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. That was the Friday when President Bush attended a memorial service at the National Cathedral, flew to New York to personally stand amid the smoldering wreckage of the World Trade Center with police and firefighters, then comforted families of the dead and missing.

But Card said there were many unseen events that day - an FBI briefing in which Bush "redirected the bureaucracy" to prevent future attacks, a "very sobering briefing" by the CIA and a Cabinet meeting in which he told department heads to keep regular functions of government going during the crisis. Card related the president's oath of office to those taken by members of the military and the principles of patriotism, duty and honor instilled by scouting.

"When the president said he'd preserve, protect and defend the Constitution, it was an awesome obligation
that he accepted for us," Card said. "But it was also an obligation that the president knew he could not meet alone."

Addressing a group of Scouts who presented the flag and led the pledge of allegiance at the start of the
fund-raising banquet, a day after Memorial Day, Card asked them "to live by the oaths that you take and
remember the sacrifices others have made so that you can take that oath."

"What this is all about is meeting the responsibility of an oath," he said. "And Scouts are taught to live by that."

Chuck Ezell, executive director for the 13-county scouting council, said Gov. Jeb Bush, Secretary of State Glenda Hood and lobbyist Randy Enwright were instrumental in getting Card to address the second-annual Golden Eagle dinner at the University Center Club on the campus of Florida State University. "It helps when the president's brother is your governor," said Ezell, estimating the dinner would raise more than $100,000 for Scouting programs.

"We had a lot of people who made requests of Mr. Card," Hood said. "We knew that Andrew Card would be
interested because he used to be a Boy Scout himself."

The Suwannee River Area Council includes more than 4,000 Scouts and 1,600 adult leaders in eight counties
of North Florida and five in South Georgia, Ezell said.

Card, a former Massachusetts state legislator, served as secretary of the Department of Transportation for
the first President Bush and was a White House aide to President Reagan. He met with the governor's staff and some department heads early in the day.

Department of Juvenile Justice Secretary Anthony Schembri, who attended the meeting and the Boy Scout
dinner, said they talked about management and leadership techniques.

"It was a wonderful opportunity to hear from them but also to share some of my observations about how the
White House works," Card said.