first covered George H.W. Bush on the other side of the world—and at what was almost certainly the least auspicious moment of his still-underappreciated presidency. He had just vomited into the lap of the prime minister of Japan.
It was January 1992. The Gulf War was won along with the Cold War—the Soviet Union had been formally dissolved only a month before—but there was little American triumphalism in the air. That would come later. The U.S. economy was mired in the recession that would cost Bush a second term ten months hence, and the 41st president knew that despite his victory over Saddam Hussein he needed to show more leadership on the economy. Japan-bashing was then at its height and the rallying phrase “American jobs for American workers” had captured the zeitgeist. “The Cold War is over, and Japan won,” Sen. Paul Tsongas cracked during the '92 election campaign.
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