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Bentsen's legacy: quiet expertise, famed barb

Ex-senator and Treasury chief Lloyd Bentsen has died at 85. He was best known for telling Dan Quayle "you're no Jack Kennedy."

By From wire reports
Published May 24, 2006

HOUSTON - Former senator and Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen, best remembered for his "you're no Jack Kennedy," putdown of vice presidential rival Dan Quayle in a 1988 debate, died Tuesday (May 23, 2006). He was 85.

Sen. Bentsen, who represented Texas in Congress for 28 years, died at his Houston home, his family said. He had been under a doctor's care since a pair of strokes in 1998.

Sen. Bentsen's political career took him from a county judgeship in the Rio Grande Valley in the 1940s to six years in the U.S. House, 22 years in the Senate and two years as former President Bill Clinton's first treasury secretary.

Remembered as a shrewd legislative operator, he maneuvered with ease in Democratic and Republican circles alike on Capitol Hill, displaying expertise on tax, trade and economic issues as well as foreign affairs.

"The state of Texas has had great senators but no senator has ever been a better senator than Lloyd Bentsen," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said on the Senate floor Tuesday.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry ordered flags at state buildings flown at half-staff for five days.

In 1988, Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis chose Sen. Bentsen as his running mate while Vice President George Bush chose Sen. Dan Quayle of Indiana.

In their Oct. 5, 1988, vice presidential debate, Quayle said: "I have as much experience in the Congress as Jack Kennedy did when he sought the presidency."

Quayle had made similar comments before and Sen. Bentsen was prepared.

"Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy," Sen. Bentsen said. "I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy."

The Democratic ticket, however, was soundly defeated by Bush and Quayle.

In 1948, Sen. Bentsen was elected to the U.S. House. After the House, he returned to private life in Houston, where he founded a financial holding company with the help of several million dollars in seed money from his family.

In 1970, he defeated Democratic Sen. Ralph Yarborough, then went on to defeat the elder Bush for the first of four Senate terms.

He did have several missteps in his career. The most prominent was in 1987, when he solicited $10,000 campaign contributions from lobbyists in exchange for once-a-month breakfasts with him. He returned the money and apologized for what he said was a "doozy" of a mistake.

Clinton gave Sen. Bentsen a higher profile than other Treasury secretaries, taking Sen. Bentsen with him for his first summit with Russian President Boris Yeltsin and deferring to his judgment on budget deliberations.

When Sen. Bentsen announced his retirement, Clinton said: "By any stead, he ranks as one of the outstanding economic policymakers in this country since World War II."

Clinton gave Sen. Bentsen the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1999.

Information from the Associated Press and the Dallas Morning News was used in this report.

[Last modified May 24, 2006, 05:32:27]