Maverick rides again

"I think he's being absolutely 100 percent true to himself," says Lanier, a Democrat who was convinced by McKinnon and Bullock to endorse Bush for re-election in 1998. "He has gone to work for a guy who he thinks -- and I think -- is a very decent person and who will be good for the country if elected. Ten years from now, he is going to be able to look back and be very proud of the decision he has made. And I know that's going to be more important to him than any labels or anyone else's opinion."

McKinnon won't speculate on what he will do when this job is finished. He says he has no great desire to work in partisan Washington -- even if there is a Bush White House. He has an option to return to the Austin-based political consulting firm he left when he took the Bush job.

Other possibilities appear to be unlimited. He could be hired as the official videographer of the Bush administration and maybe have his work displayed for eternity at a George W. Bush presidential library. Or he could get out of politics again entirely and become a documentary filmmaker. He admits to having a half-shot documentary squirreled away somewhere. Goodness knows he would be able to find investors for any project he wants to do. All he would have to do is go down the list of contributors to the Bush campaign.

"No matter what happens," McKinnon says, "this will have been a great professional and personal experience for me."

And the future?

"I believe so strongly in Governor Bush," McKinnon says, "that I would cut the lawn at the Mansion if he asked me to."