Soon Newt Gingrich arrived to help plot the Republicans’ budget strategy. It wasn’t about numbers, but sound bites. Coatless, a half dozen felt-tip pens bristling in his shirt pocket, the speaker chuckled with delight as he stopped to watch a highlight reel of the evening news shows. They all featured Gingrich and Dole blasting the president for playing golf after threatening a veto. Presidential politics is “not Ping-Pong,” Dole said on one of the shows, “it’s hardball.” He didn’t sound displeased.
If Colin Powell was a Frank Capra movie, then the ‘96 campaign he leaves behind is shaping up as pure Quentin Tarantino. There are no Mr. Smiths in the political “Pulp Fiction” we are about to witness. A year from Election Day, we’re already previewing a reel of verbal assault, interest-group clout and made-for-TV confrontation. In the latest NEWSWEEK Poll, 42 percent of voters said they wished for at least one other candidate in the field–a strong measure of dissatisfaction with the race to come. Elections are supposed to be an exercise in hope. Will this one ever manage to inspire?
The candidates, declared and still-pondering, are all street-tough survivors: the usual suspects, bred for combat. There are those consumed by the famous fire in the belly: Clinton, Dole, Gramm, Jesse Jackson. There are crusaders: Pat Buchanan and pro-choice champion Arlen Specter. There are rich men propelled and protected by their money: Steve Forbes and Ross Perot. There are models of a bionic blandness: Lamar Alexander and Dick Lugar. “It’s depressing,” says COP media consultant Greg Stevens. “There’s nobody voters are likely to get excited about.”
The tone will get nastier before uplift arrives–if it ever does. One reason is last week’s election returns, especially in Kentucky, which Clinton won in 1992 and desperately needs to win again. Democrats kept the governorship there with a negative campaign that could become a model for the White House. The Democrat, Paul Patton, “nationalized” the contest, running against Gingrich’s “Contract With America”–itself the GOP’s “nationalizing” tool of ‘94. He charged that Gingrich and Dole “never believed in Medicare” and “want it to wither on the vine.” Patton also reminded voters that an early GOP budget draft had called for selling federally owned lakes, a sacrilege in a state full of boaters and fishermen. In Louisville, Patton mounted a vast last-minute phone-bank crusade to “save Medicare.” “That’s how they won it,” says Ralph Reed of the Christian Coalition. And Republican, s, take note: the same media guru who oversaw the winning Kentucky campaign, Robert Squier, has a major role in planning Clinton-Gore ‘96.
Candidate Powell might have been a kind of humane referee in the political ring. Now the combatants are utterly free to do what they know how to do: mix it up. And they were doing so late last week in a spectacle unlikely to inspire public confidence. Emboldened by the Kentucky results (and a similar message from legislative elections in Virginia), the president seemed determined to run on one theme: as the opponent of Republican “extremism.” Once aghast at the idea of shutting down the government, Clinton last weekend was willing-even eager-to do it. Now he had Republicans to blame. Mournfully, he announced that he could not let the GOP “cut Medicare, education and the environment.”
Republicans reacted in kind. Dole and Gingrich brought golf clubs into the Senateradio-TV gallery, blithely calling the president a feckless loafer. Privately, they were outraged–but not surprised–at Clinton’s characterization of one provision in the budget bill. In it, the GOP voted to temporarily keep Medicare premiums at current levels. Under law, they were due to drop this month. The president called it a “cut” in the program. “I assume they’re going to lie about everything and go from there,” Gingrich told NEWSWEEK. “They’re utterly shameless.”
But as the campaign begins in earnest, who isn’t? This is a season of grandstanding that prefigures the one to come. Both sides want a “shoot-out” that lasts until Election Day. “It’s like ‘High Noon’!” enthused House Budget Committee chairman John Kasich, watching TV in Dole’s office. “We’ve downed our shots of whisky and now we’re heading out into the dusty street.” Politicians performing this kind of theater will make themselves look like petulant children to the voters, says GOP polltaker John McLaughlin, a top adviser to Steve Forbes. “These guys have put themselves in a box. They’re going to yell and scream, but then cut a deal. And the public will ask: what was the purpose of all that shouting?”
But maybe this is the kind of filmnoir atmosphere that suits Dole. Nobody expects him to be Mr. Geniality. He’s the candidate with no illusions in a world of no illusions. In the NEWSWEEK Poll, Dole is the chief beneficiary of Powell’s farewell. Among GOP voters, Dole is favored by 51 percent. No one else is in double digits. In general-election matchups, Dole narrowly bests Clinton in either a two- or three-way race. With the moderate Powell out, Dole can edge over to the middle of the GOP battlefield, the place where the senator is most comfortable. He continues to pile up endorsements, including two impressive ones from governors last week: Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania and Steve Merrill of New Hampshire. Dole is planning to strengthen his media team, NEWSWEEK has learned, by adding advertising man Don Sipple, a highly regarded “message” specialist.
One word: Now all Dole needs is a message. His aides carefully shield him from unstructured interviews. They have announced that he will take part in only three debates between now and the New Hampshire primary. Though Arlen Specter is considering leaving the race for lack of funds, the Dole team hopes he stays in for a while. The reason: there’s a “Larry King Live” debate Friday night. The more candidates, the less time for Dole. Indeed, Dole and his aides wouldn’t mind if the budget battle drags on until Christmas-to avoid risky confrontations with the press and rivals. So far, Dole’s message amounts to one word: endurance. It’s the story of his life, and his campaign so far. “He’s taken a pounding for months,” said his campaign director, Scott Reed. “He’s had to listen to everybody get all emotional over Powell. But he’s still got half of the Republican primary vote. He’s resilient.”
But Dole appreciates more than anyone else that the nastiness has just begun. The next few months will not be pretty. The first post-Powell battlefield is in Orlando, home of Disney World. It’s an appropriate place, since the “straw poll” to be held there this Saturday comes straight from the “land of make-believe.” It has nothing to do with actually picking delegates. But it has become a colossal media event–in part because Dole committed an off-the-cuff blunder. Reacting to a poor showing in an Iowa straw poll last summer, Dole hyped the importance of this one. And despite his strong showing in national polls, he’s losing altitude in a few key states-especially in all-important New Hampshire. So he’s going all out in Florida.
The rest of the field is eager to embarrass Dole. Gramm, Alexander and Buchanan have the best chance of doing so. The wooing, wining, dining and intimidating the 3,400 delegates to the Florida poll would be comic if it weren’t such a waste of time and money. Beside giving away candy, gifts and even dance lessons, the Dole campaign has locked up vast numbers of hotel rooms-available for free only to committed delegates. Taking no chances, his team has attacked Gramm, sending out a brochure warning that he “jeopardized our conservative revolution” by missing Senate votes.
‘Paddled twice’: Second-tier candidates are attacking each other. Desperate to avoid a third-place finish, Gramm has gone after Alexander, his Southern rival. In phone canvasses, Gramm’s team asks straw-poll participants whom they’re interested in. If they say Alexander, they get a packet of biographical material on him–from Gramm. The material notes that Alexander was “paddled twice” in high school and that he has said he believes in the “Party of Lincoln.” Buchanan, for his part, complains that “victory fund” delegates-those who get a vote only because they give $5,000 to the state party–give unfair weight to the “country-club Republicans” he loathes.
At the White House, Clinton advisers can sit back and watch the Florida festivities with amusement–for now. Things are breaking the president’s way–for now. With Powell a “no” and Specter soon to depart, the GOP field will be left without an avowedly pro-choice candidate. If moderates stay away, and turnout in GOP primaries is low, the role of conservatives will be magnified. Clinton will shout “extremism” in the crowded theater. An environment of low expectations benefits Clinton, too. Voters know his defects, and have learned to deal with them. In this field, in this year, voters may give up looking for inspiration at all. That could be as much of a relief to Clinton as it is to Dole.
Relieved that the general decided he wasn’t combat-ready, Clinton, the Republicans and a few wild cards recast their strategies. As the GOP heads to Florida for a straw poll on Saturday, a look at I0 game plans:
Incumbent Bill Clinton
GAME PLAN: Whomever the GOP nominates, Clinton will defend Medicare and environment against Gingrichitc “extremists.”
PITFALLS: As the incumbent, he could be the main issue, and voters have never forgotten concerns about his character.
Challengers Lamar Alexander
GAME PLAN: Put the heat on fellow Southerner Gramm (starting in Florida this week) by running as an outsider who can heat Clinton.
PITFALLS: Process-of-elimination strategy counts on Eveready Buchanan and deep-pocketed Forbes faltering early.
GAME PLAN: A surprise showing in Florida poll and Iowa sets him up for the New Hampshire primary, where he won 87 percent in ‘92.
PITFALLS: Even second place in New Hampshire won’t boost the firebrand pundit through the big-state primaries, where abortion and trade positions limit his appeal.
Bob Dole
GAME PLAN: Limit exposure by shirking debates; keep Senate in session to shorten the dock. Take foes out one at a time.
PITFALLS: Prime endorsements won’t insulate him from attacks from second tier. Senate work limits campaigning.
Steve Forbes
GAME PLAN: A fresh face, he can focus on specifics like the flat tax–and he can spend lavishly to get his message out.
PITFALLS: “Freshness” might read “unqualified”; gaudy media buying attracts attention to his inherited wealth.
Phil Gramm
GAME PLAN: Match Dole on money and meanness; beat him on conservatism. Play up Florida poll against New Hampshire.
PITFALLS: New Hampshire is still the most important primary. A bad finish in the Florida poll hurts him.
Richard Lugar
GAME PLAN: Use dowdiness as a badge of honesty; somehow survive until Midwest primaries put him on the radar screen.
PITFALLS: In ‘92, Tsongas proved anti-charisma wears thin. Iowa is the Midwest, but no real zip there yet.
Arlen Specter
GAME PLAN: As the only pro-choice candidate, he might run third in New Hampshire, where a clear majority is pro-choice.
PITFALLS: Already in debt, his last big act may be the Florida straw poll.
Wild Cards
Jesse Jackson
GAME PLAN: Media frenzy will get him a voice in budget and social-policy clashes. If Clinton caves totally on the budget, he’ll launch a liberal crusade.
PITFALLS: His popularity among blacks would be threatened ff his left-thrust independent candidacy dooms Clinton.
Ross Perot
GAME PLAN: After buying ballot access, he’ll hold a cyberconvention to decry other declared candidates as tools of Washington. PITFALLS: Who’ll run as the party’s presidential nominee? Admiral Stockdale? If it’s Perot, Reform Party could be Egomania Party.
