Online NewsHour: Shields and Gigot -- July 12, 1996

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SHIELDS & GIGOT

JULY 12, 1996

TRANSCRIPT

A marathon session with the NewsHour's regular pundits. First up, the impact a Perot candidacy might have on the election, and, Bob Dole's campaign woes. Kwame Holman interjects with an "explainer" on Congressional gridlock, then more Shields & Gigot commentary. They speak tonight with Jim Lehrer.

Browse the NewsHour's Coverage of:
June 10, 1996
Former Colorado Governor Dick Lamm discusses prospects for running for president on the Reform Party Ticket
July 10, 1996
Interview with Libertarian Candidate Harry Browne
July 4, 1996
Bob Dole's most recent "Where They Stand" speech
June 11, 1996
GOP split over abortion
Index of Online NewsHour's General Election Coverage

JIM LEHRER: Now how Perot, Lamm, and other things political look this Friday night to Shields & Gigot, syndicated columnist Mark Shields, "Wall Street Journal" columnist Paul Gigot. Paul, how do you see, first of all, Perot versus Lamm?
PAUL GIGOT, Wall Street Journal: Dick Lamm has got to wonder what hit him. What's he got to do? I mean, here he is. He's been thinking about it for a long time, gets in, and has day, 24 hours maybe 36, in the sun before Ross Perot comes in and slams the window down on his fingers. The conventional wisdom here, it seems to me, to be right. Ross Perot has the money. Ross Perot built most of this network. And while there are some people in the Reform Party, especially in California, who feel that they need a new face and want to go for Dick Lamm, it seems to me that if Ross Perot wants that nomination, he's going to get it.
JIM LEHRER: And he pretty well said he wants it, right, Mark?
MARK SHIELDS, Syndicated Columnist: He said he wants it, Jim. You know, in nominating Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, George Bush said race had nothing to do with it, and his nose grew about two inches. Bill Clinton said he forgot that he got a draft notice, and Ross Perot said building this party had nothing to do with him, it's not about me.
I think all three of those might follow today as major fibs in American politics by the 1992 candidates. And the irony is that Dick Lamm, "Dr. Gloom," and all the rest, as he's called and disparaged frequently, is an intriguing guy. He says things that nobody else in this race will say, that Bill Clinton won't say, that Bob Dole won't say, and he points out that 20 percent of the millionaires in the country are on Social Security, and he talks about means testing Social Security. I mean, he really confronts the generational mayhem created by what he calls his generation upon those coming after him, and it's too bad if that voice of Paul is right, and I don't argue that he isn't if that voice is quieted so early in the game.
JIM LEHRER: Paul, you heard what Linda Divall and Peter Hart just said about the impact of a, a--a Perot candidacy might have. Do you have anything to add or subtract from what they said?
PAUL GIGOT: Well, I think--I agreed with an awful lot of what they said. It seems to me that Ross Perot will be a factor in the race, but he has no chance of being President. I mean, this is a man who in 1992, in his heyday, won no electoral votes. George Wallace won electoral votes. Strom Thurmond in 1948 won electoral votes. He won none. He finished second in only two states, Maine and Utah. He won only 15 of the 3,000 or so counties. And he's going to do worse than that this time because he's a known figure. I mean, where was he, in particular, on his signature issue of 1992, which was the balanced budget? He made it a big issue, put it--give him credit for putting it on the scene, but--
JIM LEHRER: He forced--he forced George Bush and Bill Clinton to talk about it when neither one of them wanted to.
PAUL GIGOT: And both parties then took that issue after '92. Bill Clinton in his way tried to address the deficit and then the Republicans did, and they passed a balanced budget. And there was a big showdown last year, and where was Ross Perot? He was hiding under somebody else's hood. I mean, he came down and shot the wounded after the battle was over, and I think that kind of lack of credibility is going to hurt him with a lot of voters.
JIM LEHRER: So what issue does he have, Mark?
MARK SHIELDS: Well, I think we're making a mistake in underestimating Ross Perot. I mean, Ross Perot came out of nowhere in 1982. You're right. He did put that issue, Jim. Neither party wanted it addressed--Republicans because deficits had burgeoned and swelled and under their leadership and stewardship and the Democrats because they're dying to get back in after 12 years and get the keys to the Treasury.
And Perot said, you know, this is wrong, and everybody in shoe leather knew he was right when he said it was wrong. So I mean, Ross Perot did something in 1992, and, yes, Peter and Linda are both right, and so is Paul that he's not the pristine candidate, he's not the American success story that he was in 1992 coming into this race, but he is, he is a formidable person.
And he's a formidable political figure. He's continued to hold on to--you know, he hasn't disappeared from the American political scene. He's continued to hold onto one fifth or one sixth of the American support all the way through when Bill Clinton's been up, when he's been down, when Bob Dole's been up, and I don't--I don't underestimate him, I really don't. I think that the issues are not there the same way they were in 1992. This is an intriguing election year because we do not have a single central dominant economic issue that has been occupying Americans and we don't have a single national security threat that has, that has riveted the nation's attention.
JIM LEHRER: Well, speaking of issues, abortion is the big issue within the Republican Party. This very day, I just reported it in the News Summary, Sen. Dole issued a statement saying he's resolved this now by putting a "tolerance" plank at the end, saying, maintaining firmness on, on the pro-life position but saying there are people that disagree on this issue, abortion, as well as capital punishment. Does that buy him peace?
PAUL GIGOT: Well, I think this is about the third time he has resolved it. And I think maybe this time he has resolved it in the platform. I think Henry Hyde, who was named the Illinois pro-life Congressman, with enormous credibility in the pro-life constituency, putting his signature on this is going to give him some peace if--assuming Bob Dole lets it lie. The last time he didn't, but assuming he lets--
JIM LEHRER: No more questions.
PAUL GIGOT: We'll go with this, with Bob Dole, the nominee, and Henry Hyde behind it, it will, I think, as far as the platform, put this issue to rest. The, the problem is that it's still going to come up potentially in a Bob Dole Vice Presidential choice.
JIM LEHRER: Sure, if it doesn't put the issue away.
PAUL GIGOT: No, that's right.
JIM LEHRER: What do you think, Mark?
MARK SHIELDS: Puts it away until San Diego. Okay.
JIM LEHRER: And then it comes right.
MARK SHIELDS: And I think it's reopened at San Diego, and I think especially if there's anybody on the short list, you know, the historic short list of vice presidential possibilities who is pro-choice, I think it will be, I think it will be revisited and reanimated.
JIM LEHRER: Another thing this week Bob Dole did, he declined an invitation addressing the NAACP, and then he accused the NAACP president Mfume of setting him up. What do you think of that?
MARK SHIELDS: Jim, I, I--Bob Dole continues to amaze me. I mean, this is a man who is a dominant central figure in American politics, a man of such enormous personal discipline that what he goes through every day as described in Richard Ben Kramer's book on him, a book I'd recommend to anybody, just a wonderful--I mean, the determination, the discipline there, personally, the--
JIM LEHRER: The pain that he goes through just dress every day.
MARK SHIELDS: Just to get dressed, to tie his--that's right--to tie his shoes, to get himself--
JIM LEHRER: Yeah.
MARK SHIELDS: Jim, he is personally as disciplined an individual as we've ever had in public life, he is a presidential candidate totally undisciplined. Bill Clinton almost is the contrast. I mean, the White House, you know, is a mad house and havoc and a mayhem and all the rest of it, and there seems to be a lack of discipline in so much of that presidency, and yet, as a candidate, he is totally disciplined.
I mean, Bob Dole sounded--I mean, blaming the staff, I mean, this is a great opportunity for him to go in to bell the cat, go in to an audience that isn't friendly, to do what he had done so well in Hollywood with the moguls of the entertainment business, to do what Bill Clinton had done with Sister Souljah in 1992 by going in there and telling an audience what they didn't want to hear, uh, and then to have it blamed and then somehow say he was being sandbagged, this doesn't sound like the courageous hero.
JIM LEHRER: What do you think, Paul?
PAUL GIGOT: Bob Dole left the Senate a month ago, and he's still acting, thinking, and talking like a Senator. He is moving tactically on issues back and forth. He's getting into fights with Gary Bauer, Katie Couric, Kweisi Mfume, none of whom live in the White House, which is the only guy he ought to be fighting with, and I think part of the problem is he hasn't latched onto a message other than "I'm not Bill Clinton." He's running a completely character-driven campaign. "You can't possibly vote for that other guy. You've got to vote for me." But that's--because there's no driving issue, he's not determining the agenda, he's not driving the agenda, controlling the debate, the debate comes back and controls him, on these smaller issues.
JIM LEHRER: Well, there was another one this week on assault weapons where he said that he, he was no longer going to push for repeal of the assault weapons ban, at least on 19 assault weapons.
PAUL GIGOT: Neither was anybody else. This was not in danger of happening. Trent Lott was not going to bring this up saying, what a wonderful issue, let's bring it up for a vote in the Senate, but Bob Dole did it because the staff tells me and my sources suggest, and I think they're right, that it just stuck in his craw. He wanted to bring it out. He said, I had written this in a letter last year in the primaries, and now I'm going to take it back because it's bugging me. You know, he shouldn't have brought it up, and then he turned it--one day--what should have been just a one-day story, he's developing a Michael Dukakis-like flair for making the one-day problem into a two- or three-day problem. It has not been a good couple of weeks for Bob Dole.
JIM LEHRER: Mark.
MARK SHIELDS: Let me just say a word in defense of him on this issue. This was an issue that was only given any legs politically by our good friends, the Republicans in the House. After Bob Dole sewed up the Republican nomination, the first announcement the Speaker made, Speaker of the House made was, he's in charge of the party, you know, we're just in lock-step with him. One week later, the House--Republicans brought up and passed the repeal of the assault weapons ban. I mean, so that, that gave it a currency and a legitimacy. I don't argue with, with Paul's conclusion on how he handled it, but, I mean, he didn't need this issue even being there in 1996, and it was put there by his good friends on the other side of Capitol Hill in his party.
PAUL GIGOT: It wasn't coming back any more.
JIM LEHRER: Well, one other point on Bob Dole this week, Colin Powell said, "I'll vote for him but I won't campaign for him." What's the point of that?
PAUL GIGOT: Uh, I, I don't know, other than Colin Powell seems to be doing a wonderful job of trying to convince people that he really was serious, that he doesn't want to participate in the political wars this year. He is not doing Bob Dole any favors, and if he wants to run himself and have a political future, which he may not, he's not doing himself any favors in the Republican Party.
JIM LEHRER: Mark.
MARK SHIELDS: Colin Powell reminds people that he's not going to be the Vice President--whoever Bob Dole picks isn't going to be Colin Powell. I mean, that is not helpful. If he's trying to be helpful to Bob Dole, he might just think about going away to a West Virginia cabin for a couple of weeks and maybe a couple of months.
JIM LEHRER: Yeah. Okay. There's one more story to talk about, and that's the super gridlock in the United States Senate. Kwame Holman has this explainer. Don't go away.