Let's begin with some supposed Gore negatives. First, like George Herbert, Al can forget about that nonsense that only two Vice-Presidents in history ever got elected to the presidency. That's a smoke-screen. Only four Vice-Presidents ever ran for President, and the losers, Humphrey and Nixon, lost by very slim margins. Second, "Al Gore, having served eight years as vice president, will be the nominee of a united Democratic party, his people already in place in key positions in the administration of a president who long ago indicated his commitment to Gore as successor. That doesn't make Gore weak; it makes him formidable." Third, "for all the scandals swirling around the Clinton White House, Gore has at his disposal a positive message of some power. While "the Clinton-Gore years" sounds to Republicans like a phrase that should discredit Gore, it sounds rather different to Gore and his Democrats. Republicans will insist until the end of time that neither Clinton nor Gore deserves much credit, but we are looking back on eight fat years of prosperity and peace, and everybody knows it. There's a record for Gore to run on." Fourth, "Disfavor (at the polls) toward Gore is relative, not absolute. Perhaps Americans have decided they know enough about Quayle and Buchanan to favor Gore. But it's worth asking how much Americans really know about George W. or Elizabeth Dole. Clearly, Americans have taken a liking to them. Clearly, they are politically viable and have genuine credentials, especially the Texas governor. But is their standing in the polls a result of Americans' understanding of who they are and what they stand for, or is it more attributable to the fact that they come from two of the best-known GOP brand names in American politics?" Finally, Lindberg sees indications that Gore may be doing to George Waldo what Bush's dad did to Dukakis.

"The equivalent of Lee Atwater's successful effort on behalf of Vice President Bush to paint Dukakis as an out-of-the-mainstream liberal is not hard to imagine as the Gore campaign strategy." In this case, Gore would paint Dubya as being even more conservative than he says he is: "It will be the task of the Gore campaign to persuade voters that notwithstanding George W.'s carefully buffed image, he is in fact a captive of the extreme right wing of the Republican party....The Gore campaign portrays George W. Bush, compassionate conservative-by implication, unlike certain other, less savory conservatives, from whom even Republicans distance themselves-as a tool of those selfsame unsavory characters, as a crypto-right-winger who's trying to conceal it from voters because he knows that if they find out, he's finished. DeLay and Armey signed up awfully early, didn't they? Who's pulling the strings here? And what about that extreme GOP litmus test, a ban on abortion? Is Bush against that in principle? And what about that NRA-inspired and funded Texas law encouraging everybody to carry a concealed handgun? Didn't Bush sign that law?" Next, Gore could attack G-Dub's credentials, as Democratic National Committee chairman Roy Romer recently did in the Los Angeles Times . Romer said that G. W. "wouldn't be in this race if his name were not Bush. . . . The real question is having the name George W. Bush isn't going to get you there; it is do you have the leadership, the experience, the issues. . . . Somebody who has just been governor for five years, you have to ask the tough questions: Is this the kind of experience that qualifies you to run and occupy the presidency and lead?"

Lindberg goes on to suggest that Gore will take off the gloves and attack Bush any way he can, just like Atwater eventually persuaded George Herbert to do against Dukakis. We have doubts about this, since unfairly speaking ill of George got Texas Governor Ann Richards in trouble and led to her defeat by him. More likely, Gore will hammer at George's most obvious weakness, foreign policy: "Experience is, under the right circumstances, a serious issue.... Republicans have been saying for some time now that foreign policy might well reemerge as an issue in 2000 after a period of quiet. If it does-- and in the wake of success rather than failure in Kosovo--then we have a vice president with eight years' experience in foreign affairs, not counting the Senate, against yet another plucky governor," whom we're calling "the Kosovo Kid" because of his foreign policy gaffes. 9/10/99

George's "emphasis over the summer will be on why he's a "compassionate conservative" and what that means for the country if he's elected. One thing it means is that Bush will focus in speeches on non-traditional subjects for a Republican: the poor, the jailed, the non-English speaking, the badly educated. This is a risky tack," opines Barnes," but not because conservative GOP audiences may prefer to hear about other issues. For now, with Bush positioned as the savior of the party in 2000, they'll probably acquiesce. It's risky because compassionate conservatism so far lacks real substance as a political idea. It's more an emotion or an inclination-and a very appealing campaign slogan. Bush's job is to flesh it out with an urgent national agenda. That won't be easy," says Barnes, who had the benefit of Dubya's personal description of the planned speech: "'I'll talk about rallying the armies of compassion and about ushering in the responsibility era....I'll use Texas examples like Prison Fellowship'.... The idea, says Bush, is that 'changing hearts' will also change behavior and 'affect policy the way we want it.' School choice is another compassionate-conservative theme, but Bush may approach it gingerly, since his voucher plan was rejected by the Texas legislature. Indeed, he admits his proposal came closer to passing in 1995 than it did this year. Nonetheless, he says, 'it's an important part of the menu of opportunity.' Bush sees vouchers as a way to increase demand for better schools, and he favors charter schools to increase the supply of good schools."

Apart from using vouchers and charter schools as an appeal to the Theocrats on the right wing of the GOP, " Bush won't make much of an effort to shore up his conservative credentials. He'll appear at a faith-based social program in Iowa on June 12, but that's part of his emphasis on compassionate conservatism, not conservatism per se. And he intends to avoid specifics as much as possible. His speeches will be, as the Bush euphemism goes, 'thematic.' After several months of campaigning, Rove says Bush should be seen as 'an activist conservative, a charismatic campaigner who talked about ideas in a way that is appealing. Details to follow'....Bush says he wants to answer three questions for voters this summer. Who's the man? What's his plan? Can he lead? 'There will be ample opportunity to lay out a specific agenda,' including a 'detailed tax plan.' But Bush says he'll spell it out 'on my time,'" indicating that the Rove/Bush political strategy of hiding the candidate and his views from the voters for as long as possible is still firmly in place. 6/9/99

And George isn't helping: "On the Republican side, there is W (with his clever branding advantage), who not only has no theme but is invisible. Here is the man who, according to all polls, will almost certainly be his party's nominee to be the next president of the world's most media-saturated nation at its most media-saturated moment, and most of us have only the vaguest idea of what he really looks like (a blurry version of his father). It's quite possible that most Americans have never even seen W on the television; I cannot now imagine his voice -- no, I don't think I have ever heard him speak. He's announced he's headed for New Hampshire and is reported to have said he really likes to look people in the eye. Call me cynical, but I'll bet he just hates to look people in the eye. The Bushes, of course, have always had a covert side: buried Wasp emotions combined with George Sr.'s stint running the CIA. Such reticence or control has been out of fashion for some time, but things come back around. Obviously it makes sense that if you have something to hide -- and W has said as much -- you hide. Duh."

But perhaps the problem is that political campaigns, like political conventions, are artifacts of the past. Perhaps this time around there will be a political campaign and no one will attend. Perhaps White House 2000 will be the last hurrah of political campaigns as we know them: "I don't know of a reporter -- at least of my generation -- who hasn't imagined him- or herself stomping around in the snows of New Hampshire. That was our big career challenge, because only the best of breed got that assignment. The big challenge now is of a different order. It's how to reconcile the fact that many of us still love this stuff -- New Hampshire, caucuses, stump speeches, polling reports, the press plane, and in general the verve and sloppiness of a political campaign -- with the overwhelming evidence that most Americans are not at all interested in any of these things." Perhaps with the Bush campaign we have reached the point where campaigns are fought and won in the board rooms of banks and voters are called in at the last minute to second their decision, voting for a Rorschach candidate and waking up the day after the election to ask, "Who was that masked man?" 6/8/99

Tort reformers have been quick to point out abuses of our court system by trial lawers defending their consumer clients, but examples of similar abuses by corporate lawyers also have been found. When looking at the reported facts in the Gaverson article, many would conclude that the pendulum now has swung to an extreme in favor of too much corporate protection from lawsuits. "One analysis by a consumer group in Austin, Court Watch, showed that individual people...have won only 18 percent of the cases before the Supreme Court since the 1995 legal changes were passed. Manufacturers, hospitals and other businesses won more than 76 percent of the time. Four of the current members of the nine-member court were first appointed by Bush to fill vacancies. A study by Texans for Public Justice found that more than 68 percent of the money raised by the current Supreme Court justices in their last elections came from corporation lawyers or people identified as supporters of groups pressing for civil justice changes. Only 4 percent came from plaintiffs' lawyers or consumer groups."

What this translates to on the campaign trail is corporate lawyers backing Bush with campaign contributions, trial lawyers doing the same with Gore. And as for Hollywood with its John Grisham-like movies about evil corporations trying to destroy the little guy, you know where the campaign money is going there. Of course, this is being offset by Silicon Valley, where, since the federal law suite agains Gates, more libertarian-nerd money is going to Republicans than ever before. In general, since the deeper pockets are found in corporations than in consumer groups, Bush looks to be the financial winner. Little mentioned is the effect tort "reform" has on justice and the legal system in the U.S. when dollars become the criteria for obtaining justice. "Proponents say the changes are reintroducing fairness in a legal system gone haywire. But critics in Texas and across the country say the 'reform' label is being used to force the most extensive cutback in the legal protections for citizens in this century." Consequently, in the election to come, Bush, as a backer of tort "reform," will be seen by many as the instrument of a well-financed attempt to shrink citizens'legal protections in an attempt to make a corporate buck. 6/7/99

Gramm confesses that "it makes me nervous that people that don't even know George Bush are for him. Normall, the way you get people to be for you is get them to know you. In this case, people are for him before they know him. And so what tends to happen...is that people sort of fill in the blanks, so that if they're real compassionate they say he's real compassionate. If they're conservative, they say he's real conservative...And if they're pro-choice, they say, 'Well, you know, he's from Texas'....It's like with Colin Powell to some extent. When you talk to people, people had taken their views and turned them into Powell's views. They didn't have the foggiest idea what his view were. So, invariably, there's some people who are going to be unhappy....He is invariably going to make some mistakes in the campaign. It is hard for a Texan to run in states like Iowa and New Hampshire, where they have great influence because of this early caucus and this early primary. They want to see the candidate kind of grovel. And Texans don't grovel very well."

Gramm suggests that George might run for president by follow the dumbing-down approach created by Karl Rove for Dubya in the first gubernatorial campaign five years ago: "I hope that George will set out about three things he wants to do as president. And basically say, 'You elect me as president, these are three things that I'll do...and be specific about those things....If somebody asks him a question, answer it but basically say, 'Well, you know that is an important issue and obviously, as president I'll be dealing with that, but I want to tell you about three things that I want to do as president." One suspects that Gramm is taking a page out of his own playbook, here, but George seems to have mastered this dumbing-down technique some time ago. 6/6/99

"Governor Bush rarely talks about the environment," writes Robert Bryce in the Austin Chronicle. "It wasn't mentioned in his inaugural address. It wasn't mentioned in his speech announcing his presidential plans on March 7. He did mention it, however, during his state of the state speech when he said, 'I believe business and a healthy environment can coexist. I look forward to working with Sen. Buster Brown and Rep. Ray Allen on legislation to make our Texas air cleaner by significantly reducing emissions from older grandfathered plants.' But Bush didn't work with Brown and Allen. Instead, he let industry write its own regulations. Documents obtained through the Texas Open Records Act by the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development Coalition, an Austin-based environmental group, show that the grandfathered air program's parameters were developed by Exxon, and the bill was actually written by industry lawyers." Keep in mind that George gets his campaign contributions from giant electric utilities such as Enron in Houston, not environmental groups such as the Sierra Club. If the Guv's claims of being an environmentalist were true, one would think it would be the opposite.

With this kind of approach to environmental controls, allowing the polluters to write the bills that supposedly stop their polluting, environmentalists consider the Bush record to be a joke. " By some common measures," Bryce continues, " the air quality in Texas has been getting worse under Bush, not better. According to TNRCC, (a state environmental committee appointed by George,) the amount of ground-level ozone in Victoria, Tyler, Longview, Laredo, Brownsville, Houston, and Dallas increased steadily over the three-year period beginning in 1996 and ending in 1998. In Laredo, the one-hour ozone measurement increased by a third, from 73 parts per billion to 97 parts per billion over the three-year period. In Dallas, it increased from 144 ppb to 152 ppb; at 115 ppb, a health advisory is put into effect and healthy adults and children are advised to avoid prolonged outdoor exercise. Just two weeks ago, the Environmental Protection Agency sent a letter to state officials warning them that the state could face sanctions due to an inadequate air pollution control plan in Dallas. In fact, over the three-year period (three-fourths of Bush's tenure in office) the average one-hour peak ozone measurement for 13 Texas cities increased from 115 ppb to 129 ppb, according to the TNRCC data. And in 1997, Houston, for the first time ever, threatened to wrest the title of America's smog capital from the city of Los Angeles, when the Bayou City recorded a record level of 234 ppb of ozone, far exceeding the ozone level reached in Los Angeles. 'Where's the proof that the air is getting cleaner?' asks Neil Carman, the clean air program director for the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club. 'It doesn't show up in the monitoring data.'"

One wonders how George Waldo's father and his brother Neil feel as they view Houston through the smog from their glass office building. "In 1988, President George H.W. Bush declared, 'I am an environmentalist; always have been and always will be.' He also said his administration would 'enforce environmental laws aggressively, putting the responsibility for cleanup where it belongs -- on those who caused the problem in the first place.' Governor George W. Bush has taken a decidedly different tack. His mantra has been, 'Let Texans run Texas.' And his lack of decisive action on air pollution disturbs... environmentalists. 'This is a frightening foreshadowing of how Bush would handle environmental policies at the national level," said (one environmentalist). 'He puts polluters in the driver's seat.' " 6/4/99

The Daily News' Lars Erik Nelson disagrees: "Oops. Anyone who defends President Bush by arguing that he was clueless about a given issue must be given the benefit of the doubt. But if the elder Bush really did not know about Chinese nuclear spies, he must have been wearing blinders and earplugs. In October 1990, when Bush was President, George Carver, former deputy director of the CIA, told employees of Lawrence Livermore nuclear laboratory that Chinese agents had stolen data on the U.S. neutron bomb in 1989. Also in 1989, the General Accounting Office reported that foreign intelligence agents posing as visiting scientists had gained access to Livermore and two other weapons labs. And all through the 1980s, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) wrote letters to Reagan warning about security lapses at the labs. None of this was secret. On Nov. 21, 1990, the San Jose Mercury News reported that data stolen from Livermore had been used by the Chinese to construct a nuclear device. The same story was repeated in The New York Times, the Chicago Tribune and The Associated Press: Chinese spies had penetrated our nuclear labs. Nothing happened — no tightening of security, no demands for resignations. But now Gov. Bush is blaming the Clinton administration for being slow to shut the door on espionage that not only occurred on his father's watch, but was discovered on his father's watch, made public on his father's watch and left untended on his father's watch."

We suspect Dubya listened to his father on this one, rather than his more objective foreign policy advisor, Condoleezza Rice. Dad was ambassador to China at one point and fancies himself to be the American president who best understands China, its relationship to the United States, and the values that tie the two countries together However, as Joe Conanson indicates in his 6/7/99 piece in the New York Observer, those value are not the ones George Waldo would want to have taught in our schools: "So if financial ties to the Chinese Government are 'evidence' of treasonous laxity toward Chinese espionage, then what of the Bushes and their friends? Only weeks after the Tiananmen incident, President Bush went out of his way to placate China, quietly dispatching top aides Brent Scowcroft and Lawrence Eagleburger to drink a toast to the Beijing butchers. On three occasions, President Bush signed waivers for satellite deals by U.S. corporations with Beijing. (Those same firms gave nearly $800,000 to the G.O.P. during the Bush years.) One of those waivers benefited a company that had hired Prescott Bush as a $250,000-a-year consultant. Prescott Bush visited Beijing in the fall of 1989, three months after the massacre; a few months later, his brother the President signed the desired waiver. As Prescott Bush assured reporters at the time, 'There’s no conflict of interest,' adding slyly: 'It doesn’t hurt that my brother is President of the United States.' The first brother later became chairman of the U.S.-China Chamber of Commerce, and an ardent advocate of easy trade and technology terms with those terrible Commies. Meanwhile, Henry Kissinger, Alexander Haig, Mr. Eagleburger and Mr. Scowcroft went on to do a lucrative business as advisers to American and other Western companies seeking commerce with the Chinese. Does anyone believe they didn’t know about China’s nuclear espionage when they hopped over to Beijing for a handshake and a glass of mao-tai?"

" Democrats as well as Republicans can play connect-the-dots with China policy. It is a stupid, hypocritical and pointless game for both sides, and one that may prove especially perilous for the Republican Presidential front-runner, " concludes Conanson. No wonder Cecil Johnson begins his Fort Worth column with: "Americans have a right to expect more of a candidate for the presidency of their great nation than the kind of blatant, petty and reckless political demagoguery that Texas Gov. George W. Bush has spewed out in reaction to the release of the Cox report. " 6/3/99

Here's part of what we said: "Since the ed. voucher movement has had so much difficulty establishing itself over the years, its major backers have decided upon a two-pronged approcah to wear down the opposition. One, billionaires like James Leininger in Texas and at least one member of the Walton clan (of the Wal-Mart fortune) outside of Texas simply establish scholarships with their own money for those who want to leave public schools and go to private schools. Two, the movement focuses on poor students in the neediest inner-city school districts. Of course, the backers anticipate that eventually the system will spread to wealthy, suburban districts as well. Further, no distinction is being made between private and religious education. What most folks don't know is that if you look through the history of the literature of the voucher movement, one of the goals of the financial backers is to get their money back; thus, in effect, creating a state-paid voucher system without even giving citizens an opportunity to vote for one. With a week to go in the session, "Rep. Charlie Howard, R-Sugar Land, now is searching for a bill to carry his franchise tax credits. Under the proposal, corporations would receive franchise tax credits if they donated money to public schools or private scholarship organizations. Howard said he has broad support, including from some lawmakers who are opposed to vouchers. 'In this case, the public schools could come out ahead,' Howard said. But voucher opponents labeled the move political payback because the Children's Educational Opportunity Foundation in San Antonio -- a pet project of San Antonio businessman, voucher patron and Perry friend James R. Leininger -- stands to gain from the measure. 'If this end run to vouchers is successful, Jim Leininger stands to gain up to $33 million in tax credits,' said Sam Smoot, executive director of the Texas Freedom Network, which opposes vouchers. The San Antonio scholarship fund gained national attention last year, creating a $50 million privately financed voucher program in the Edgewood Independent School District. The foundation is financed by CEO America and Leininger." This "back-up" plan is, indeed, a "Phantom Menace" to opponents of the voucher movement."

As the clock ticked toward the end of the legislative session last Sunday evening, voucher backers managed to insert an amendment into the Senate package containing R+D franchise tax cuts and consumer sales tax cuts, $500 million in all. "Under the proposal, Texas corporations could get tax credits (up to 1/2 of their franchise taxes) for donations made to institutions that offer before- and after-school programs. The donations could be used for constructing or remodeling a building for the program; purchasing equipment, supplies and food for the program; or operating the program, including administrative and staff costs." The Senate passed the entire package by 9 p.m. and sent it on to the House for its approval. When it reached the House with its voucher amendment intact, "Rep. Jim Dunnam, D-Waco, said he supported the other programs in the tax-cutting measure known as Senate Bill 441. But he said he's opposed to any program that allows public money to go to private schools...'I think this is an end-run to vouchers,' Dunnam said." Other voucher opponents, including Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, agreed, saying " the program may not require the state to give up tax income for private school tuition, but 'these tax credits do cover everything else.' Turner said private schools could be among those institutions to which corporations could donate money and get tax credits. He added that the state indirectly would be subsidizing private school costs, allowing those schools to reduce tuition," (thus creating a de-facto voucher system paid for with state funds). (AAS 5/31)

With the clock still ticking, the Senate was forced to stop its debate on the entire $3.9 billion education package to await the decision of the House. At this juncture, a House member read a letter from Comptroller Carole Keeton Rylander, assuring the legislators that her office "would require corporations to prove their donations went to cover costs primarily (our italics) associated with before- and after-school programs." The reader might recall that Texas voucher point-man billionaire "Sugar Daddy" Leininger was Rylander's major campaign contributor. She won her post in a very tight race against Paul Hobby. Also, Rylander has a near-perfect score on her Eagle Forum Questionnaire. After the reading of the letter, "the House passed a resolution clarifying the legislative intent by saying the tax-break bill 'is not a voucher program and does not provide any tax assistance for private school tuition of any kind." (SAEN 5/31) The letter and the resolution were enough to break the log-jam, and the bill passed the House 144-1, allowing the Senate to vote in the education bill at the very last moment. While the voucher folks didn't get their foot in the door during this session, it's correct to say they got their toe in the door. Meanwhile, look for the billionarie voucher backers to shift their contributions to before- and after-school programs at private schools. Today as you read this, Lt. Gov. Perry (you know who was his major campaign contributor, don't you?) is forming committees do deal with major problems of state in the 2001 session. At that point, the "Phantom Menace" will probably no longer be a phantom. Next: Who was the one guy who voted against the tax cut bill,what are "after-school programs," and where does Bush come in? 6/2/99