Putting People On

The Pander Bear Returns

Thomas W. Hazlett from the November 1996 issue

(Page 3 of 3)

The most dramatic difference between these two candidates for president: There are some things (even those which rate 62 percent approval in the latest CNN/USA Today poll) that Bob Dole just won't say. One thing he will say every day from now to the election is that he wants a 15 percent across-the-board tax cut. The Clinton camp will press its charge that such a scheme would "bust the budget" and parade its phony deficit-reduction bona fides. That is not a bad place for the Dole-Kemp ticket to be. Dole, having been hammered for his effort to actually reduce the deficit to zero in the seven-year budget plan which led to the government shutdown, is saying to Clinton: "You want the balanced budget as your issue--fine, you take it." The budget plan put forth by Dole is easily legit by Clinton's own rules of budget politics, and an able, articulate defense is put forward by economist John Taylor of Stanford University.

There is no doubt that Bill Clinton's stars have lined up perfectly on the business cycle and that--constrained by Congress, public opinion, and a nervous bond market--he has been saved from actually implementing the now-buried "New Covenant." But the massive Clinton polling edge among seniors indicates the rising economic tide does not lift all votes equally. "Shameless exploitation" of Medicare has provided lift-off for the president's re- election bid. Yet Bob Dole has at least succeeded in spinning Clinton around on the deficit. Instead of allowing his opponent to sell the glitzy model home (i.e., Medicare benefits), Dole has opened up a plush new tract of his own (tax cuts), and will let Clinton sell the vacant lots (future benefits in the form of lower deficits). That is a much tougher sell; we have yet to see if anyone really cares about the unimproved property called a "budget deficit." Many economists think not--which is why we get deficits about 29 years out of 30.

Pundits have written off Dole since springtime polls showed no closing of the 10-20 point gap opened by Clinton's "Mediscare" demagoguery last winter. But it has always been a race--which is just why Clinton has been running so hard. It may still be one. Do not forget that Clinton detests being so far out in front. He feels titillated "on the edge," as Elizabeth Drew called her compelling account of the first two years of the Clinton administration. Example: In spring 1996, sailing in the polls, Clinton pauses to ad lib during a fundraising dinner in Connecticut about the frozen Inca virgin, Juanita, discovered in the Andes and put on display at National Geographic. I quote our president: "Did you see the mummy? If I were a single man, I think I'd ask her out. That's a good-lookin' mummy. I bet I'll hear about that before this is all over."

Now, suppose you were even a junior political adviser to the president. Would you really have to perform complex analysis, or convene even one focus group, before telling your boss: "Sir, please don't go there. Jokes about dating teen-aged virgins, even if dead for 500 years--no, no. And, sir, please do not begin a sentence with, 'If I were a single man?'" Not a tough call, as shown by Bill Clinton's instant analysis about what would follow. But the president knew exactly where he was going: He was heading straight to the edge of the electoral cliff. Dole hopes that Clinton goes there once too often to dare the gods--and that something makes his knees knock.

If not, then Clinton, having repudiated his entire 1992 platform and presenting a picture of fiscal austerity which Steven Spielberg would admire for its special effects, will succeed in vanquishing a lifelong advocate of fiscal austerity--on the grounds that "plain-speaking" Bob Dole cannot deliver what he promises. This would be a sensational event in the history of the republic, and the magic that is America will surely be complete. For it will show that literally anything that can be produced can be sold, if only people believe the president of the United States of America. God bless us all.

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