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OPINION
Page 4 Friday, November 16, 1984 The Michigan Dily
A field of stro
democratic outs
By Dave Kopel
Second in a series looking at the
1988 presidential race
Yesterday's article looked at the
Democratic Presidential possibilities
for 1988, and examined four candidates
preferred by inside party pros: Mario
Cuomo, Ted Kennedy, Geraldine
Ferraro, and Dale Bumpers. Today
we'll look at some of the party in-
surgents.
Jesse Jackson will remain the wild
card of the Democratic party. He cer-
tainly won't win the nomination, but if
he runs, he might do even better than he
did last time around. In the 1984 elec-
tion, Jackson picked up votes from
Blacks who preferred Mondale (and
some younger ones who preferred
Hart) but voted for Jackson out of
racial pride. Having made the racial
pride point once, Black voters may not
feel compelled to make it again. Just as
many Catholics voted for John Kennedy
out of pride, but no longer pay special
attention to Catholic candidates,
many Blacks may move beyond racial
voting next time around.
JACKSON'S REAL potential for gains
is among left-wing white Democrats. In
1984, Jackson was the only Democrat
calling for cuts in defense spending,
and the only candidate praising the
Sandinistas. At least twenty percent of
the Democratic electorate agrees with
Jackson on these issues. In 1984, that
twenty percent split between Mondale
and Hart. But in 1988, Jackson might be
able to pick them up if he convincingly
repudiates anti-Semitism and Louis
Farrakhan (since much of the
Democrat's left wing is Jewish). In
1988, Jackson may have more money;
and when he has enough for television
advertising, as he did in the California
primary, he does well with young white
leftists. If Jackson plays his cards
right, he could succeed George
McGovern as the leader of the
Democratic left.
Gary Hart, my favorite candidate,
will certainly run in 1988. Colorado in-
siders predict that he will pass up re-
election to the Senate in 1986 so that he
Gary Hart may look good for 1988, but he won't have a monopoly on new,
ideas within the Democratic Party.
can get started on his second presiden-
tial bid. Hart's 1988 position is both
stronger and weaker than his 1984
position.
One of the main reasons Hart lost in
1984 was the organizational disaster
that developed in March. After his up-
set in New Hampshire, he suddenly had
to build organizations in states he
hadn't even planned to contest. By the
time of the Indiana and Ohio primaries,
he had state organizations strong
enough to provide the crucial margin of
victory. But in Illinois and New York,
Hart had to spend valuable energy
trying to straighten out organizational
confusion. And his national staff ad-
visor Pat Caddell, who had provided the
winning advice in Iowa and New Ham-
pshire, decided he was the new cam-
paign manager and the new pollster. As
a result of all the chaos, Hart could not
focus his message. Commercials ap-
peared that Hart hadn't authorized, and
Hart appeared (in Mondale's words) to
be "unsure, unsteady, untested." Next
time around Hart will have solid
organizations in place, and won't wear
himself down keeping his staff under
control.
BY THE NEXT election Americans
will feel more confortable with Hart
since he will have been a familiar
figure for four years, instead of for four
weeks. Trivialities like his age and
signature change will matter less to a
public that already knows who Gary
Hart is.
The delegate process also looks much
better for Hart. Thanks to a stronger
organization, Hart will receive all the
delegates he's entitled to, unlike in 1984
where Hart lost dozens of Florida and
Illinois delegates because of missed
filing deadlines. And last summer at
the Mondale-Hart peace conference,
Mondale accepted revisions in the
delegate-selection process. In 1988 the
number of "super-delegates" (unelec-
ted party officials, who over-
whelmingly supported Mondale and
provided him his margin of victory)
will be cut in half. Finally, most all of
Hart's rivals are from the Northeast;
he will pick up large blocks of Western
delegates with little competition. If
Dale Bumbers does not run there will
be no Southern candidates except for
Jesse Jackson. Hart's strong pro-
military record, his boosting of small
business entrepreneurship, and his
questioning of the continued vitality of
the New Deal all put him much closer
ideologically to the South than his Nor-
theastern rivals.
But Hart's 1988 prospects are not all
rosy. The AFL-CIO leadership still
despises him, despite his 80 percent
pro-labor voting record. Hart can ap-
peal over the heads of the leadership
and win rank-and-file; he swept union
households in New England, and won
Ohio and Indiana by pulling in indepen-
dent-minded union members. But the
AFL-CIO and NEA still provide lots of
money, and lots of organization, and
they will both be aimed against Hart in
1988.
A SERIOUS danger for Hart is that
he will no longer have a monopoly on
his message. In 1984, Hart was the
vanguard of the new generation of
leadership. By 1988, he will face com-
petition from at least three other
Senators for the role of leader of the
young in age and in spirit.
Connecticut Senator Christopher
Dodd supported Hart in 1984 but may
aim for the Presidency himself next
time. An effective member of the
Senate "club," Dodd has become one of
the most important young Democrats
in the Senate. He has taken the lead in
calling for a less militaristic foreign
policy in Central America and in sup-
porting Constitutional limitations on
presidential foreign adventurism.
Although Dodd is not a speaker of
Cuomo's or Kenndy's or Jackson's
calibre, he is more outgoing and
relaxed than Hart. Should Dodd win
some primaries, he will have to convin-
cingly squash questions concerning his
character-doubts that will spring up
from the media's "discovery" that
Dodd's father also a Connecticut
Senator, left office in a scandal in-
volving personal use of campaign fun-
ds.
Before pollster Pat Caddell signed on
with the Gary Hart campaign he tried to
convince Delaware Senator Joseph
Biden to run and become the candidate
who would move beyond the failures of
the Republican and Democratic pasts.
Biden declined but might run in 1988.
Even more so than Hart, Biden has split
from traditional liberal positions. He
opposes busing and has sometimes
voted in favor of anti-abortion
legislation. He suggested terminating
all federal entitlement programs ex-
cept Social Security and Medicare,
requiring all other programs to be fun-
ded out of general appropriations.
Biden's intensity and energy will carry
him far, but they often seem to betray a
disturbing fanatacism. If you have a lit-
tle money to put aside, though, you
might want to bet on Joe Biden winning
some early primaries.
FORMER RHODES Scholar and
National Basketball Association. All-
Star Bill Bradley is the most formidible
challenger to Hart's youthful base. The
Senator's "Bradley-Gephart Fair Tax"
reform bill will be at the top of the
Congressional agenda in the next
session. The bill gives Bradley a chance
to prove to the nation that the new
generation of Democrats can combine
innovation and efficiency with fairness
Bradley-Gephart would eliminate
almost all the exemptions and
deducations from the personal income
tax, and then lower the basic tax rate;
rates would range from 14 to 28 percent.
If voters are filling out their simplified
Bradley-Gephart tax forms by 1988,
they may reward Bradley at the polls.
Bradley, like Hart, can appeal beyond
traditional Democratic constituencies;
his disapproval rating in New Jersey is
an astonishingly low 3 percent.
To win the election however, Bradley
' N
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iders
will need to improve his uninspirtni
speaking abilities. And to govern effecr
tively, Bradley will need to broaden hio
expertise, especially in foreign polity)j
where his approach has been noticably
shallow.
One other contender for the party's
nomination is West Virginia Senator
(and former Governor) Jai
Rockefeller IV. In fact, Rockefeller
already has started his campaign.
When running for election to the West
Virginia Senate, Rockefeller spent a
quarter of a million dollars to advertisi
on Washington television stations that
reach only seven percent of West
Virginia voters. The intended audience,
obviously, was not West Virginians bot
Washington leaders. On the surface,
Rockefeller looks like a strong cori-
didate. He was elected Governor of
West Virginia by the largest margin in
history. He has the financial resources
to take on better-known candidates.
And to the chagrin of West Virginia
Republicans, he has a "teflon" coating
that kept West Virginians from blaming
him for the state's miserable economy.
But Rockefeller has his flaws. He
runs poorly with the young. He is a boring
speaker with large audiences. While he
understands, intricate poliy
.questions he cannot articulate I
broader vision. He record as Govern6f
of West Virginia is universally coi-
sidered mediocre. Considering tho
seven million dollars he just spent tokie
elected to the Senate, his margin of
victory was small. And in what sofne
people consider low-class opportunisi
he has changed his mind and adopted
conservative positions on strip-mining,
gun control, abortion, and school
prayer.
Whoever the Democrats nominate,
they will have a stronger head of the
ticket than they did this time. That :is
good, because as we'll see in
tomorrow's article, the post-Reagan
Republican party has some fine poten-
tial 'successors to the Great Com-
municator.
A strong contender with some fresh
ideas of his own is Connecticut Senator
Christopher Dodd.
Kopel is a third year law student.t
Sinclair-
Edite btn a niesto M ichig an I
Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan
ta~w., ,,.,m
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Vol. XCV, No. 62
420 Maynard St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Editorials represent a majority opinion of the Daily's Editorial Board
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'PROTESTERS WHO broke up
Wednesday's Central Intelligence
Agency recruitment meeting on cam-
pus did this community a favor when
they held a mock trial and charged CIA
representatives with such things as
publishing manuals advocatng
assassination and mining Nicaraguan
harbors. They stimulated a valuable
discussion of the CIA's strategies and
invited the representatives to explain
the agency's morals. The CIA
recruiters, however, decided they
would rather not take the time to ex-
plain controversial policies and would
recruit where their actions aren't so
openly questioned.
Some may claim that the protesters
violated the CIA representatives'
freedom of speech or freedom to
assemble. While the protesters con-
duct was indeed disruptive to the
meeting, they did offer the CIA
representatives a chance to defend
their organization -an opportunity the
representatives declined. Further-
more, the CIA doesn't believe in or
practice free speech. The agency does
not encourage an open discussion of its
actions and, in fact, the philosophy of
the CIA is absolutely contrary to the
values of an academic community
where ideas are freely discussed and
engaged in. "It is the responsibility of
the Central Intelligence Agency to
collect, research, and analyze the
foreign intelligence information which
senior officialsof our Government must
have in order to make the informed
decisions necessary to maintain our
national security," the CIA application
states. Yet, as the protesters correctly
pointed out, there is proof that the
agency is connected with serious
violent acts, not just intelligence
research.
Last April it was discovered that the
CIA had secretly mined Nicaragua's
harbors and shipping lanes, giving
Americans reason to fear a return to
the CIA's destructive, covert policies
practiced in Vietnam.
Further evidence calling into
question the agency's moral principles
was given last month when it released
a manual advocating political
assassination. The pamphlet recom-
mends the use of "selective violence"
to "neutralize" leftist Nicaraguan
government officials. The Reagan ad-
ministration denies the manual is a
violation of an Executive Order the
president signed in 1981 prohibiting the
U.S. government's indirect par-
ticipation in assassination. But it is
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LETTERS TO THE DAILY
Employee claims discrimination
A
To the Daily:
I am a handicapped person who
for the past 6 years has been
working as a custodian at the
University Medical Center. I
have worked with physical
limitations for some time now
and have received good work per-
formance evaluations from my
supervisor. Last month I was
examined by two University
Physicians, an Orthopedic
Surgeon and a General Prac-
titioner, both recognizing that I
(TrrPPi nn
have physical limitations but also
stating that I can perform my
duties and should be allowed to
continue working. Instead, the
University Personnel Depar-
tment placed me on a forced
medical leave. I have been out of
work for a month with no support
from the University.
For 5 years I have been an ac-
tive union member in the Univer-
sity branch of the American
Federation of State County and
Municipal Employees. In recent
union officer elections I nearly
BLOOM COUNTY
won a top officer position. I have
gained a lot of influence with and
support from my union sisters
and brothers. The University
recognizes my position in the
union and is trying to use my
physical handicap as an excuse to
get me out of the University and
the union. But it is just an excuse.
I am being discriminated
against because I am handicap-
ped. If the University is allowed
to use my handicap against me,
even though I can do my job, then
they will be able to use this
against anyone with a handicap.
The University doesn't seem to
care about my physical condition
or my financial need to keep my
job. After 6 years of service I am
just tossed aside-their excuse is
my handicap.
I have called upon the Univer-
sity Board of Regents for im-
mediate reinstallment and am
seeking support from the com-
munity.
-Paul Hrabosky
November 14
by Berke Breathed
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