Forbes to Bush: Come on out and fight fair
Live! Republican presidential candidate Steve Forbes bought a half hour of time on WMUR-TV (Ch. 9) last week to take telephone calls from viewers and questions from a small studio audience that included well-known New Hampshire Forbes supporters Wally Stickney, Patti Humphrey and state Senators Mary Brown and Pat Krueger. It was a reserved affair, but that's Forbes. As always, he talked about ''putting forth bold and exciting ideas,'' including a flat-tax system and tax-free medical savings accounts to take the place of health insurance. He said the American people are ''tired of glitz, cliche, slogans and smoke and mirrors from the Washington political culture.'' Nothing will get done, said the self-proclaimed outsider, until the end of ''politics as usual.''
The high point came early on when Forbes took a swipe at Texas Governor George W. Bush, who, as you know, is leading in the GOP primary polls. Forbes says Bush's big-money contributors are behind a new TV ad in which a middle-aged lady, sitting in her kitchen, says Forbes better be nice this time around and not go negative on fellow Republicans, like he did in 1996. The ad, called ''Warning,'' was produced by the Republican Leadership Council, a Washington-based group of GOP ''centrists,'' many of whom are Bush backers. The council's executive director, Mark Miller, said board members who have endorsed Bush in any way were not consulted about the ad, which was approved by the council's chairman and two cochairmen.
''If he wants to attack me, if he wants to debate me he should have the courage to go out and do it up front,'' Forbes said of Bush. Forbes said Bush was hiding behind campaign financing loopholes that let issue groups like the council spend loads of unregulated ''soft money'' on its favorite candidate. ''It's wrong,'' Forbes said. He has filed a formal complaint with the Federal Election Commission.
''Play by the rules. Come out front,'' said Forbes, asking for a debate. ''Lincoln and Douglas did it. We can do it too, George.''
The Bush campaign says it was not consulted about the ad and does not condone it. And the council has not flinched. It has spent a total of $100,000 on the ad, which is running in New Hampshire, Iowa and Washington, D.C.
McCain blasts ad directed at Forbes
US Senator John McCain of Arizona, who is way ahead of Forbes in the polls, wrote a letter to the Republican Leadership Council, defending Forbes and accusing the council of breaking election laws by using soft money to fund an ad directed at a single candidate. Campaign finance reform, of course, is McCain's favorite topic. He urged the council to pull the ad off the air.
''Because Forbes has not aired any negative commercials in this year's campaign, your advertisement serves only to cast doubt on your intentions,'' McCain said in a letter, suggesting that helping Bush was the motivation.
P.S. McCain's staff was busy last week pumping up the candidate's memoir, ''Faith of My Fathers,'' which received strong reviews and has been on The New York Times bestseller list for nine weeks.
Coming sometime: McCain, the film
A campaign press release noted that USA Films has bought screen rights to the book, which chronicles how McCain, a Navy aviator who spent five years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, tried to live up to the reputations of his father and grandfather, both four-star Navy admirals. So who plays McCain? The senator likes the idea of the ever-good-looking Tom Cruise, who played a maverick pilot in ''Top Gun.'' According to the press release (it must have been a slow day at McCain headquarters), McCain's family suggested the less-dashing, shorter, rounder and funnier Danny DeVito. We're voting for Brad Pitt.
Forbes' camp says phooey to voter polls
Back to publishing heir Forbes and his presidential fortunes: A new poll has Forbes a distant third among the GOP candidates for president, with Bush and McCain in almost a dead heat, at 38 percent and 33 percent, and Forbes with 11 percent. The poll of 466 GOP primary voters was conducted on Oct. 26 by the Quinnnipiac College Polling Center. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.5 percent. Recent numbers from the American Research Group in Manchester had Bush with 38 percent, McCain with 35 percent, and Forbes a very distant third at 7 percent, with 13 percent of the 600 likely GOP voters undecided.
Forbes' senior political adviser, Paul Young, says it's too early to put any weight on polls, which he called ''ridiculous.'' He said past history shows that two-thirds of New Hampshire primary voters are undecided or willing to change their votes between the Iowa caucuses (Jan. 24 this time around) and the New Hampshire primary (Feb. 1). Young called the race ''fluid,'' and the Quinnipiac poll found the voters opinions are hardly set in stone at this point: 69 percent of Republican primary voters and 63 percent of the Democratic voters surveyed said they might change their minds.
Candidate takes a stab at humor
The morning after his TV appearance, Forbes and his wife, Sabina, were guests at the latest in a series of breakfast meetings with the presidential candidates called ''Politics and Eggs'' at the Bedford Village Inn. The event, sponsored by the New England Council and other business groups, drew about 200 people (the blue suit types, as one observer put it) who got a gimpse of a bit more relaxed candidate, occasionally trying to be funny in a droll sort of way.
Forbes, the anti-politician, described the ''rooster method of government in Washington,'' for example in which politicians get up in the morning and think the world commences when they say ''cock-a-doodle-do.'' In a variation on his stump speech, Forbes talked about serious stuff like relations with China and school vouchers (he favors ''freedom'' in education) and finished saying if he was elected president he would guarantee cholesterol-free eggs. ''How's that for a Washington promise?'' he said, trying to be wry. He chopped the air with his right hand to emphasize his points, as he always does, and still seemed irreparably stiff, but the audience enjoyed the brief flashes of personality.
''I like his nerdy dry sense of humor,'' said Republican activist Claira Monier, a Bush supporter.
Comedy Central gets the leftovers
After Forbes left the dining room, a tall, thin dark-haired man in a gray pin-stripped suit sat down at Forbes's seat and ate all the food left on the plate. Then, with a maroon napkin tucked under his chin, the man proceeded to lick the plate clean, with gusto. And it was all videotaped.
Turns out the scrounger was Mo Rocca, the ''chief'' political correspondent for ''The Daily Show'' on Comedy Central. Rocca says he was traveling with Forbes for the day.
''I feel like I understand him better,'' Rocca said, trying to explain why he ate Forbes's leftovers. ''I want to get right into his digestive track.''
Rubens nixes 2d run for governor's chair
Former state senator Jim Rubens, who ran for governor in the 1998 GOP primary, says he won't try again in 2000. He says he's a ''realist.'' Consultants he talked to in Washington, D.C., said if she runs again, Governor Jeanne Shaheen has a 3-1 chance of winning. That is despite all the protesting in some quarters about her handling of the education financing crisis.
''It's a suicide mission,'' said Rubens about trying to unseat Shaheen. He noted most polls show her favorability ratings in the 60 percent range. Make no mistake about it, Rubens has still got a litany of harsh complaints with Shaheen. So why not get in the race? Well, it's the economy, stupid. Times are good, voters are prospering and Rubens says their attitude as best he can figure is, ''Why mess with a good thing?''
''There certainly are cliques in both parties who are upset'' about Shaheen, Rubens said, ''but those are small in number compared to the number of people who vote.''
Bradley's ads range from usual to not so
Former US senator Bill Bradley's presidential campaign unveiled the candidate's first television ads last week. One is the traditional, uplifting biographical piece about the small-town Missouri boy who becomes a basketball hero, scholar, Olympian, and senator. It's complete with inspiring music and compelling statements from US senators Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York (on Bradley's work on the 1986 Tax Reform Act), and Bob Kerrey of Nebraska (on Bradley's outrage at the police beating of African-American Rodney King), and from Maureen Drumm of Bradley's home state (on a law Bradley proposed on hospital stays, because of which, she says, ''my daughter is alive today.'')
The ad ends with Bradley's new theme for his campaign to win the nomination over Vice President Al Gore, ''It Can Happen.'' The ad began last Thursday for a 14-day run on WMUR. (Kerrey, by the way, will be campaigning with Bradley in New Hampshire today.)
A second ad, called ''A Different campaign,'' isn't scheduled to run yet, but it is, different. It's just Bradley, seated in an office with an American flag behind him, calmly talking into the camera saying ''Wouldn't it be better if we had more than sound bites and photo ops when we were choosing a candidate?'' Bradley says he will spell everything out in detail and sometimes people will agree and sometimes they won't. ''But at least you'll know exactly where I stand,'' he says.
And that's all it says. No cute pictures, patriotic music or campaign scenes. Stay tuned.
Democratic camps spar on health care
State Senator Katie Wheeler, a Durham Democrat, led the charge last week for Vice President Al Gore 's campaign as it continued to duke it out with rival Bill Bradley over their health-care plans. Wheeler said Bradley's proposal to eliminate Medicaid is a ''big mistake and it creates a big problem'' for low-income families, senior citizens and disabled people who rely on Medicaid for health care and other essential services.
Bradley's team, repeating its charge that Gore is engaging in ''scare tactics and divisiveness,'' pointed out that Bradley's proposal is ''very similar'' to a Clinton-Gore proposal in 1993 that would have overhauled Medicaid and required people to join ''health alliances'' and choose their own plans. Bradley, who calls Gore's current plan to expand coverage ''too timid,'' says his proposal would not reduce Medicaid benefits and would give recipients choices of doctors and programs.
''Well, that failed. It's a dead horse. Why talk about it?'' Wheeler said about any comparisons to the earlier Clinton-Gore ideas. ''Why go back and rehash something from 1993? We've learned a lot since then,'' Wheeler said.
P.S. The Quinnipiac poll had Gore at 44 percent, gaining 8 points in a month, and now in a tight race with Bradley, who is now at 41 percent, down slightly from October when he had a slight edge on Gore.
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