ORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - The seniors at Sunrise Lakes Condominiums, a sprawling development of dirt-colored stucco apartment buildings near Fort Lauderdale, are watching Senator Joseph I. Lieberman very closely indeed.
Some see great cause for celebration in the fact that Vice President Al Gore chose Lieberman as his running mate, making him the first-ever Jewish candidate for the vice presidency. But they know how things are, so they're worried, too. Stop by the retirement community, where most of the residents are Jewish, and free with their opinions, and you will find an optimism that is decidedly guarded.
''I think it's very good,'' said Cathy Bulavram. ''So do I,'' said Jack Bulavram. ''But!''
''But!'' repeated Jack's 48-year-old son, William.
Those buts are rich with years of history and experience for the Bulavrams.
''I wish him luck, 'cause I like the idea,'' said Jack Bulavram, ''but there are so many anti-Jewish people around.''
''They feel a lot stronger against Jews, but they won't talk about it,'' said William Bulavram.
Many of the residents poolside at Sunrise Lakes had watched the talk shows and read the papers yesterday morning. They'd heard the pundits say Lieberman's early stand against President Clinton's behavior with intern Monica S. Lewinsky could inoculate Gore against criticism that links him to Clinton's indiscretions. And they agreed, mostly, with what they heard.
Many said Lieberman had their votes. But then again, most of these retirees would have gone with Gore anyway, they said. Lieberman simply makes them that much more certain to turn out on Election Day, and more likely to get involved in the campaign this year.
Jewish voters make up 6 percent of Florida's voters, according to local pollster Jim Kane. Whether the senator from Connecticut makes any difference to the rest of the state's voters was the big question by the pool yesterday, as it was elsewhere in this crucial Southern state. The seniors wondered whether Lieberman's religion would turn off non-Jews and whether he would be a victim of anti-Semitism. Analysts wondered whether Gore's candidacy could be helped anywhere in the South by his choice of running mate, but agreed that if Lieberman could help the vice president's chances in any southern state, it will be in Florida.
The contest in this state is far closer than it is elsewhere in the South, according to recent polls. Those polls show Gore trailing Governor George W. Bush of Texas badly in the rest of the South, but only by single digits in Florida. This state is far more urban and diverse than other Southern states, and voters are almost evenly split between the two major parties. Indeed, many locals will say the state is hardly southern at all, which makes it more fertile ground for Gore than other states in the region.
Lieberman might not help Gore in Florida as much as Bob Graham, a very popular US senator from this state who also was under consideration as Gore's running mate, might have, but Lieberman does change the equation, some analysts said.
The Connecticut senator is ''a godsend'' said Susan MacManus, a political scientist at the University of South Florida in Tampa. Voters in Florida are 53 percent female and comprise the oldest electorate in the country. In 1996, 40 percent of those who voted were over 60, MacManus said. Those voters carried Clinton to victory in Florida in 1996 and made his 1992 defeat in the state a narrow one.
Bush, whose brother Jeb is the popular governor of Florida, has made inroads among female and elderly voters, she said, mostly by trying to tie the vice president to Clinton's scandal. Lieberman may allow Gore a way out of that pigeonhole in Florida.
''He does bring the morality issue to the forefront,'' MacManus said. ''He gives undecided, particularly female, voters - wavering towards George W. because of the morality issue - some excuse to go back to their ticket.''
''My first reaction is that I feel very comfortable with Joe Lieberman,'' said Jacques Abitan, a Miami travel wholesaler and Moroccan immigrant who is Jewish.
Abitan said that yesterday, he probably would have voted for Bush, but ''Today, I'm ready to listen to both of them. I have to give Gore credit for his choice.''
Abitan said his new open-mindedness was due to Lieberman's integrity and had nothing to do with the fact that the senator is Jewish. ''I think it would be very wrong for Jews to vote for Lieberman just because he's Jewish,'' Abitan said.
But some local political organizers said Lieberman's faith alone is shifting people's positions.
''His selection has energized people both ways, those who are afraid and those who are attracted,'' said Barbara Miller, who is active in the Fort Lauderdale community. ''A lot of Jewish people are afraid to have a Jew spotlighted because there has been the belief that that has brought some repercussions.''
But, Miller said, her son, who usually eschews politics, said he was going to become involved in Gore's campaign after his selection of Lieberman. Others are less optimistic.
Rosalie Phillips, a Sunrise Lakes retiree was torn yesterday. She is Jewish and proud that Lieberman had been chosen, but worried that he wouldn't help Gore in November.
''I'm a staunch Democrat,'' she said. ''But I'm hoping this won't be a detriment to us. It will make religion a big issue.''
It pained her, but Phillips conceded that she would have preferred that the vice president choose a sure winner rather than a Jewish running mate.
Gore and his campaign have clearly decided Lieberman is both.
And so has Edie Booke, the exuberant lifeguard at Sunrise.
''Oh, he's the greatest!'' she yelled when she realized whom everybody was talking about. ''The best thing. And I'm not talking religion. If you looked at the other five guys Gore looked at, [Lieberman] was so clean.''
Jack Maltz, a man who gave his age as ''two years younger than God,'' also downplayed the role religion would play.
''I think the American people are way beyond that now,'' he said. ''You got these fringe people, but the majority of American people won't care that he's Jewish. They'll go for his integrity.''
Several analysts said the majority of American people won't care about Lieberman, period. They say a vice presidential nominee has little effect on people's decisions in November, particularly after the initial flurry over the selection dies down.
''When push comes to shove, the nominee's choice of vice president says more about the presidential candidate,'' said Kane, the pollster. ''It's the first real decision voters get to see the person make. It's not who he picks so much as the person he picks is somebody he respects and trusts.''
