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| FIGHTING WORDS | |
 August 2, 2000  |
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How will the war of words affect votes in key swing states? Media correspondent Terence Smith begins with background on campaign advertising, then Margaret Warner leads a discussion with GOP analysts.
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MARGARET WARNER: Now, three views on how Cheney's nomination-- and the war of words and ads-- will play in critical electoral vote states. Alan Novak is Republican state chairman in Pennsylvania. Don Benton is Republican state chairman in Washington State, where he is also a state senator. And John Zogby is an independent pollster. Well, now both of you are state party chairman in states where these ads are running. Alan Novak, do you think these attacks on Bush and Cheney will have any impact on the independent voters, the swing voters that are key to this election?
MARGARET WARNER: Do you think the same thing, and if so why? Why would voters who do not agree with Dick Cheney on some of these issues not care? DON BENTON, Republican State Chairman, Washington: Well, I think it
is pretty clear, in Washington State, if you go to one ad on the Clean
Water Act, people look at Dick Cheney as a visionary for being one of
the few people to vote against it because a lot of the farmers in Washington
State actually have to make sure the water that leaves their farms is
cleaner than the water that came in. And so maybe he was a visionary
in voting against that because it did not contain a human element. And
I think that's important. Property rights in Washington State which
are affected greatly by the clean water act have really gone a long
way to bring a lot of the Democrats and middle of the road independents
that used to vote Democrat over to the Republican side. So really I
think some of these ads may help George Bush in Washington State. MARGARET WARNER: So one, do you think what they are finding, would you think, is this plausible to you? And two, why do you think the Democrats are doing this. JOHN ZOGBY, Pollster: The Democrats are doing it because they have to do something. And do one of two things. One is to bolster the positive or favorability rating of Al Gore and make him more likeable. Or at the same time, what they also have to do is knock down George W. Bush a few pegs. The problem is, Bush's personality leading with heart is building up his likeability so high that we learned with Ronald Reagan, you can't attack somebody who is liked by the American people. Instead they go after Cheney. But the difficulty is that, and we learned with this with Dan Quayle, don't amount to a hill of beans what Americans think about the vice presidential nominee. And so, Al Gore is in a box at the moment. MARGARET WARNER: So even though we see Democrats saying what we're really trying to do is sort of tie Cheney's voting record around Bush's neck and say George W. Bush is really not as pragmatic and moderate as you think he is; you just think that doesn't fly?
MARGARET WARNER: You were trying to get in here. |
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| The importance of the Cheney voting record | ||||||||||||||||||||
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ALAN NOVAK: Well, the one thing that I wanted to say is, Cheney's voting record is yesterday's news when the voters are focusing on today's news. And George W. Bush's vision is carrying this along. Cheney in the perspective of Pennsylvania, and I live in a moderate wealthy county, people like the experience and integrity Cheney brings to the Bush ticket. MARGARET WARNER: You agree, both seem to agree with what Dick Cheney said to Jim, he doesn't think this is what people are going to be interested in this campaign, period.
JOHN ZOGBY: Margaret, there is another factor here as well. Voters typically ask two questions. What has he done for me lately? And what are you going to do for me next? They don't care very much about what you did during the 1980s. That's ancient history. MARGARET WARNER: How much do you think, how do you think Cheney's personality comes into play also? We just saw it on display in this interview with Jim.
MARGARET WARNER: Cheney being the scoutmaster. JOHN ZOGBY: Cheney being the scoutmaster. And if you want to look at it in very positive terms, this is the perfect supplement to George W. Bush, someone who has been around the park and someone who says I'm not going to do the political thing the way it is normally done. Like me or don't like me. Vote for me anyway. ALAN NOVAK: One thing that I would like to add, to the extent that there was a John McCain phenomena that we saw earlier in the year, it was independent voters that did not like negative campaigning. If this battle is all about trying to get independent voters, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are going to get them by staying positive with the vision.
DON BENTON: Well, it is risky, but really if you think about conventions and what are they about, they are about articulating the policy and the idea and vision for the future. They are not about the past. And I think we have done a good job here in Philadelphia this week and the Bush campaign has done a good job of articulating the positions of the party and his vision for the future, rather than dwelling on the failures of the Clinton/Gore admission. And I think that's going to carry this party a long way forward by doing it that way. |
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| The risks of role reversal | ||||||||||||||||||||
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MARGARET WARNER: So, John Zogby, what happened to the conventional political wisdom, which is that a charge unanswered is a charge that sticks?
ALAN NOVAK: That's interesting, considering the sense that we have that people just want an end to Clinton. And this may make it even a big, a quicker exit. MARGARET WARNER: From the attacks.
MARGARET WARNER: All right, I'm sorry, gentlemen, I have to leave it there but thank you all three very much for joining us. |
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ALAN
NOVAK, Republican State Chairman, Pennsylvania: I don't believe they
will, Margaret. And evidence from what we're able to find out since
they have begun to run indicates they are not. George W. Bush is running
very well in Pennsylvania and after Dick Cheney was named as his running
mate, the Democrats came right away with the sound bites on Dick Cheney's
voting record and the numbers jumped in favor of Bush. 
We
just had a poll, just out of the field, and John will be interested
in this. In Seattle, no less, just last week, it shows Bush up in the
eighth congressional district in Seattle by ten points. We're pretty
encouraged by George W. lead in Washington State and we really don't
think these ads will have a great effect. 
JOHN
ZOGBY: It isn't so far. We polled at the end of the first week after
a lot of the Cheney negatives were aired, and what we found was actually
no change from the previous poll. George W. Bush still led by four.
Now, that's not a big lead, but the problem is, Al Gore is stuck in
the high 30s and low 40s. You can't win the presidency with those kind
of numbers. What the Democrats instead really have to do is move those
numbers up by going positive first. 
MARGARET
WARNER: As Cheney said, it was a conscious decision, obviously, not
to do any Clinton bashing here, believing that the voters really don't
like that. Isn't it sometimes risky though?
JOHN
ZOGBY: Well, I think basically if you go back to 1988, that's the classic
example. Dukakis never really built up his likeability, therefore it
was easy to knock him down. But America likes George W. Bush. They seem
to like what they see. And at the same time, they don't like Al Gore
very much. The Democrats really run a risk, and that risk is, role reversal.
In the early and mid 1990s, the Republicans were the exclusive, small
tent, mean party. And the Democrats were all inclusive with a projection
of building a bridge to the 21st century. Now, what you have is the
Republicans showcasing inclusivity and the Democrats led by the President
of the United States, perhaps very unbecoming, becoming the politics
of mean. That could be very risky for them. 
