POLITICAL WRAP

December 10, 1999
		Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Wall Street Journal columnist Paul Gigot discuss John McCain and George W. Bush's candidacies.

Online Forum: What issues do you think should shape election 2000? Dec. 7, 1999: Looking at the Campaign ads of Gore and Bradley Dec. 3, 1999: Shields and Gigot analyze the GOP New Hampshire debates Nov. 11, 1999: A campaign snapshot with George W. Bush Oct. 28, 1999: Bill Bradley and Al Gore engage in a town meeting. Oct. 22, 1999: One-on-one with Bill Bradley. Sept. 1, 1999: The Post's Dan Balz on the McCain campaign Browse the NewsHour's coverage of the Politics and Campaigns. Browse past Political Wraps	JIM LEHRER: And that brings us to Shields & Gigot for some analysis of some presidential politics, among other things, and, that's, of course, syndicated columnist Mark Shields, Wall Street Journal columnist Paul Gigot. Paul, what's your reading of the Bush campaign race in New Hampshire at this moment? PAUL GIGOT: John McCain has surged, Jim. He's surged into the front, and I think now has to be considered in that state the clear front runner, no question about it. JIM LEHRER: Do you dispute that? MARK SHIELDS: I don't dispute it. I'd just say that I think it's bigger than New Hampshire, Jim. I think in the first week of December 1999, that the perception of John McCain's invincibility has been shattered -- PAUL GIGOT: You mean George Bush's. MARK SHIELDS: I mean George Bush's. I'm sorry. Thank you. His -- the inevitability has been shaken, in a sense, but the invincibility -- the idea that he was going to cruise to victory and carry with him congressional Republicans in his wake like a great ocean liner coming in, so that -- the debate performances have shaken that perception.
	They don't know him
	JIM LEHRER: So, Paul, is it -- is it the result of a McCain surge, in other words, a positive thing for -- for McCain -- or a leveling off for Bush? PAUL GIGOT: I think it's both, but right now the emphasis is more on the leveling off of Bush. I think what happened was he won the invisible primary -- the money, the endorsements -- and then what happened is they kept him under wraps for so long because -- JIM LEHRER: Who's "they?" Who kept him -- PAUL GIGOT: His advisers to the Bush campaign made this decision -- well, he did -- he made this decision that, look, we've got this momentum, we're doing great, let's wait, let's sit on our lead. It was a dreadful mistake. Now, they ought to have done off Broadway first. You don't go to the network -- you know, you're better off going to the network news if you worked in Milwaukee first; and they didn't do that, and I think that that put all of this emphasis on this -- on the first two debates here, and a lot of people were getting their first introduction to George W. Bush. JIM LEHRER: Your theory being that should have been old hat, that he should have been old hat by then, right? PAUL GIGOT: Yes. Ronald Reagan -- by the time he was running in 1980 and people had some doubts, he had been in public life for 25 years debating national issues, thinking about national issues. People had seen him on television. They knew him. A lot of voters don't know George W. Bush, so when he makes that first impression and they say this isn't the juggernaut we thought -- you told us -- who's going to roll over Al Gore, and so they look around and say, well, what else is the field like, and there's John McCain. JIM LEHRER: Do you read it the same way? MARK SHIELDS: I think it is. I think John McCain deserves enormous credit, though. John McCain didn't listen to wise people like me and said, you got to go to Iowa, you got to -- may very well end up stumbling if somebody else emerges from Iowa -- and Paul's leveling off theory of Bush continues -- because usually campaigns have emotion, and if the emotion is horizontal or worse, then it's entirely possible that Bush could be in some trouble even in Iowa. But John McCain didn't have the resources, didn't have the endorsements. I mean, he really did have the slingshot, and the slingshot was a few bucks and confidence in his own ability to reach voters in New Hampshire, and he has done that.
	Shields: Without McCain, it'd be a Bush coronation
	JIM LEHRER: So without a McCain in the race, Bush wouldn't be doing as poorly, is what you're saying? MARK SHIELDS: I think without McCain, it's a Bush coronation. JIM LEHRER: Even -- no matter what has happened? MARK SHIELDS: I just don't think that anybody else had the traction that McCain has developed -- and McCain has touched something -- there's no doubt about it. And New Hampshire is a great place for him because independents can vote, and his appeal to independents - as Senator Bradley on the Democratic side - is real. PAUL GIGOT: There's one other thing. I agree with Mark about McCain has touched something in this cycle, particularly. He's the purest anti-Clinton candidate, the purest character candidate, with his biography, his war record, and then his campaign finance reform I don't think works for him necessarily as an issue, but it works for him in a personal sense of saying, I'm willing to stand up to the big money crowd -- to my party -- that sort of thing. Then that signature line we use, "something greater -- I want to appeal to the voters with something greater than their self-interest." That's a perfect kind of phrase for this cycle, where the country's doing OK. Issues don't cut as much, but people want somebody they can look up to and admire. That's the McCain biography.
	Questions of intelligence hard to answer
	JIM LEHRER: Back to Bush for a moment, Mark. This issue, we had it in our snapshot. It's something that we talked about here before on Friday nights, but this intellectual issue that has now risen on Bush, how serious is that? MARK SHIELDS: It's serious, Jim, because there are a few charges in politics that once they get into the blood stream against any candidate, are tough. I mean the idea that the candidate has sticky fingers on money for any reason, or the idea that a candidate is light or dishonest. I don't know how you rebut it. I'll tell one quick anecdote that Teddy White, the great chronicler of American politics, told about the legendary Democratic boss in Brooklyn, Hymie Shorenstein. Hymie Shorenstein regularly delivered from the Brownsville District of Brooklyn 20-1 majorities for the Democrats during the FDR years. He filled out the ticket and had a very wealthy judge -- lawyer running for a judgeship. The wealthy lawyer put several thousand dollars into Hymie's campaign coffers and didn't see billboards or bumper stickers bearing his name and he got nervous. And Hymie Shorenstein assured the candidate in the middle of October, saying look, let me tell you one thing. He said, Did you ever go down to the wharf and watch the Staten Island ferry come in? When the Staten Island ferry comes in, in its wake are gum wrappers and cigarettes and banana peels. And they all automatically are pulled in when the Staten Island ferry itself comes in. The name of your Staten Island ferry is Franklin Delano Roosevelt and you'll win. George W. Bush was seen as the Staten Island ferry by a lot of Republicans until the last two weeks. They just said this guy's got double digit leads over Al Gore. He's cruising. All of a sudden as he stumbled, he didn't have the command. He didn't have the sense of confidence in those debates and now the questioning starts. Is he intellectually curious? I think the man is smart enough to be president of the United States. But I think once that question is asked, it's a killer to be asked. JIM LEHRER: What does he do about it, Paul? PAUL GIGOT: It is hard to rebut because you can't go around saying I'm not stupid, in essence. That's sort of the accusation. I don't think it's as big a problem as Mark does for the reason that I don't think it's true. I've spent hours with the guy, with colleagues and other journalists one-on-one talking about all kinds of issues. JIM LEHRER: He's a smart guy. PAUL GIGOT: He's a smart guy. I mean, Texas isn't Arkansas. It's a serious state. It's a big state. You don't get to be governor of that state -- JIM LEHRER: You'll handle the mail on that one. PAUL GIGOT: All right, I will. JIM LEHRER: OK. PAUL GIGOT: And Bill Clinton in his press conference this week referred to he quoted Oliver Wendell Holmes about Franklin Delano Roosevelt who said he's a second-class mind but a first-class temperament. You know, I mean FDR was pretty good if he was only a second class mind. George Bush is smart enough to be president. MARK SHIELDS: The worst thing that happened to George Bush this week was that press conference. Two things happened. First of all, Bill Clinton, what anyone thinks -- Bill Clinton has a command of information, of knowledge that is truly masterful, that is remarkable. You measure him up to George Bush's performance 36 hours earlier, you say wait a minute, the guy ain't ready for prime time. The second thing is, John McCain very, very sagely and shrewdly in that debate last Monday night jumped in when George W. Bush did not have the answer. When he was asked about the Dean Acheson book, he couldn't talk about the Dean Acheson book and went back to the rote material from his speech. And McCain picked up on it, gave an Acheson answer, and identified himself with Harry Truman, the patron saint of all political underdogs. And it worked for him. And the question asked him by Steve Forbes about oil prices, was he going to intervene in the market and help freezing widowers and widows in New Hampshire. Again, McCain saw the opening, grabbed it and talked about Chechnya, showing realistically his own mastery of foreign policy. JIM LEHRER: And every time he did that, that hurt George Bush -- is what you're saying? MARK SHIELDS: Yes. I'm saying it adds further fuel to the speculation about intellectual curiosity and intellectual heft. JIM LEHRER: Compared to McCain. MARK SHIELDS: Compared to McCain and compared to Clinton. PAUL GIGOT: The Bush campaign has to break out of its Ann Richards analogy. They stuck to a script in 1994. Four issues, stick to the discipline, discipline, discipline, and I think they've tried to carry it over to this campaign. And the problem is when you're president, when you're running for president, particularly in Iowa and New Hampshire, they like to rough you up. They like to ask you about the price of milk. They like to see if you can perform. If they try to stick to the script, they say wait a minute. We want to see how you do on your feet, whether you can stand up to questions. I think they may have to loosen that up and show what clearly in Texas worked as a pretty good appeal.
	Gore vs. Bradley
	JIM LEHRER: Quickly before we go, any major change in Gore versus Bradley on the Democratic side this week? MARK SHIELDS: Well, I think the Bradley people are hitting back and understand that they've paid a certain political price in their anxiety in the ranks of their own supporters for having been slow to respond and counter punch. JIM LEHRER: What do you think? PAUL GIGOT: I think he faces a moment of truth. He's got to decide whether to fight back even more aggressively. I think they have been half-hearted in their response and I think it's hurting them. JIM LEHRER: You mean not fighting back is not working for him? That was his strategy. He said look I'm not going to play that game. PAUL GIGOT: The Gore people, they think if he doesn't respond to our attacks, they sink in. If he does respond, he loses the aura of being above politics. I think that's a recognition Bradley has to make, that this is a street fight, not a Quaker meeting house. MARK SHIELDS: I think that Gore did hurt himself on the tax, accusing Bradley of saying he wouldn't raise taxes and admitting that he would have to. And the debate over the health plan, I think, is starting to tilt a little bit in Bradley's direction. JIM LEHRER: All right. We have to go. Thank you both.