POLITICAL WRAP

October 13, 2000
		Syndicated columnist Mark Shields and Wall Street Journal columnist Paul Gigot discuss how the violence in the Middle East and the second presidential debate may impact the national elections.

Online Special: Election 2000 Oct. 11, 2000: The Second Presidential Debate Oct. 5, 2000: The Vice Presidential Debate Oct. 3, 2000: The First Presidential Debate Shields and Gigot Oct. 6, 2000: The vice presidential debate and the week in politics Oct. 5, 2000: Reaction to the vice presidential debate Oct. 3, 2000: Reaction to the first presidential debate Sept. 29, 2000: The abortion pill and the week in politics. Issues and Debate Oct. 2, 2000: Bush and Gore and the Supreme Court Sept. 20, 2000: The Bush and Gore education plans Sept. 14, 2000: Military readiness as a campaign issue Sept. 7, 2000: How will the politics of the surplus play in this year's election? Sept. 5, 2000: Bush and Gore policy experts debate different views of a Medicare prescription drug benefit Campaigns and Politics Oct. 10, 2000: Journalists Broder, Oliphant and Brooks discuss the presidential campaign Oct. 10, 2000: The 106th Congress wraps up the session Oct. 9, 2000: A report on the battle for Pennsylvanian voters. Sept. 19, 2000: Bush and Gore campaign for women's votes     Debating Our Destiny Commission on Presidential Debates	MARGARET WARNER: And that's syndicated columnist Mark Shields, who's in California tonight, and Wall Street Journal columnist Paul Gigot
	The Middle East and the Gulf
	MARGARET WARNER: Paul, how do you think all this turmoil in the Middle East and in the Gulf is going to have any impact on the campaign, and if so what? PAUL GIGOT: I spent the day talking to Republicans and Democrats about this, and I don't think anybody really knows. That's the fascinating thing. Everybody knows it's a wild card, it's going to have some impact but nobody is sure who it works for. You can make the argument it helps the vice president, somebody who is more experienced and more seasoned in these kinds of matters. On the other hand, Republicans have had the traditional advantage on foreign policy as a party. One thing I think is certain is that the 45 minutes of the debate the other night on foreign policy could turn out to be about the best 45 minutes in timing for George W. Bush. Because if this last 48 hours of turmoil had happened after the first debate, where Governor Bush left a much poorer impression of his mastery and comfort with that subject, I think it would hurt him more than it does this week where he left a good impression and he spent 45 minutes ruminating on all kinds of subjects, even brought up names. Before he was dodging them; now he brought up Nigeria throughout this and Africa. And he really did seem to be a lot more comfortable. So I don't think it is a real advantage for the vice president. MARGARET WARNER: How do you see it, Mark. MARK SHIELDS: Well, let me pull an Al Gore and say I agree with Paul. And there's a great rule that my precinct committee woman taught me a half century ago and that is, Margaret, that a day is a lifetime in politics, and a week is an eternity. And if you think about it, prior to Wednesday night, this would have been -- I mean, other than the human tragedy and the chance for peace lost and all the rest involved -- this would have been a political ten strike for Al Gore. In the sense that he was seen far better situated, far more experienced and far deeper and after Governor Bush's really weak and reed thin performance in the first debate in Boston on foreign policy, it would have been a natural, but Paul is right. And the other thing that George Bush did in that debate was he emphasized bipartisanship. So he looked even bigger than just being right on the issues or knowing the names of the capitals and the principal products of the country. For that reason he distanced himself very nicely from the Republican Congress, from Tom DeLay, from Dick Armey, from Trent Lott who have been biting and nipping at Bill Clinton and foreign policy throughout, and especially in the Balkans. MARGARET WARNER: And in the two days since the debate and since all this has erupted, Bush has continued to basically not be critical of the administration on the foreign policy aspect of this. PAUL GIGOT: That's right. MARGARET WARNER: Explain the strategy there because he was critical on one other point today. PAUL GIGOT: Mark keyed on one point. I think he wants to sound a bipartisan note when you have American soldiers killed. He looked like a statesman. I also think he wants to play it safe. It is such a close election they don't want to make a mistake so they are being very cautious. When you look at what he is doing, he is trying to carve a little angle here by hitting the bipartisan note, the statesman note on the foreign policy aspects of it, the diplomatic aspects but he went after Gore today on the energy aspects, the economic consequences of this, the high oil prices and playing on the threat that they might pose to the economic... to the economy and the potential for recession. I think he feels that that is a better way to attack, and that raises.. and that also has the benefit of increasing people's doubts about how good the country is and the state of the country and may be increasing the mood of the public for change. MARGARET WARNER: Mark, he also in that same speech in Pontiac, Michigan, said that it called into question the wisdom of the Gore-Clinton plan to take oil out of the strategic petroleum oil reserve because he said what we should be saving it for, which is, of course, what he has been saying is, for emergencies like this. Do you think these sort of domestic economic aspects provide an opening for him? MARK SHIELDS: I don't see it as an opening, quite frankly, Margaret. I think people's attention is solely on the Middle East and what appear to be the dimming hopes for peace and the increased prospects of violence there. And I don't think that we'll get that quickly between now and election as to who lost Pearl Harbor or anything of the sort. I think instead it's a case of good offense, being a better defense because there is a vulnerability on the whole question of oil prices because, as we pointed out, Governor Bush's chumminess and familiarity with that industry, as well as Dick Cheney's being on record urging OPEC to raise oil prices, so it's a little tough do a double flip on that.
	The post-debate analysis
	MARGARET WARNER: And, Mark, this is the post-debate period. Do you... how do you think it's played, the debate has played otherwise, other than the foreign policy discussion in the last 48 hours, for each of them? MARK SHIELDS: Well, I think we saw last week in Boston where Al Gore won on Tuesday and lost on Friday. And this week there seemed to be after Wake Forest, a consensus that George Bush had raised the comfort level of voters with him. That had been the question, about the comfort level of voters with him in the Oval Office -- and that Al Gore, under wraps, under perhaps something stronger than wraps even, I mean, seemed to be -- confused the idea of not being arrogant or not being condescending with being passive passive. And we, I think Paul and I both agreed before the debate that night that the country... This was a question of Gore and the country. And he had to establish who he was, and he just did not seem to be a figure of command or a figure of defined differences. And there's nothing wrong with defining differences between yourself and your opponent. You don't have to be disagreeable to do it. You don't have to be unpleasant to do it, but that's what campaigns are about and that's what Al Gore didn't do Wednesday night. And I think it has hurt him since. MARGARET WARNER: But, Paul, I hate to suggest that pundits aren't always right, but if you think about how wrong the pundits were last week.... PAUL GIGOT: Mark is always right. MARGARET WARNER: Mark, did you hear that? You're always right. MARK SHIELDS: Thank you, Paul. MARGARET WARNER: Is it possible that, again, the pundit class is missing what happened in the debate? I mean, is there any sign in the polls, for instance, that the public thought either man won - Bush won in this case, which is what the press - PAUL GIGOT: Maybe what's going to save us, bail us out, is the fact that I think the debate reaction has been blown away by the events in the Middle East. So that has become now on Page A-31. And we're left with the impression from Tuesday, whatever that impression was, whatever you took away from the screen. There hasn't been a lot of regurgitation, a lot of back and forth. We now shifted our discussion tonight. Our original discussion was about what is the impact of the events in the Middle East. So in that sense if Bush did better on Tuesday, which I think he did, I think that's going to be the impression that sticks until the next week. MARK SHIELDS: Let me just pick up on that, Margaret. I think Paul is right. The other thing is I think the press felt a little bit gone overboard last week on scrutinizing every one of Al Gore's statements and then psychoanalyzing them. And I think that George W. Bush would have gotten a little bit of the same treatment this week especially for his statement about we ought to get more countries in the Balkans when 85% of the troops there are from places like Finland and Norway and Italy and Germany and Greece. And he was just so wrong on that. And that would have been a natural. But I think Paul is right. That has been eclipsed. The oxygen has been taken out of that story because of the events in the Middle East, and it is back with the "I will not responsible" ads and the very small print in the newspapers.
	A double standard for Gore
	MARGARET WARNER: But, Paul, the Gore folks are complaining there is a double standard here. PAUL GIGOT: I'm not` surprised at that, but look, there are stereotypes that form in campaigns about the candidates that the press, those of us in the press kind of funnel our coverage through. The stereotype in this race has been about Gore, that he doesn't tell the truth, about Bush that he's a little light. Now if Bush had made a mistake, mispronounced words or made a big mistake in knowledge or something, you can bet the press would have jumped on that. That's what we were looking for. So he gets a little bit of a buy on questions of fact, perhaps, or truth telling, whereas Gore, if he makes a mistake of knowledge somehow, nobody assumes that that's necessarily Al Gore's problem. But if it looks like he is self-aggrandizing, he's playing up his own role, that's what we jump on because that's his history. I think that is what tends to happen in campaigns. It happens all the time. In 1992, Bill Clinton - he couldn't tell the truth, he didn't inhale. Dan Quayle, on the other hand, couldn't get a break regarding his intellect. So these are things that -- stereotypes that form and that's the way that the coverage looks at it. MARGARET WARNER: So, Mark, does this yet again raise the stakes for the third debate since the polls show everything's still dead even? MARK SHIELDS: I think it does Margaret, but just one postscript to Paul's, and that is I think there is a double standard. I mean, if Al Gore makes a mistake, this is malevolent knowledgeable. Okay. This is somebody who knows the subject matter and is obviously doing it out of free will and consciously. If George Bush makes a mistake, then it's well-intentioned, good-natured ignorance. So that really is, you know, that is a double standard, I mean, because in the final analysis, if somebody is making mistakes, and doesn't know, it's going to read down to the nation's detriment. But it sure does raise the stakes. I don't think anybody... I think people would be foolish right now to say it's over or, boy, that was it on Wednesday night at Wake Forest or anything of the sort. I think that this election is still very much up for grabs and we'll see more twists in the road between now and the seventh of November. MARGARET WARNER: Paul. PAUL GIGOT: I agree with that. This is a long way from over, but the pressure is on Al Gore to try to draw some more contrast with Bush. MARGARET WARNER: All right. Thank you both. See you next week.