Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 9, 1994 TAG: 9410100066
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KEITH MONROE
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
``In the political race, the contestants are down from four to three after the withdrawal of Douglas Wilder, a Democrat who opted to run as an independent and who now knows (thanks to poll ratings of around 12 percent) just how unpopular he managed to make himself during his four years as Virginia's governor.''
The Economist concludes that ``Virginians are about to elect either an embarrassing nonentity [Robb] or a famously convicted felon. ... An ugly pig of a race it may be, but the winner's squeaks and squeals could be heard across the nation.''
\ Tom Carson, writing for The Village Voice (Sept. 27), watched Minority Leader Bob Dole join the North campaign. He decided Dole wasn't having much fun.
``The delighted air that most politicians can effortlessly assume while doing something in which they don't believe isn't in his repertoire. That's why it's like watching a Rube Goldberg contraption in the shape of a man clank to life when Dole undertakes a chore he finds repellent but advantageous, like campaigning in Virginia for Oliver North. ...''
Carson argues that Dole's support of North is more significant than it first appears.
``As recently as the '92 convention, establishment Republicans still believed that the party could survive by merely placating the Christian right, as opposed to becoming its hostage.'' However, ``accepting Ollie-the darling, if not the flat-out creation, of Pat Robertson's Virginia-headquartered Christian Coalition-has been a Munich for the GOP's old guard. Nothing spells out its inevitability like seeing Dole cave in, because he's made of sterner stuff than Neville Chamberlain.''
Carson also explains why North gets the lion's share of the attention in campaign coverage. ``The unlovely Chuck Robb, on a good day, makes Al Gore look like a figure of Falstaffian heartiness.''
\ Tom Baxter, a columnist for The Atlanta Journal and Constitution (Oct. 4), found North in Martinsville and decided that ``by a host of indicators-from the enthusiasm at this rally to the money he has in the bank-this race looks like North's to lose.''
Alex Chadwick of National Public Radio's Weekend Edition (Sept. 24) came to a similar conclusion after watching North stump.
``He seems to like running for office, and he does it with a sense of style and good humor. ... The Republican campaign consultant Roger Ailes once said a key characteristic for success in politics is what he called `simple likability,' and a campaign analyst in Virginia, not a North supporter, said this is what liberals and academics and the media don't get about Oliver North. People know everything about him, all the bad stuff, and they still like him. He is an immensely likable man.''
\ David Corn of The Nation magazine (Oct. 24) also trailed North around Southside Virginia and decided North will be Virginia's next senator. His explanation for the former Marine's appeal:
``North has tapped the obvious constituencies-economic and social conservatives. But he has also attracted the fed-up vote. These people, perhaps past supporters of H. Ross Perot, are looking for someone to toss a few bombs in Washington, and who better than the ex-Marine who went mano-a-mano with all those damn senators and House members.''
Corn found North on the stump to be ``charismatic in both the secular and the spiritual sense.'' He thinks the North campaign, ``which fuses elements of the insurgent crusades of Pat Buchanan and Ross Perot, has engulfed and devoured the country-clubbers.''
And Corn thinks North has been able to fashion this coalition because of his skill as a campaigner.
``He is smooth, masterful. He doesn't explicitly mention abortion, school prayer, guns or gays in the military. But they are all there. And the initiatives he advocates directly-lower taxes, the balanced-budget amendment, the line-item veto-are bedrock GOP issues that appeal to suburban and Chamber of Commerce Republicans. North, the presidential aide who creatively linked covert actions in Central America and the Middle East, has found a way to speak passionately to different sorts of Republicans - small-business owners, Christian Coalition members-at the same time.''
\ A somewhat different explanation for the North appeal appeared in the Washington Post (Oct. 2). American University professor Michael Kazin floats the startling hypothesis that North and Marion Barry are mining the same political vein.
``They share a flamboyant, confrontational style typical of both the New Left [black and white] and the New Left'' in the 1960s. ``And they employ that style in the service of a strategy that might be called balkanized populism. The 1960s slogan `all power to the people' has been altered by both the Barry and North campaigns to mean power to my people.''
Kazin claims that both Barry and North make a narrow populist appeal ``confined to embattled minorities ... in fact, each candidate draws nearly all his strength from a specific, rather narrow social group-and sparks hostility from almost everyone else.'' Perhaps most amusing is Kazin's assertion that ``the North and Barry campaigns share the same constellations of enemies-though one calls it the liberal elite and the other the white power structure.''
Compiled by Keith Monroe of Landmark News Service with help from Peggy Earle.
by CNB