CLINTON WOES DEPRIVE DEMOCRATS OF EARLY, HOPED-FOR MOMENTUM

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, February 14, 1992                   TAG: 9202140035
SECTION: NATL/INTL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: DAVID ESPO ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium
CLINTON WOES DEPRIVE DEMOCRATS OF EARLY, HOPED-FOR MOMENTUM
In their dreams, Democrats saw themselves emerging from New Hampshire with a front-runner who would swiftly unify the party and mount a strong, 50-state challenge to a Republican president weakened by recession.
But with five days to go to the leadoff primary, the dream has turned to dilemma. Bill Clinton is struggling to regain his political footing and neither Bob Kerrey, Tom Harkin nor Jerry Brown is generating much voter enthusiasm. Former Massachusetts Sen. Paul Tsongas is positioned to win the first balloting of the year - and the great momentum it will bestow.
Can an "Anybody but Tsongas" movement be far behind?
Not even Ronald Brown, the chairman of the Democratic Party, rules out a late entry.
"I think it's unlikely . . . that others will get into the race," he said recently.
Unlikely, but not impossible.
In Brown's words, the rules and technicalities that would make it difficult for a late entrant to win could be "amended or changed."
Then there are the 771 delegate slots allocated to members of Congress and party officials - a third of the total needed for nomination.
The roster of Democrats who once looked into the 1992 race and then looked away when President Bush was riding high includes: New York Gov. Mario Cuomo, whose supporters in New Hampshire are pushing him as a write-in option; Rep. Richard Gephardt; Sen. Al Gore of Tennessee; Sen. Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia; Sen. Bill Bradley of New Jersey; and Sen. Lloyd Bentsen of Texas.
To hear their handlers say it, their phones are ringing constantly with supporters and party leaders urging them to consider a late entry.
It's an impressive list - more impressive on paper than the current crop of candidates.
But there are problems, as well.
A late race carries huge risks, especially for a candidate young enough to run in 1996. Non-candidates often seem larger than life, at least until they enter the race.
Whoever wins New Hampshire isn't going to welcome a party-anointed latecomer. "You spin out as much as you can about the inexorable march of delegates" to discourage a new candidate, says Leslie Dach, who did so in 1988 for Michael Dukakis.
Even so, for many Democrats, the ones in the race seem small; the ones out of it larger.
And the one who started smallest of all - Tsongas - suddenly looms as the hottest politician in America.
Ron Brown offered his less-than-definitive view before Arkansas Gov. Clinton released the 1969 letter in which he thanked an ROTC official for "saving me from the draft."
For Clinton, who had converted his claim of "electability" into front-runnerdom, the draft issue came on top of controversy over his personal life.
Electability in the Democratic Party is a code word for being able to win white, middle- and working-class votes in the Sun Belt, the foundation of Republican success in presidential elections. But Clinton's region may have a particularly tough time with his opposition to the draft.
Nebraska Sen. Kerrey, wounded in Vietnam, a Midwesterner, a self-styled leader of a new generation, has been unable to generate much support in New Hampshire. Kerrey is "no regional candidate," says a new television ad that targets Tsongas.
Iowa Sen. Harkin runs as the most liberal Democrat, but in a primary that has rejected the most liberal candidate in each of the last four elections.
Brown seems irrelevant. A Cuomo write-in is a genuine wild card.
That leaves Tsongas, up from nowhere in the polls with his stern message that Americans need to rejuvenate their economy by pouring money into programs that will create jobs.
He starts off as a regional candidate with the good luck to see his region vote first.
After New Hampshire goes Maine on Feb. 23, and Rhode Island and Massachusetts on March 10. A total of 550 delegates will be picked before Southern-dominated Super Tuesday on March 10, when another 783 will be chosen in 11 states.
No money? If Clinton falters, none of the field will have money. Momentum will mean much.
Keywords:
POLITICS

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB