THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, November 4, 1994 TAG: 9411040678
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A18 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Compiled by staff writer Keith Monroe with assistance from staff
researcher Peggy Earle.
LENGTH: Long : 122 lines
Handicappers and humorists are still commenting on the Virginia Senate race. Writing in the Washington Post (Oct. 27), Steve Twomey posed as the ghost of Thomas Jefferson. He admits he's still dead but remains interested in the state and fate of Virginia.
He worries about Democratic candidate Charles S. Robb. ``Is he dead too? I mean, he's stiffer than I am. Ol' George Washington's wooden teeth had more charisma.''
Twomey, as Jefferson, worries that people hate the government he helped create and concludes, ``that's why Robb's in trouble. He's a sitting senator, which makes him a deceitful perpetrator of the horrible, wasteful Jeffersonian status quo, or in the vernacular, a sinkhole.''
But North ``is touting himself as an untainted breeze of honesty and character who will clean house. Hey, doesn't that make him the Sharon Pratt Kelly of Virginia? She turned out well, I thought.''
After outlining some of North's more celebrated collisions with the truth, this Jefferson says: ``Fellow citizens, this man does not appear to be a fresh breeze. He appears to be the same old stink, a politician who will say anything outrageous and then disavow it when caught, who has no respect for facts, no sense of prudence. . . . So why is this man doing so well? Because he smiles nice. He seems just folks. He's an outlet for people who think answers are simple.''
William Schneider, resident political analyst at CNN, provided an explanation for Virginia's race in two paragraphs (Oct. 26).
``Most Virginia voters do not like either Sen. Robb or Oliver North, so why don't they vote for Marshall Coleman? Because they don't think he can win and until he can prove it in the polls, a vote for Marshall Coleman is going to look like a wasted vote.
``Now, suppose you really like Coleman, you really hate Oliver North and you're indifferent to Chuck Robb. If you vote for Coleman, the man you really like, you're helping to elect North, who's the man you really hate. Robb is hoping that Coleman's vote is going to get squeezed down in the next two weeks because the polls show that most of the support Coleman is getting would otherwise go to Sen. Robb.''
Derrick Jackson in the Dallas Morning News (Oct. 27) said crime and punishment is an important issue in almost every race across the country. ``The only races where prisons are not a top issue is where the candidates themselves are either criminals or dirty tricksters, such as the Senate contest between Oliver North and Chuck Robb in Virginia.''
A Wall Street Journal editorial (Oct. 31) expressed concerns about Oliver North's role in alleged drug smuggling by Nicaragua's Contras.
``Since we've been assiduous about Whitewater and the BCCI scandal, both of which primarily focus on Democrats, we ought to pause in this election season to remark that Republicans also have some questions to answer . . .
``Drug smuggling, the Contras and Oliver North, for example, have been flitting through the hot Virginia Senate contest. The Washington Post reported that Drug Enforcement (Administration) officials had complained that Mr. North did not pass along reports that aircraft and crew used in a humanitarian assistance programs for the Nicaraguan Contras may have been involved in drug smuggling.''
The Journal, which has made much of an airfield in Mena, Ark., and its connection to such operations, says, ``Mr. North and others really do owe the Republic a complete explanation.''
Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer (Oct. 31) expressed concern about a campaign year in which skill at mudslinging has become the measure of the man.
``The basic theme of the 1994 campaign is that everyone running is a liar, a cheat, a crook or a fraud. In the most publicized case of mutual assured political destruction, the Virginia Senate race, Republican Oliver North's TV ad starts with `Why can't Chuck Robb tell the truth?,' which Democrat Robb answers with `After lying about President Reagan and even lying to school children, now Oliver North is lying about Chuck Robb.' To school children, mind you.
``The immutable fact is this: As of Nov. 9, one of these two highly advertised liars will be the next senator from Virginia. Every state in the union will be sending to Congress some brutally excoriated campaign survivor. The 104th Congress is guaranteed to be an assembly of the most vilified persons in every American community.
``Do we really need seminars on why voters loathe politicians?''
L. Brent Bozell, a conservative media critic, wrote an op-ed piece in the Washington Times (Oct. 30) accusing reporters following the Virginia race of bias against North.
He quotes a number of remarks on the candidate and then refutes or mocks them. For instance, he notes that Newsweek movie reviewer David Ansen takes this gratuitous swipe at North: ``Today, Oliver North makes hash of the Constitution, and it jump-starts his political career.''
To which Bozell replies: ``Liberals have an uncanny way of using the Constitution only to thwart anti-communists, to defend aborting babies and to justify providing free government services to illegal aliens.''
Later he quotes Lisa Myers of NBC claiming that most military experts say North erred in suggesting U.S. forces were too weak to defeat Saddam. Bozell rejoins: ``At the same time in Beijing, one military expert was agreeing with Mr. North. Mr. Clinton's own defense secretary, William Perry, told Chinese military officials that U.S. forces would have a tough time fighting on two battle fronts. The media outlets that trumpeted Mr. North's comments ignored Mr. Perry's.
``All this moral outrage over the prospect of Sen. North is just so much partisan politics from a partisan media. These same consciences were unburdened by the offenses of Rep. Dan Rostenkowski, Rep. Tony Coelho, Speaker Jim Wright, Sen. Edward Kennedy and even Sen. Charles Robb. Reporters just hate the idea of Sen. North because they hate the ideas of North. Since they can't beat him on his platform, they've succumbed to character assassination.''
Ferrel Guillory, reporting for the Raleigh News and Observer (Oct. 31), paid a visit to Norfolk to watch Wilder on the campaign trail with Robb.
``Every so often, it seems, the South serves up a political contest so legendary, so extraordinarily graphic - for the personalities involved, for the amount of money spent, for the intense clash of political forces - that the nation watches with a mixture of revulsion and fascination. North Carolina produced Helms-Hunt in 1984, with a sequel, Helms-Gantt in 1990. Louisiana came up in 1991 with Edwards-Duke. Now it's Virginia's turn. . . .''
Guillory concludes that ``to win, Robb must depend on the kindness of surrogates - even a prickly rival such as Wilder and even officials of a government not held in high esteem by many of his constituents. It is a race in which both the Democrat and the Republican nominees run with the heavy weight of character questions strapped to their candidacies.''
KEYWORDS: U.S. SENATE RACE VIRGINIA CANDIDATES by CNB