THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, March 6, 1996 TAG: 9603060024
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Maddry
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
NAME-CALLING can be effective in politics, but there's something unseemly about Republican candidates for the presidency jumping on Steve Forbes simply because he's rich.
At every whistle-stop last week, Alexander, Dole, Buchanan, et al. were whining about the millions Forbes has spent of his own fortune on TV and radio advertising.
Excuse me, but whatever happened to the GOP notion that people should stand on their own feet and not expect taxpayers to pay their bills?
Forbes' opponents are relying on public matching funds to finance their campaign junkets and advertising. Then a genuine pay-as-you-go millionaire - who was an unknown until he began tossing fresh ideas at voters - enters the fray and they freak.
It just ain't fittin', as we say in Dixie.
Or, to quote from the artful evangelist Rev. Ike, who once mailed me a flier showing a woman standing beside a new Cadillac, which came her way after receiving one of his special sale prayer cloths in the mail:
``Money is not bad. Money is gooood!''
Indeed it is, Rev. Ike. And Forbes has so much of it that his primary opponents would be greasing up to him as shamelessly as the ``But I love you, man,'' character in the Bud Light commercials given normal times.
But this is a campaign year. So his opponents are saying, ``Don't vote for Forbes because he has no experience at anything except making money, and he inherited much of that.'' It is another example of how hopelessly out of touch GOP candidates have become this year.
For shame!
I think I speak for voters everywhere when I say that of all money, inherited is the very best kind. Actually, polls show the public prefers it to earned money 80 percent to 10 percent. Which is not surprising, because earned money can be exhausting to acquire and, regrettably, often carries the odor of sharp practice.
Which is not to say Forbes hasn't doubled his daddy's fortune. Odds are he has. He also has the highest IQ of any candidate in the field. He has the most attractive family. He is more upbeat than the others. And he can exude more charm than a bush filled with butterflies.
Another reason to vote for Forbes is his steely grasp on tradition. Voters certainly like change. But voters, particularly Republican voters, don't care for too much of it. Remember when it was once accurate to say that the Episcopal Church was the Republican Party at prayer?
No more. The Christian Coalition - now a powerful voice in the party - has gathered under its tent a sawdust-stomping collection of evangelicals who range from stout Methodists to boil conjurers and foot ablutionists.
Worse, not many of them sit around country club bars wearing tiny frogs or whales on their slacks. Other candidates have groveled before the coalition seeking approval. Forbes has treated it like the crazy aunt locked in the attic and ignores it.
Many Republicans like Forbes' tradition. They certainly don't like to see GOP candidates on the cover of Time magazine wearing hard hats, as Buchanan did recently.
That's disturbing.
Republicans draw comfort from the hope that when the last tick of recorded time is sounded, someone like Steve Forbes will be sitting on the stern of his yacht, his cunning eyes glinting behind rose-colored glasses, peering into the inferno, drink in hand, wearing either tiny whale pants or, perhaps, walking shorts in the family tartan.
Now I know many of you are thinking: ``Maddry is just writing about how great Forbes is because he's rich. He wants Forbes to be so pleased with his column that he will send him a Scottish salmon, a silver tray or perhaps a wad of money.''
But I don't want you to think that. I want you to know it! These are difficult economic times with people fearful of losing their jobs as their wages seem frozen.
It is certainly no time to be bashing millionaires, as some of those GOP candidates are doing.
As a matter of fact, if you know a millionaire, today isn't a bit too soon to say something nice to that person or drop him or her a really flattering letter.
If you know what's good for your wagon. by CNB