Tactic of Concentrating on Super Tuesday Will Pay Off, Gore Says

Sen. Albert Gore Jr., gambling on winning big in the Super Tuesday Democratic presidential primaries and caucuses on March 8, Friday attacked the candidates who beat him in Iowa and New Hampshire and predicted his “modern” strategy will pay off.

The Tennessee senator criticized his opponents for campaigning “the old way” by “bombarding the airwaves” in Iowa and New Hampshire. He predicted that his decision to virtually ignore those states in favor of concentrating on Super Tuesday, when he tests his popularity in 20 states, 14 of them in the South, will pay off.

“I plan to be one of the two leaders Super Tuesday in the delegate count,” Gore told reporters and supporters before a $50-a-plate fund-raising luncheon in San Francisco’s financial district.

‘New Approach’

“I’m taking the new approach and campaigning on a national message: economic growth, social justice and a clear roll for the United States abroad,” Gore said.

In indirectly attacking Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis, Gore said that the next President must be equipped with foreign policy experience in order to reverse the arms race and deal with Persian Gulf tensions.

“You can’t learn it by a course at Harvard,” Gore said. “Experience in foreign policy is a prerequisite for a President.”

He criticized the foreign trade policy of Rep. Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri as “an extremist approach that would touch off a trade war” and accused him of changing his stance on issues.

“He has switched, not just on a few issues, but on issues all down the line,” Gore said.

Of civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who has firm support among the South’s sizable black population, Gore said that there is “a place for tree-shakers, but in the Oval Office you also have to make jelly,” picking up on a Jackson remark earlier in the week about being a “tree-shaker, not a jelly-maker.”

“The approach I’m taking is completely different from the others,” Gore said, adding that the question before the voters in the 1988 presidential election is “whether we’re capable of change, a fundamental change in our outlook. That’s what this election is all about.”

Won’t Name Chief Rival

Gore refused to say whom he considers to be his chief rival on Super Tuesday, but he said Dukakis, Gephardt and Jackson “all represent the old approach” to presidential primary campaigning “that lost four of the last five (presidential) elections and that voters at the grass roots are rejecting.”

“This campaign is really moving,” Gore told supporters before heading into a luncheon, expected to raise $50,000, that attracted such California party bigwigs as former Mayor Dianne Feinstein.

The luncheon at a Chinese restaurant included fortune cookies with the message: “Think some more and vote for Gore.”

Turning to issues important to Californians, who will vote in a late presidential primary on June 7 but who have lots of money to contribute now, Gore emphatically opposed the Interior Department’s plans for offshore oil drilling in Northern California.

“As President of the United States, I will put a stop to that kind of (Interior Secretary Donald P.) Hodel plan, I can guarantee that!” Gore shouted. He said he favors “ocean sanctuary” legislation before Congress that would ban new oil and gas drilling in federal waters off California.

Backs AIDS Fight

He put in a strong pitch for combatting AIDS, which is a big killer in San Francisco.