Dukakis Scoffs at Criticism From GOP

Democratic presidential nominee Michael S. Dukakis today brushed off criticism heaped on his party at the Republican National Convention as barely noticeable.

It was, he said, “like a day at the beach” compared to the attacks on him during his unsuccessful 1978 bid for reelection as governor. Dukakis won back the governor’s office in 1982 and gained a third term in 1986.

“Facts are stubborn things,” Dukakis told a news conference, borrowing the phrase President Reagan used Monday night in New Orleans to detail what he said were the untruths raised by the Democrats at their convention.

“Last month the national crime rate went up. Last week, interest rates went up. Today the trade deficit went up again,” Dukakis said.

“This is a nation that eight years ago was the largest creditor nation in the world. Today we are the largest debtor nation in the world. That’s the consequence of eight years of borrow and spend, borrow and spend.”

He said those facts are the ones “we are going to be debating in the course of the next 85 days. These are the reasons I believe the people of this country are going to elect a Democratic President.”

Dukakis, on a swing through central Massachusetts, said that if he is elected President, he hopes to submit a balanced budget in the fourth or fifth year of his Administration.