Dukakis Attacks Critics as Using McCarthyism : Assails GOP Rival for Aides’ Activities; Bids to Regain Offensive

In the sharpest attack of his campaign, Democratic presidential nominee Michael S. Dukakis charged Friday that Republicans who question his patriotism “haven’t changed a bit” since Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy “slandered good Democrats” in the 1950s.

And he slammed Vice President George Bush for relying on “key advisers” who have lobbied for Bahamian officials suspected of “drug profiteering” and for using a campaign group led by several men who “have been involved in anti-Semitic activities or have links to fascist groups.” News reports detailed the allegations this week.

“I don’t question Mr. Bush’s patriotism, but I do question his judgment,” Dukakis said repeatedly.

After weeks of slipping in the polls, Dukakis’ hard-hitting speech to about 10,000 people at East Texas State University marked an attempt to regain the offensive in an already unusually bitter presidential race.

Dukakis repeatedly cited Sam Rayburn, the Texas populist and longtime Speaker of the House of Representatives, who attended college here, in attacking his Republican rivals.

In the 1930s, Dukakis said, the Republicans “put together the most vicious campaign of propaganda, lobbying and intimidation ever seen” to attack Rayburn and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

‘Can Smell Garbage’

“Sam Rayburn didn’t back off,” Dukakis said. “He snorted: ‘Hell, I’m a conservative, but even a conservative can smell garbage in his front yard.’

“Sam Rayburn knew that, when you fight for the real people, the other side will attack your patriotism,” he added. “He saw that when he passed the Wall Street reform bills. He saw it again in the 1950s, when the Republicans cheered as Joseph R. McCarthy slandered good Democrats and called them communists and Soviet sympathizers.”

“Those Republicans haven’t changed a bit,” he continued. “Just as they did to Franklin Roosevelt and Sam Rayburn, now they’re attacking my patriotism. And just as they did in the 1930s and 1950s, the American people can smell the garbage.”

‘Telling the Truth’

At a rally in York, Pa., Bush responded: “All I’m doing is telling the truth, and I’m going to keep on telling the truth and I’m not going to be deterred by a bunch of liberal Democrats.

“I understand that today the liberal governor of Massachusetts attacked me for questioning his patriotism. I’m not questioning his patriotism; I’m questioning his judgment.”

In an interview Wednesday with Knight-Ridder Newspapers, Bush said: “I’m right on this, and it’s not demagogic and it’s not McCarthy. And, for those who said it is, show me what I said that makes it demagogic or McCarthyesque.”

In an interview, Dukakis campaign manager Paul P. Brountas compared recent Republican attacks to the “smears, distortions and slurs” of the McCarthy period.

Symms’ Comment Cited

Brountas cited a recent comment by Sen. Steve Symms (R-Ida.), never substantiated, that he had heard that photographs showed Dukakis’ wife, Kitty, burning a U.S. flag during the 1960s.

“What do you think Sen. Symms was doing?” Brountas demanded. “What do you think Vice President Bush was doing when he questioned our patriotism? I would remind him that decency is important, even in politics.”

Dukakis’ aides appeared most concerned about the Bush campaign’s repeated references to the Massachusetts governor’s veto in 1977 of a bill that would have required teachers to lead students in the Pledge of Allegiance each day. The state Supreme Court, citing a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, had advised Dukakis that the bill was unconstitutional.

John Sharp, Texas railroad commissioner and Democratic state campaign chairman, said “lies” about the issue had cut into the governor’s support in Texas.

Rewrote Speech on Plane

Dukakis spokesman Dayton Duncan said the candidate rewrote part of his speech on the flight here from New York City after reading a newspaper report that Bush had dismissed a member of a committee formed to enlist ethnic support for the GOP.

The man, Jerome Brentar, had been active in efforts to defend John Demjanjuk, who was sentenced to death by an Israeli court in April for committing atrocities as a Nazi concentration camp guard. Jewish organizations and Nazi-hunting groups have accused Brentar and two other Bush panel members of anti-Semitic activities.

“He read that in the paper and he said: ‘These guys are questioning my patriotism?’ ” Duncan said. “He was outraged.”

In his speech, Dukakis referred to news reports that a Washington lobbying firm--Black, Manafort & Stone--headed by top Bush campaign advisers, earned $800,000 in 1985 by working for Bahamian Prime Minister Lynden O. Pindling, whom federal officials suspect of drug trafficking. The aides have denied any misconduct.

Points to Drug Profiteering

“Recently, we learned that key advisers in the Bush campaign had a contract with a foreign government, some of whose members have been under investigation for drug profiteering,” Dukakis said. “These advisers, or their representatives, had over a dozen meetings with the vice president’s staff and used their personal relationships throughout the government to help their client.

“Yesterday, we learned that a committee established by the Bush campaign to build ethnic support included one member, and perhaps others, who have been involved in anti-Semitic activities or have links to fascist groups,”

Introduced by Jackson

In Dallas later, the Rev. Jesse Jackson introduced Dukakis to several thousand people at the National Baptist Convention USA, which claims to be the nation’s largest black religious organization.

Although Jackson has criticized Dukakis and his aides recently, the former presidential candidate offered only praise in Dallas.