California Campaign : Fitting the Pieces of a Rich Mosaic

In this presidential election, all eyes are on the prize--and the prize is California.

The nation’s most populous state has 47 electoral votes, more than Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia combined. Or, put another way, more than Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.

It is also among the most politically complex states, testing the mettle of any campaign to penetrate the dense California mosaic of people and issues, symbols and media. From the standpoint of the campaign managers, this is the ultimate test.

Although California always looms large in presidential races, what is different this time is that the Democrats seem to have a chance.

Since 1952, Republican presidential candidates have won California every time but once (1964). But this time Michael S. Dukakis has led George Bush here by as much as 17 points.

Tightened Up

Now, most polls show, the race has tightened up. The lead may swing back and forth several times, and it is possible that the entire national election will come down to counting the votes in California on the night of Nov. 8.

Both Bush and Dukakis already have spent a lot of time in the state and will be spending much more in the next 57 days.

For Dukakis, it is hard to figure out an electoral-vote strategy that does not include a win in California. That is because of Bush’s apparently strong base in the Southeast and in a collection of small Western states.

But Bush is taking nothing for granted, especially with Democratic vice presidential candidate Sen. Lloyd Bentsen putting on the pressure in Texas.

Bush chose, for example, to come to California for the traditional Labor Day campaign kickoff last week. And President Reagan will be here often to stump for Bush.

Symbolic Presence

For both campaigns, there is also the symbolic presence of California, with its tendency to mirror the rest of the country and generate big headlines. Both camps want to guard against gloomy reports coming out of here lest they reverberate around the country.

Behind the candidates’ stump speeches and photo opportunities is a fierce and often secret battle by strategists, media consultants and demographers, who have divided the massive job of constructing a winning California campaign into manageable components:

-The Civil War: It’s north versus south again, and in California the battlegrounds are on either side of the Tehachapi Mountains. The roots of the folks who settled Northern and Southern California say a lot about how they may vote in this election.

-The Tube: “A campaign rally in California is three people around a television set,” Democratic consultant Robert Shrum once said in describing the dominant element of state campaigns. But which is more effective this time: TV news or political commercials?

-Jesse and Ronnie: The Rev. Jesse Jackson could play a crucial role in California for Dukakis by turning out an unusually large black and liberal vote. But could he also hurt the Democratic campaign? President Reagan, California’s most successful politician, will be given one mission by Bush: Generate a phenomenal turnout in Orange and San Diego counties.

-Oil and Guns: Issues rarely decide a presidential race, in which the ultimate decision rests on such things as character and leadership. But in California, Bush could face problems with his wavering stands on offshore oil drilling. And Dukakis may be hurt with conservative Democrats because of his support for gun control and opposition to the death penalty.

-Se Habla Espanol: Dukakis hopes that his fluent Spanish will help him with Latino voters in California. But if this group does not turn out in higher numbers than it has in the past, Dukakis won’t get the edge he needs in a close race.

-Bodies versus Soul: The Bush campaign is focusing on emotional symbols in California, using the Pledge of Allegiance and the crime issue to try to paint Dukakis as a cultural liberal. Dukakis hopes to win on election day by using thousands of labor volunteers to turn out his vote.

-Sneak Preview: The campaigns may not have to wait until election day to know the score. If, after after dealing with all of the above variables, polling in selected congressional districts brings bad news, it’s possible that a campaign may quietly begin to write off the state.

Overlaying the mosaic is the consultants’ map: California’s congressional districts. The districts were drawn up after the 1980 census by Los Angeles consultant Michael Berman and the late Democratic Rep. Phillip Burton. They took into account such factors as age, race, background, roots, spending habits and voting tendencies to construct districts that are generally safe for both Republican and Democratic incumbents.

In the presidential race, all the factors that went into drawing up those districts now come into play in the constant pulse-taking the two campaigns will do before the vote.

Because of their distinct demographic flavor, the districts lend themselves to targeted polling. And that can lead to major changes in what kinds of television ads to run, where to send in extra troops to turn out the vote and where to put the candidates themselves when they arrive.

As the following explanations show, the demographics and politics in California are so complex that when the votes are counted on Nov. 8, the winner will know he earned every one of the state’s 47 electoral votes.

Strategists and media consultants for the campaigns of Vice President George Bush and Democratic presidential nominee Gov. Michael S. Dukakis are faced with an immensely complex task in California. In their view, campaigning in the state must be divided into the following components:

Divide And Conquer: The Strategy For Winning California THE “MANAGEABLE CHUNKS” OF A CALIFORNIA CAMPAIGN

The Civil War

Roots of North-South Voter Differences Can Be Traced to the State’s Early Settlers

Bill Lacy, George Bush’s California campaign director, says he bases his strategy on the premise that there are four Californias:

“It’s rural, it’s Los Angeles County, it’s the San Francisco Bay area and it’s what we call the Republican heartland--Orange, San Diego and San Bernardino counties.”

Ads, speeches, direct mail and news events are tailored for those four areas.

But in the larger sense, the Bush and Dukakis campaigns still face the two Californias--north and south. And since 80% of the registered voters in the state are white, the campaigns look to the voting patterns of this group first.

What they see are two different stories.

Northern California was settled mainly by people from the east, and demographers say their descendants are more receptive to urban, Eastern Democrats like Dukakis. That is his base in this election.

Southern California was settled by people from the Midwest and the South who brought with them more conservative voting patterns. It is Bush country.

Since there are more votes in Southern California, Bush wins, right? Not necessarily.

First of all, there is Los Angeles County, where more than 2 million people will vote this time. There is fertile ground here for Dukakis because of the overwhelmingly Democratic city of Los Angeles.

But he has to do even better than Democratic Sen. Alan Cranston did in his squeaker reelection in 1986. Cranston won Los Angeles County by 200,000 votes.

Secondly, Los Angeles Times polling has found that conservative Democrats in such areas as San Bernardino and Riverside are considering voting for Dukakis after supporting Reagan twice. Some talk about wanting more government services; others express a general dissatisfaction with Bush.

Bush will try to to run up his score so high in Orange and San Diego counties that he offsets close battles elsewhere in the state.

In raw vote totals, he has an advantage. Thousands of people have moved into those counties in the last decade and many are white, middle-class individuals with a habit of voting. Contrast that with Los Angeles County, where the many minorities arriving recently are not as likely to vote.

“The Republican districts in San Diego County have so many more voters than the older areas that they count as two districts when you are totaling the score,” said Democratic demographer James Wisely. “When we reapportion after the 1990 census the growth down there will probably mean two or three new congressional districts.”

But both camps concede Dukakis has a fighting chance to keep it close in Southern California while he tries to drive up his numbers in the north.

In the north, the Golden Gate Bridge is the road to riches for Dukakis. In liberal San Francisco, Walter F. Mondale beat Ronald Reagan by 190,000 to 88,000 in 1984.

And on the other side of the bridge, in Marin County, consultants say, Dukakis should win big too. Its high education level and concern about the environment are a good fit for the Democrat. Once, a Rockefeller Republican could have taken Marin. But Bush has gone right as Reagan’s partner and that means he’s down in Marin.

Consultants in both parties say that Dukakis also has the edge in the following: The misty north coast; in vote-rich Alameda County; in the areas going east toward Sacramento, including Vallejo and Davis; in Sacramento County; in parts of Santa Clara County, and in Monterey County.

More uncertain for Dukakis, but winnable, are Contra Costa County to the east of San Francisco, and most of San Mateo County to the south.

Oil and Guns

Offshore Drilling, Death Penalty Stand Could Tip Balance

Presidential races usually hinge on broad themes. But in California, there are several issues that could tip the balance in a close race.

One is the environment, particularly offshore oil drilling. Few can forget the devastating spill from an oil rig off the coast of Santa Barbara in 1969.

The issue is so delicate that GOP Sen. Pete Wilson pushed Bush to disown the Reagan Administration’s willingness to sell new drilling plots off the northern coast. Bush finally agreed last spring.

But recently, Bush and his running mate, Sen. Dan Quayle, told Texas and Louisiana audiences they were very much for offshore drilling in those states. Dukakis will warn Californians that they would drill here, too.

Bush, for his part, is going after Dukakis on two other issues of historic interest in California. One is Dukakis’ support for gun control, which was rejected by voters in 1982. The other is Dukakis’ opposition to the death penalty, twice approved by overwhelming margins in ballot initiatives.

Those sound more like gubernatorial issues than presidential ones, but they could hurt Dukakis with conservative Democrats in such areas as the San Joaquin Valley and Riverside-San Bernardino if they create the impression that he is a cultural liberal.

Bodies versus Soul

Dukakis Counts on Organized Labor While Bush Focuses on Symbols

When he comes into California and talks about the Pledge of Allegiance, patriotism and such issues as the death penalty, Bush hopes to continue the Republican mastery of symbol and emotion developed by Reagan.

Dukakis is counting on something else: Lots of bodies to volunteer for voter turnout efforts in key precincts.

Republican Gov. George Deukmejian talks about having his “organization” help Bush in the same way. But in reality, California Republicans have never been able to rely on the kind of volunteer manpower the Democrats can summon on election day.

The reason? Organized labor. It is the one large group in the state that can mobilize hundreds and even thousands of people to walk precincts, call voters and even, in some cases, help them get to the polls.

Also, California’s environmental activists can be an organizational factor in coastal areas, and they will swing behind Dukakis.

Democratic Sen. Cranston believes an aggressive voter turnout effort by both those groups was the single biggest reason he barely won reelection in 1986 by 100,000 votes.

Dukakis strategists say that to win California they have to get 1 million more votes than the 3.9 million Mondale got here in 1984. If their turnout effort succeeds, a third of that 1 million will be “loyal but lazy” Democrats and the rest will be swing voters.

On the other hand, if the Republicans have the most compelling message for independent-minded voters, the Democratic turnout efforts may be in vain.

Jesse and Ronnie

Heavyweight Campaigners Face Prospect of Dwarfing Candidates They Stump For

Democratic presidential candidates get about 90% of the black vote, so Dukakis could benefit in a close race from an unusually large turnout in the four congressional districts with large black populations.

Those districts are: the 8th, which includes Oakland and Berkeley; the 28th, which includes neighborhoods around the Los Angeles Coliseum; the 29th, which is south-central Los Angeles, including Watts, and the 31st, which includes Compton and Carson.

The man who can truly excite those voters is the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

But Dukakis strategists worry whether high visibility by Jackson here could drive away the conservative Democrats Dukakis is trying to woo in such places as Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

Working that one out will require all the skills the Dukakis campaign can muster.

On the other side, there is no better person than Ronald Reagan to drive up the vote margins for George Bush in the GOP strongholds of Orange and San Diego Counties.

“I am convinced we are in the midst of a Reagan renaissance,” chortled Bush campaign manager Lee Atwater the other day.

A recent poll done for The Times had Bush ahead in Orange County by a whopping 32 points. But the real focus will not be victory percentage. It will be the raw vote. Can Reagan turn out so many voters that they offset closer contests for Bush in the swing areas?

Also, will Reagan hurt or help if he campaigns in those swing areas? Times interviews there find some of those voters becoming disillusioned with the man they voted for twice.

One thing is certain: As personalities and as campaigners, both Jackson and Reagan dwarf the two nominees in media-mad California.

Se Habla Espanol

Potentially Large Bloc of Hispanic Voters Tends Not to Turn Out for Election Day

In presidential races, the Democrats can usually count on getting 55% or so of the Latino vote in California. But because many recently arrived Latinos do not to go to the polls, the raw turnout is not all that high compared to the population.

Latinos make up more than 20% of the California population but are only 8% of the registered voters.

That’s bad news for Dukakis, who will need every vote he can lay his hands on if the race is as close as it promises to be. But he has three aces in the hole in his effort to get more Latinos to vote.

First, he reminds them that he is the son of immigrants. Second, he and his running mate, Bentsen, both speak Spanish. Although Latino activists point out that a candidate has to do more than speak Spanish to get Latino votes, it’s an advantage.

Finally, another factor favoring Dukakis with California Latinos is the presence of several voter registration and turnout programs financed by congressional and state Assembly candidates.

On Bush’s behalf, campaign manager Atwater says the Democrats are overestimating their pull this time with Latinos--”This election is about values, and our (conservative) values appeal to Hispanics.”

Sneak Preview

Both Parties Keep Close Watch on Pulses of Several Vital Congressional Districts

Because presidential campaigns must carefully target their resources, knowing who will win California on Nov. 8 isn’t good enough. Mid-October is more like it.

So, in California, look for Dukakis and Bush to take the pulse in the several key congressional districts. And since Bush has such a large and strong base in Orange and San Diego counties, Dukakis will be the one on tenterhooks.

Democratic demographic expert James Wisely says there are two districts in Northern California to watch: One is the 7th, east of San Francisco, which includes Contra Costa County.

It has a Democratic congressman, George Miller, but Dukakis will have to work hard to convince some of these voters he is not another Mondale. Reagan did fine here, and Wisely says the many corporate managers living here may go for an Organization Man like Bush.

Since Northern California is Dukakis’ base, bad poll numbers in the 7th District are very bad news for him.

The 15th District, which takes in Modesto and the mid-San Joaquin Valley, also has a Democratic congressman, Tony Coelho. But many of the voters here are wary of Democratic presidential candidates and could respond to Bush’s charge that Dukakis is another of the party’s “cultural liberals.”

On the other hand, there are a lot of immigrants and children of immigrants here; at a Modesto rally in July, they responded strongly to Dukakis’ reference to his immigrant roots.

Also, such government services as libraries and ambulances have suffered in the 15th District during the Reagan Administration.

Since this area was good to Reagan twice, polling that finds disillusionment and a tendency to support Dukakis could mean that the Democrat is catching on beyond his bases in the Bay area and Los Angeles County.

In Southern California, the polling by both campaigns will be closely watched in two congressional districts.

The 32nd District includes heavily blue collar sections of Long Beach and San Pedro. The voters there keep electing Democratic Rep. Glenn M. Anderson but also went for Reagan twice. Dukakis needs to get back many of these conservative Democrats if he is to win California.

Polling in mid- to late October should indicate if they are being receptive to him.

The other district in the Southland to watch is the 36th. Liberal Democratic Rep. George E. Brown Jr. survives here each time because he has a big minority population in his district.

The Dukakis and Bush camps will poll the conservative white Democrats in this district. They went for Reagan twice but have shown signs of coming home to the Democratic Party. Again, good numbers for Dukakis here could mean he is attracting enough conservative Democrats around the state to squeak past Bush on Nov. 8.

The Tube

In a Media Center, Ad Blitzes Will Face a Highly Sophisticated Viewing Audience

“TV owns 75% of the gubernatorial and senatorial election processes--and 100% of the presidential.”

So said the late Republican consultant Bill Roberts. He was talking about the combination of political ads and the stories that appear on the nightly news.

Which is more important in California this time? There are different opinions within the Bush campaign.

“I have thought for a long time that TV ads are overrated in a presidential campaign,” said Bill Lacy, who is directing Bush’s campaign here. “I’d say that what’s on the TV news, among the many other elements of a campaign, is what matters.”

Minutes later, Lee Atwater, Bush’s national campaign manager, offered a different view:

“Generally, I would say that TV news is more crucial. But this race is going to be so close that TV ads could ultimately make the difference.”

He was talking about the potential for Bush’s ads to deliver a simple message: “Let’s continue the peace and prosperity of the Reagan years with a man who is prepared for the job.”

So important is television to Anthony Podesta, director of Dukakis’ campaign in California, that he said in a recent interview: “Look, my main interest is media markets. Los Angeles is one market and it has a third of the entire vote in the state. The Bay area is another market. It has a fourth of the vote.”

In television terms, there are 11 ADI’s, or areas of dominant influence in California, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Fresno and Sacramento. To run commercials, the most expensive is Los Angeles, where it can cost more than $20,000 to air a 30-second spot in prime time.

Both campaigns now face a major decision: How many negative ads--attacks on the opponent--should they run, and how many positive ones--ads about their own man? The best approach is the “two-track,” an equal mix of each. But that is enormously expensive.

And Democratic consultant Karen Kapler warns that either kind of ad could be a waste of money in California.

“More than any other state I have worked in,” she said, “California has been so saturated with political advertisements in the last 10 years that I think the ads are losing their effectiveness. People are on to the hype. They aren’t buying it.”