Workers Remember Defense Job Losses : Bentsen Bucking Record of Jimmy Carter in Texas

As far as Roy Marchman is concerned, the candidates can skip the speeches because he knows the record: When Democrat Jimmy Carter was President, he was laid off at Bell Helicopter; under Ronald Reagan’s Republican Administration, he’s done well as a tool maker at General Dynamics.

“There are a lot of things I don’t understand about the way the government operates, but I do understand that,” said Marchman, a registered Democrat.

Although Marchman said he is considering giving the Democrats another chance, experiences such as his explain why Democratic vice presidential nominee Lloyd Bentsen had a tough assignment Tuesday when he visited the 27,000-employee General Dynamics plant here to try to convince its workers that they would fare better with a Democrat in the White House.

GOP Warns of Shutdowns

Bentsen’s home state of Texas is one of the largest recipients of federal defense dollars; and, in statewide television and radio advertisements, Republicans have suggested that electing Democrats could ultimately mean shutting down defense plants and closing military bases.

“When liberal Democrats talk about slashing defense spending, they are not just talking about America losing ground, they are talking about Texans losing jobs,” legendary test pilot Chuck Yeager says in one of the Republican ads.

Bentsen argues that, no matter who is elected, deficit pressures mean an end to explosive growth in defense spending. But, in speeches in the last two days, the Texas senator has tried to sell the idea that, under a Democratic administration, this relative austerity does not mean fewer jobs.

Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis would shift defense emphasis further away from nuclear weapons and toward conventional forces, which provide more work for the defense industry, he said.

Sees California Being Hurt

As Texas party Chairman Bob Slagle put it, defense cutbacks under the Democrats would affect only “stuff in California and places like that,” which get a greater share of the federal investment in nuclear weapons.

Bentsen, in his speech to General Dynamics workers, characterized the GOP attacks as “a total distortion . . . . Chuck Yeager came in here and said we’re going to close down all the plants. That’s just not true.”

“Michael Dukakis and Lloyd Bentsen support a strong national defense for this country of ours,” Bentsen said at the General Dynamics plant, which manufactures the F-16 on a mile-long assembly line. Indeed, he has often noted that it is the Republican Administration that has proposed cutbacks in F-16 production and Democrats who have defended the fighter.

At a rally a few hours later in Owensboro, Ky., Bentsen reaffirmed the ticket’s pledge to maintain a strong defense. “A second-best defense system has all the value of a second-best poker hand. All it does is cost you money,” he said.

Many of the workers in Texas who listened to Bentsen were skeptical.

“I don’t believe, in the long run, that the liberal viewpoint, which is anti-defense and anti-military, will maintain the factory,” Marvin Wood Jr., a mechanic, said. “We had a little (setback) in the Carter years. We lost a lot of ground.”

Not Convinced by Union

Workers said that they were not even convinced after their union, the International Assn. of Machinists, endorsed the Dukakis-Bentsen ticket. “The union officials are supporting Dukakis, but the rank and file is not,” said Tom Shepard, an inspector.

But many of the workers said that they like Bentsen, who has solidly conservative credentials and has been ranked in polls as Texas’ most popular elected official.

Even if they don’t vote for Bentsen on the national ticket, many plan to express their support for him by simply turning to the second contest on the ballot--the Senate race. An unusual Texas law has made it possible for Bentsen to run for both offices at once.