Oliver North Takes a Little Friendly Skewering at Roast : Politics: Conservative Republicans poke fun at Iran-Contra figure, but aim their sharpest barbs at foes on the Left.

Oliver L. North stood at the microphone, ramrod straight, and cast a wry glance at the politicians who had just hung him out to dry. Except this time, the setting was a ballroom, not the halls of Congress.

And it was all in fun. Sort of.

“It’s nights like this that make me think seriously about seeking refuge in the Vatican embassy,” the former Marine told 570 supporters who had paid as much as $10,000 a table Wednesday to watch North served up as the main course at a “roast” at a downtown hotel.

“It is indeed a pleasure for me to be here tonight with so many members of Congress,” added North, the one-time Reagan National Security aide who was convicted of three federal crimes in connection with the Iran-Contra affair.

“This is part of my public service. If (members of Congress) are here, they’re not up on the Hill enacting legislation.”

At the business end of North’s jabs were the official roasters, evangelist and former presidential candidate Pat Robertson, Reps. Robert K. Dornan and C. Christopher Cox of Orange County, and Reps. Philip M. Crane and Henry J. Hyde of Illinois, conservative Republicans all.

They, in turn, treated the appreciative crowd to attacks on the traditional bogymen of American conservative politics, including the Congress, the state of California, Westside Assemblyman Tom Hayden, his former wife Jane Fonda, Sen. Ted Kennedy and the two openly homosexual members of Congress, Reps. Barney Frank and Gerry Studds, both Massachusetts Democrats.

Dornan told the crowd he had a telegram for North from “Gerry Studds, Congressman from Massachusetts.” Dornan paused, mustering an effeminate voice, then boomed, “Hi, sailor.” The remark drew loud applause, and a few gasps.

Dornan also read a phony telegram he said was from Fonda, who was divorced last year from Hayden, the former radical of the 1960s. “Ollie,” Dornan read, “you were right all along, Tom Hayden is flat-out ugly. An ugly, draft-dodging wimp. Jane.

“P.S. I love a guy in uniform.”

Hyde also said he has trouble getting Californians to understand the nomenclature of politics. “I once mentioned the whip, and people thought I was talking about a leather bar in Malibu.

“In California, people do two things,” Hyde added. “They jog a lot and they help a divorced friend move.”

Robertson explained the purpose of the evening. “It’s a roast. And what happens is, a man is invited by his supposed friends to come to a place where he’s going to be insulted for somebody else’s benefit.

“It’s like a congressional hearing, Ollie, so you’ll feel right at home.”

Although much of the evening’s tone was lighthearted, its purpose was anything but. North and his roasters raised an estimated $300,000 for the Washington-based Media Research Center, which publishes a conservative media critique called Media Alert. The organization is generally critical of what it perceives as a liberal bias in major news organizations.

Among those who attended the dinner of beef, salmon, spinach leaves and “harvest vegetables” were a baker’s half-dozen conservative Republican stalwarts. They included Reps. Toby Roth of Wisconsin, Stanford E. Parris of Virginia, William E. Dickinson of Alabama, Dan Burton of Indiana and James H. Quillen of Tennessee, and Sens. Orrin G. Hatch of Utah and Conrad Burns of Montana.

Also cheering on North was Joe Fernandez, the former CIA station chief in Costa Rica who was involved in aiding supply flights to the Nicaraguan Contras and passing messages between the rebels and North. After his actions were discovered, he was suspended from active duty.

L. Brent Bozell III, chairman of the organization, said later that he was only partly joking when he said at the evening’s outset, “Liberals have made careers out of vile, repugnant, below-the-belt character assassination. . . . Tonight we’re going to prove that we can do it better.”

If the roasters failed, it was not for lack of trying.

“This is obviously an occasion for levity, but I have a different reason for being here,” said Cox, who served with North in the Ronald Reagan White House.

“It’s a very personal reason,” Cox continued. “Something very important to me--an honorarium.”

Cox referred to North’s role in secretly channeling profits from Iranian arms sales to aid the rebels in Nicaragua, using Swiss bank accounts. Cox joked, “Normally I don’t accept honoraria, but the truth is it’s never before been offered in Swiss francs.”

North was convicted of three federal charges in connection with the so-called Iran-Contra affair, including destruction of government documents. He was spared jail time and placed on probation for two years.

Cox added, “Naturally, all of us who worked at the White House were disappointed when we learned that President Reagan actually had pardoned Ollie, and that Ollie had accidentally included the pardon in the batch of documents he was shredding.”

North wasted no time in returning the slights.

Looking straight at Dornan, the red-haired firebrand known for his intemperate remarks, North said: “You know, Bob is really down on moderates. That’s why he refuses to go to Rambo movies.”

North told the crowd that he was disappointed that Robertson had lost out to George Bush in the 1988 presidential campaign. “It would have been the ultimate photo op watching Pat take his morning walk across the Potomac.”

And of Cox, North said, “Since your last trip to Eastern Europe, I’ve heard it said that . . . you were getting soft on communism.”

However, North said another Orange County congressman, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, had eased North’s concerns about Cox meeting with communists.

“Dana assured me that you were simply having lunch with the Democratic delegation from California.”

Despite the barbs, Bozell later said: “This really is not intended to be an attack on the media or an attack on the Left. It’s a salute to Ollie.”

He added, however, “The underlying theme is that conservatives are sick and tired of Ollie North being dragged through the mud.”