‘Top Gun’ Turns His Sights on an Unruffled Bates : Elections: Duke Cunningham may be the congressman’s strongest challenge for the 44th District since Bates came to office, but that may mean little when November rolls around.

Like the highly decorated Navy fighter pilot he once was, Republican congressional candidate Randall (Duke) Cunningham often lapses into the swaggering, cocky vernacular of his former job to describe his campaign for what he hopes will be his new profession.

Cunningham dismisses his opponent, Rep. Jim Bates (D-San Diego), as “just another MiG, and an unethical one.” When the two debate, Cunningham predicts, he will “shoot down” Bates, “knock him right out of the sky.”

Asked about the formidable challenge of opposing a four-term incumbent whose party holds a more than 3-2 voter registration edge, Cunningham smiles wryly and says, “I’ve come through tougher missions and beaten bigger odds.” In short, Cunningham views Bates as “a pretty easy target” in their 44th Congressional District race.

Bates, however, exudes confidence that he, not Cunningham, will be the “Top Gun” in this political battle. Toughened by a bruising June primary campaign dominated by debate over Bates’ sanction by the House Ethics Committee on sexual harassment charges, the former county supervisor and San Diego City Council member feels he has already survived his toughest challenge of this political year.

“If voters wanted to trade me in, they would have done it in the primary,” Bates said. “It’ll be a tough race, but I’m not sure it’s going to be as tough as the last couple ones.”

Though Bates’ southern San Diego district was specifically crafted to be “Repub lican-proof” by the state legislators who drew its boundaries, the combination of candidate and circumstance has caused Cunningham to be widely seen as potentially the strongest challenger to face Bates since he won the newly created seat in 1982.

One of the most decorated Navy pilots in the Vietnam War--where he became an ace by shooting down five enemy planes--the 48-year-old Cunningham also served as director of Miramar Naval Air Station’s “Top Gun” fighter pilot school, the inspiration for the popular film of the same name. In 1983, Cunningham attracted international headlines when he accompanied an 11-year-old California pilot on a trip duplicating Charles Lindbergh’s New York-to-Paris flight.

A staunch conservative who says he represents “the traditional values lacking in Jim Bates,” Cunningham capitalized on his celebrity at candidate forums during last spring’s primary by distributing photos of himself in his flight jacket. A Cunningham brochure also showed him with “Top Gun” star Tom Cruise--a photo later pulled when Cruise’s agent objected.

Calling Cunningham “one of the better candidates we have around the country,” Ed Rollins, co-chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, describes the 44th District race as among the top two dozen congressional contests nationwide.

Party leaders’ interest in the race was piqued by the five-candidate primary scramble for the GOP nomination, a prize that, as one also-ran’s campaign manager noted, “normally . . . is worth about as much as a case of smallpox.”

Evidence that national GOP leaders believe that Cunningham has a credible chance can also be found in the fact that a number of high-profile party officials will visit San Diego on his behalf--the type of commitment rarely made in a heavily Democratic district where general elections typically are races in name only.

U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Jack Kemp and Michigan Rep. Guy Vander Jagt, the NRCC’s chairman, appeared at Cunningham fund-raisers here last week. Vice President Dan Quayle is scheduled to do the same later in the campaign, and Cunningham aides are negotiating with former President Reagan over dates for another major fund-raiser--events aimed at raising a $400,000 campaign budget.

Comforted by the district’s demographics, Democratic officials have categorized Bates’ bid for a fifth two-year term as a “third-tier” campaign--a seemingly secure race that will be closely monitored in the event that late special assistance is needed. Bates, who hopes to raise about $300,000, benefited from a fund-raising visit from House Speaker Thomas Foley here earlier this summer, and expects Democratic Majority Leader Richard Gephardt of Missouri to also make a local appearance.

Beyond Cunningham’s name recognition and assiduously self-promoted “right stuff” image, the GOP’s hopes hinge largely on the prospect of a voter backlash over Bates’ ethical woes--a possibility that failed to materialize in the two races since the charges surfaced late in his 1988 reelection campaign.

Last year, the House ethics panel rebuked Bates over two female staffers’ complaints that he sexually harassed them via suggestive remarks and gestures, and expected aides in his Washington congressional office to solicit campaign contributions, a violation of House rules.

In sending a “letter of reproval”--the lightest possible punishment--to Bates, the ethics panel ordered him to write personal apologies to the two women. Bates also agreed to hire a professional consulting firm to develop sensitivity training for him and others in his office concerning attitudes toward female employees.

Although the allegations attracted wide press coverage in the closing weeks of the 1988 race, Bates turned back Republican Rob Butterfield by a convincing 60%-37% margin. His challenger in June’s Democratic primary, lawyer Byron Georgiou, built his uphill campaign around the same issue--running on the slogan “The Democrat We Can Respect”--but also was trounced, 63%-37%.

Bolstered by those two lopsided victories, Bates characterizes the incident as “old news” with rapidly declining political impact. As he has from the outset, Bates attributes the controversy to “some kidding and flirting around,” arguing that, technically, he was not found guilty, since the reproval letter precluded any action by the full House.

“It gets less important with each election,” said Bates, a scrappy, streetwise campaigner. “I don’t know how many times in how many campaigns it can be brought up, but I’m sure (Cunningham) will try. But if it hasn’t changed people’s minds by now, it never will.”

While saying that he does not plan to emphasize the issue, Cunningham pulls no rhetorical punches when asked about the topic, which he contends will play a significant role in the election’s outcome--the past two races notwithstanding.

“This guy is a sexual pervert who’s guilty as sin,” Cunningham said. “These women were violated. I don’t need to bring that up because, by now, everybody knows what a jerk this guy is. He’s a disgrace, unfit for any public office.”

In choosing between Bates and Cunningham, voters can look to stark contrasts in the two men’s personal backgrounds, political philosophies and positions on major issues. Two minor candidates--Libertarian John Wallner and Peace and Freedom Party member Donna White--will also appear on the ballot in the 44th District, which covers downtown and southern San Diego, extending from Linda Vista south to Otay, and also includes Lemon Grove, National City and Chula Vista.

While most of Bates’ adult life has been spent in public office, Cunningham spent most of his in the military, although he was a high school coach and teacher before entering the Navy and now heads a small company that markets aviation products.

Fiscally conservative but a moderate to liberal on most social issues, Bates has compiled a strong environmental record and played a much-publicized role in exposing military procurement excesses. In contrast, Cunningham hews to a rigidly conservative line on most issues, illustrated by his opposition to abortion and gun control, two of many measures on which he differs with Bates.

As highlights of his 7 1/2-year congressional record, Bates points to his efforts to tighten military purchasing practices; his sponsorship of key health and environmental legislation, and helping to secure funding for expansion of the San Diego Trolley, to address the border sewage problem and for other local problems.

Proud of his heavy emphasis on constituent services, Bates, whose local office is open six days a week and who routinely puts in 12-hour days, has taken to half-seriously billing himself as “America’s hardest-working congressman.” Critics, however, contend that his emphasis on resolving constituents’ problems with the federal bureaucracy has minimized Bates’ legislative achievements, an argument Cunningham underlines by sniping, “A congressman has to do more . . . than find lost Social Security checks.”

But that attention to what some dismiss as the unglamorous minutiae of his job has long been Bates’ major political asset. Even in non-election years, the 49-year-old Bates returns to San Diego on most weekends, spending hours politicking door-to-door and attending endless community events.

“He’s done a great job solidifying his base,” conceded primary loser Georgiou.

Cunningham, meanwhile, stresses in his public appearances that he would like to be known as “the education congressman”--a variation of the theme used by George Bush in 1988--and also cites drug control as a major objective. A frequent speaker in schools in the “Say No to Drugs” program, Cunningham also helped Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Coronado) draft legislation authorizing the use of military forces in controlling illegal drug trafficking.

“If you want to compare records, look at the fact that . . . I’ve never failed at anything, whether it was as a coach or teacher or at Top Gun or the Pentagon,” Cunningham said. “That tells you a lot more than how someone voted on this or that. Anyone can push a button. I got things done.”

While he hopes to keep Bates on the defensive, Cunningham has had to put out several political brush fires of his own.

A former Del Mar resident who moved to an apartment in Chula Vista to enter the race, Cunningham now lives in Mission Valley--though Bates questions, as did Cunningham’s primary challengers, whether he will remain in the 44th District if he loses in November. Cunningham, however, says that his Del Mar house is for sale and that he plans to make his permanent home in the 44th District, regardless of the election’s outcome.

During the primary, Cunningham also was embarrassed by an opponent’s revelation that he did not vote between 1966 and 1988. Pointing out that Cunningham was in Vietnam during part of that time, one of his brochures--responding to what some of his aides saw as an attack on his patriotism--noted that he “voted for all of us with his blood.”

Cunningham also was roundly denounced for a mailer that attacked his major primary opponent, Joseph Ghougassian, an Egyptian-born Armenian who served as U.S. ambassador to Qatar from 1985 through 1989. Beneath sketches of Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi, a Saudi Arabian prince and an oil barrel dripping dollars, the mailer accused Ghougassian of being “bought and paid for” by Arab oil interests.

After Ghougassian called the mailer “blatant racism” and another GOP candidate described it as a “racist, KKK-type attack,” national Republican strategist Rollins issued a stern public rebuke of his own. In apologizing, Cunningham said the brochure was not an attack on Ghougassian’s ethnicity, but rather was simply intended to point out that he had received campaign donations from several Mideast businessmen and oil company representatives.

Cunningham hopes to use more recent events in the Middle East, however, to boost his candidacy. Believing that the tensions in the Persian Gulf play to his strength, he has used the crisis between the United States and Iraq to further distinguish his own record from Bates’ “defense-bashing.”

“I can tell you every weapon (Iraqi President Saddam) Hussein has, their range, their tactics and our tactics,” Cunningham said. “I know which weapons systems we should or shouldn’t be developing. . . . All Bates wants to do is cut and then cut some more, without any real knowledge of what problems that causes. If we get into it over there, Jim Bates, by cutting back on defense, is going to be directly responsible for losing American lives.”

But Rick Taylor, Bates’ campaign consultant, argues that, if the Iraqi crisis casts a major shadow over the race, the Democratic incumbent will be well positioned to address the broader questions posed by it, thanks largely to his disclosure of the military procurement gaffes.

“Cunningham’s experience might be useful out in the desert, but in Congress I want the guy who’s cut out the $675 ashtrays so we can spend the money efficiently,” Taylor said.

Similarly unimpressed with Cunningham’s rhetoric, Bates dismisses his GOP opponent as someone who “might be happier in an F-14 than in Congress” and a “blank check for the military.”

“He sounds pretty one-dimensional, doesn’t he?” Bates said. “Maybe he ought to think about running for secretary of defense instead.”