Perot Yet Again Sidesteps Big Issue: Is He Running?

Like a veteran boxer, he bobbed and weaved. Like a coy schoolboy, he flirted. And after an hour spent gazing through a television lens into America’s living rooms Thursday night, billionaire H. Ross Perot came no closer than he had before to answering the most pressing question he was asked: Is he running for President?

That, Perot said, is in the hands of the people who have been overburdening telephone lines by calling in by the hundreds of thousands to beg him to run, who have been organizing petition drives in 50 states to get him on the November ballot as a third option to the Democratic and Republican candidates.

“Right now, each of the 50 states is beautifully organized,” Perot told CNN talk show host Larry King, adding that he believes he will make it onto all 50 ballots.

Reminded by King that he had told viewers during a February appearance that he would run if he made every ballot, Perot replied: “You heard me say it, and my word is good.”

But a few minutes later, he said he was not running, at least “not yet.”

“It’s up to the people,” he added.

Perot’s appearance on King’s show was a reprise of his Feb. 20 visit, when he first broached the idea of running for President. Since then, the Texas magnate has engaged in a nationally televised flirtation with the notion of a third-party campaign financed out of his own deep pockets.

But if viewers tuned in to learn much about Perot, they had to listen hard. The man whose political cachet is his outsider’s status displayed a veteran politician’s dexterity for avoiding specifics.

He accused politicians of hiding the vast scope of the national deficit from Americans as if it was “a crazy aunt in a basement.” But he did not say what he would do, apart from gathering top-notch officials together to solve the country’s economic problems.

Asked whether he supported former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr.’s proposal that the income tax system be scrapped in favor of a 13% flat tax, Perot said he had not yet studied it.

“I do think we need a new tax system,” he added. “I think the old system is like an old inner tube that’s been patched by every special interest in the country. So let’s start with a blank sheet of paper.”

He said he supported environment protection, but indicated he would not do so at the expense of jobs, and called the state of Israel “our friend” but stopped short of a specific position on the ongoing Mideast peace talks.

Perot also edged around the subject of gun control, a particularly touchy one in his home state of Texas.

“The problem is to get the guns out of the hands of the violent people,” he said. “I don’t really care if you keep a Patriot missile in your back yard if you’re a collector. I don’t care. But if you shoot it, I get worried.”

Registering guns wouldn’t solve the problem, he said, so he suggested bringing together law enforcement officials and the National Rifle Assn.--who have long been at loggerheads--to “figure out” a solution.

“This is the way you solve problems,” he said.

While not overwhelming his audience with specifics, Perot did salt his remarks with some of the upfront, blunt ripostes that have come to characterize him. One such exchange occurred when he was asked during the call-in portion of the show whether he belonged to country clubs that excluded blacks and Jews.

“Yes, I do,” he said, “and I go there about once a year and all my Jewish friends in Dallas have had a great deal of fun with me over this. If it bothers the people, I will quit immediately.”

He joined the clubs, Perot said, because “it’s a good safe place for my family to swim and do things like that.”