PERSPECTIVE ON THE GOP SENATE RACES : Hard Work Still Gets More Votes : Despite the disgust with professional politicians, pure ‘outsiders’ in the Republican races are looking bad in the polls.

In their background and in their beliefs, the leading Republican candidates in California’s two U.S. Senate contests show more diversity than their Democratic counterparts. One way or another, the leading Democrats are all professional politicians. As to their positions on the issues, it would be surprising to find any of them straying one iota from the agenda laid down by the National Organization for Women or the Sierra Club.

The Republicans, like the Democrats, have two incumbent congressmen on the ballot, plus John Seymour, a political pro who was appointed to the Senate by Pete Wilson. We also find a pop songwriter, a radio commentator and a college professor. Overall, the views of these candidates range from conciliatory centrism to prickly conservatism. The California races suggest that the GOP remains the party of ideas, hospitable to more diverse candidates and a broader spectrum of opinion than the Democrats.

If pollsters are to be believed, the voters this year are looking for salvation from outsiders. The Republicans have outsiders, but that may not be enough. Consider Sonny Bono, the songwriter, entertainer and one-term mayor of Palm Springs. He is a candidate for the “long” seat--the vacancy created by Sen. Alan Cranston’s retirement. Bono tells interviewers that he has succeeded at all of the things that he has done without the usual qualifications. He never could read music, yet he wrote 10 hit songs; he had no business credentials, yet he ran a fairly successful restaurant, and so on. His unconventional background only seems to disqualify him for politics, he implies; once again, an unanticipated success may be just around the corner.

Popular entertainers can do well in fields for which they appear unqualified, as Ronald Reagan showed, and Bono certainly has the name recognition. Unlike Reagan, however, he has given the impression of not being terribly interested in the issues of the day. At the state GOP convention in February, Bono took part in one of the debates but rather conspicuously read most of his answers from a thumb-indexed notebook. The questions were confined to the most topical issues, but he obviously had not thought them through at all. That really is disqualifying, with or without political credentials.

Bill Allen, a professor of government at Harvey Mudd College, who is running for the “short” seat held by Seymour, presents the opposite problem. He has thought a good deal about current political questions, but few people have heard of him. An eloquent black conservative who was chairman of the Civil Rights Commission under Reagan, Allen lends credibility to Republican criticisms of inner-city pathologies. But unheard ideas have little impact, and statewide candidates must buy television time to have any hope of reaching the electorate.

Allen might have done better to run for one of the several open House seats this year and, if victorious, run for the Senate later. This was the path taken by another GOP college professor, Tom Campbell. As it is, Allen will divide the conservative votes also sought by Rep. William Dannemeyer, probably ensuring that Seymour will win.

Even without Allen, Dannemeyer would have faced great difficulties. He has been engaged in a cultural war, taking on homosexuals, the permissive society and the “virus of atheism” that he claims has infected our schools, courts and so on. Maybe it has, but such a message must be dressed up with diplomacy and tact if it is to be delivered statewide. His demeanor on the campaign trail suggests a fatalistic indifference to such concerns.

Seymour, then, seems set to win the nomination to the “short” seat--not a brilliant prospect for Republicans, and certainly not for conservatives. Seymour’s best-known legislative contribution to date has been opposition to a much-needed reform that would permit the transfer of water rights in the state. This pleases farmers, but it will encourage a continued waste of water. Seymour is so cautiously centrist that there may be little to choose between him and the probable Democratic nominee, Dianne Feinstein.

A Historic Race

The main event in the Republican column this year is the contest between Rep. Tom Campbell of Palo Alto and Los Angeles radio commentator Bruce Herschensohn. One or the other will surely win the nomination to contest Cranston’s seat. It may be one of the more important GOP races in the state’s history. Its outcome is likely to influence the state GOP in the years ahead. Both are outstanding candidates in many respects, and with significant philosophical differences between them:

Campbell supports abortion rights, gay rights and the civil-rights legislation enacted last year that jeopardizes employers who hire certain groups in the “wrong” proportions. Herschensohn opposes all of these positions. He supports offshore drilling, waxes eloquent about the excesses of environmentalists and jokes about delta smelts. He supports “flat-tax” legislation (and did so before Jerry Brown).

Campbell opposes offshore drilling and supports desert-protection laws. At the same time, he rises above the humdrum level of garden-variety liberal Republicanism. Seeing Congress at work in his first term made a fiscal conservative of him in his second. He now has a proposal to link spending cuts to automatic reductions in the income tax rate--a proposal that might at last succeed in bringing the neglected taxpayer to the bargaining table of budget negotiations. Unlike some prominent (and anti-defense) Democrats, he did not resist the recommended closure of a military base in his district. He supports the “Brilliant Pebbles” strategic defense program.

A tenured professor at Stanford, with degrees in law and economics, Campbell is far more intelligent than your average pol. Yet he has mastered the political skill of making everyone he meets feel they are uniquely at the center of his attention. Herschensohn is a conservative idea man, more comfortable discussing “sunset” legislation and tax-reform proposals than bracing himself to do what big-state candidates have to do to survive: solicit money. Campbell, by contrast, has that rare quality of earnest and sincere ambition that is essential in big-state politics. Herschensohn’s support is the more intense, but, at the moment, polls suggest that Campbell, who has raised a good deal more money, will win. If he does, determination more than ideology will probably have been the decisive factor.

Tom Campbell may be on the verge of showing that professionalism, whether by a professional politician or an “outsider,” is the deciding factor. It’s not a matter of who has a better grasp of the relevant issues, but of who works harder at it.