Campaign Volunteers Celebrate 62nd Birthday of Ross Perot

Passionate supporters of Ross Perot congregated Saturday to celebrate his 62nd birthday, stir enthusiasm for his unannounced candidacy and sculpt an eight-foot likeness of the man they would make President.

“We just have to finish with the chicken wire, plaster him and we’ll be done,” said Michael Racine, an Oxnard sculptor. Racine and several friends volunteered most of their day molding a plaster-of-Paris sculpture of Perot.

By midafternoon, the bust had taken shape but was lacking Perot’s most prominent feature--his ears. “We’ll stick those on last,” Racine said.

Racine estimated it would take four hours to complete the bust that he was fashioning in the parking lot of his Oxnard gallery. Once completed, he said, it will be donated to the campaign and probably placed at its Ventura office on Main Street.

Festooned with banners, balloons and a “Happy Birthday, Ross” sign over the door, the Main Street headquarters attracted a steady flow of about 50 people an hour throughout the day. “They just keep walking in,” said Irene Bragg, 58, a campaign coordinator.

“I figure he’s just the only salvation we’ve got,” said Art McBride, 61, an engineering consultant from Camarillo. “I can’t see anything in the other candidates that impresses me.”

Speaking to volunteers at the open house, Bob Hayden, a Ventura resident and state chairman of the Perot petition drive, dispelled rumors that Perot might announce his candidacy on his birthday. “We haven’t heard anything,” Hayden told the disappointed crowd.

A table offered Perot-for-President T-shirts, buttons and bumper stickers. Supporters gathered around a television to watch videotapes of Perot’s recent appearances on Larry King and “60 Minutes.” Frank Stark, a 46-year-old musician, offered background music, including “We the People,” a song he wrote about the Perot movement.

“He’s a straight talker,” said Stark, who voted for Democratic presidential nominee Michael Dukakis in 1988. “We may not agree with him on all issues, but you can’t buy him,” he said.

Most of the supporters said the Perot campaign marked their first experience in politics. “I’ve never done this before,” said Scott Buonocore, 35, a carpenter who organized the open house. “I was never politically active.” Buonocore said he was impressed with Perot’s “straight talk” and his “sense of austerity.”

“He’s a billionaire but he still drives an ’89 Buick,” Buonocore said, echoing the sentiments of many who attended the open house.

“He doesn’t have to buy the election, we’ll give it to him,” said Bill Ransbottom, 47, campaign coordinator for the Central Coast. Now that Perot has submitted ample signatures to qualify him for the California ballot, the campaign will concentrate on getting out the vote precinct by precinct, Ransbottom said.

Betty Langer, 68, a retiree from Ventura, said she became a volunteer because the Bush Administration is not getting the job done. “I’ve been a Republican all my life, but now I’m an independent,” she said. “I never dreamed I would be an independent. I thought they were people who wanted to be different.

“I saw some of the volunteers in the Midwest,” she said as she studied a map tracing the Perot campaign’s progress across the United States. “They look just like we do.”

“The people I was talking to weren’t voting for parties, they were voting for someone who could turn this country around,” said Herb Loeb, 68, referring to his work as a Perot petitioner. Loeb, a retired sales manager, compared Perot to the Rev. Billy Graham, the popular evangelist. “He fulfills a need.”

“That’s right, we need him,” Langer added.

Back at the Oxnard sculpture gallery, Racine and his friends discussed Perot’s candidacy as they built the replica based on an image they found in a newspaper.

There was at least one skeptic among the four sculptors. “I’m waiting for the (dirty) laundry to come in,” said John Shippey, a 43-year-old artist from Ventura. Shippey said he was referring to possibly damaging revelations about the Texas billionaire that have yet to surface.

“If nothing else, he gets the people back into the process,” said Jim Smolin, 41, a jeweler and goldsmith from Oxnard. “He’s added another dimension to the campaign.”