Nixon to Bush: California Lost, Avoid ‘Fanatics’

Former President Richard M. Nixon has some words of advice for President Bush: Your campaign is in trouble.

Right now, your chance of winning stands at about 30%. California’s a lost cause--don’t waste time or money trying to win it. Get off the family values thing; it’s turning undecided voters off. Stop hanging around with “fanatics” like the Revs. Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell; they’re ruining the Republican Party. Most of all, offer a more positive message; that’s the only way you can win.

Bush and campaign czar James A. Baker III haven’t asked Nixon for his advice, but the former President has been offering it indirectly, meeting with members of Congress and old political associates to offer his view of the campaign.

Here, according to several people who have spoken with him, is what Nixon has to say:

Bush’s chance of winning is 30%. He still has a reasonable shot at reelection, but he is starting from behind.

He won’t win unless he stops his futile effort to win California, concentrates his energy on Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and New Jersey, and develops a more positive message.

Bush isn’t doing as well as he ought to in Ohio and New Jersey.

The religious right, in its exercise of power at the Republican Convention, was “worse than the Goldwater Republicans” of 1964. “The Goldwater Republicans were fanatics, but at least they were fanatics about communism; these people are fanatics about moral issues that shouldn’t be political questions,” Nixon is reported to have said.

“Baker has done a good job solving the ‘how’ (the mechanics of the reelection effort), but the campaign has to focus on the ‘why.’ ”

According to one source, Nixon has even suggested that Bush won’t deserve reelection if he can’t present a stronger, more positive program. In that case, the former President reportedly mused: “It might be better for the country if (Democrat Bill) Clinton wins.”

Charles Black, a senior adviser to the Bush campaign, said Nixon’s advice has reached the Bush campaign through intermediaries. He said he considers much of the advice to be sound.

“President Nixon is a very wise man,” Black said. “His point about the positive message is exactly what we started doing (last week) in the President’s speech presenting his economic agenda.”

Black and other campaign aides said they don’t know why Bush and Baker have not asked Nixon for his advice. A friend of Nixon said the former President hasn’t offered his thoughts directly because he thinks he should wait until he is asked.

But by talking to members of Congress and others, wasn’t Nixon making sure the message got through anyway, just as he did last spring with a widely circulated memorandum that accused Bush of doing too little to aid Russia’s new democratic reformers?

“You’re not suggesting that Mr. Nixon has a Machiavellian side, are you?” one of Nixon’s contacts joked.

Nixon’s office did not respond to a request for a comment from the former President.

According to several people, Nixon has been most upset by the rise of the religious right as a dominant faction in the Republican Party, fearing that its fierce opposition to abortion and its emphasis on evangelical Christian beliefs could drive younger and less-devout voters away from the GOP.

At the convention, he thought Falwell, conservative leader Phyllis Schlafly, Robertson and former conservative candidate Patrick J. Buchanan “were running amok,” said one contact. Nixon wondered why such moderate, secular conservatives as former Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Hanford Dole, Massachusetts Gov. William F. Weld, former New Jersey Gov. Thomas H. Kean, and Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar did not play a role.

Nixon’s worries echoed comments from 1964 GOP candidate Barry Goldwater, who warned early last month that including a strong anti-abortion plank in the Republican platform would cause Bush’s reelection campaign to “go down in a shambles.”

Black said the Bush campaign considers those worries overstated. “We’ve already made an adjustment to that,” he said. “The gay-bashing, Hillary-bashing, Woody Allen stuff--you aren’t hearing that anymore.”

On campaign strategy, Nixon “definitely feels California is lost,” one associate said. “That means (Bush) has to carry Texas and Florida, and he’s got to take four out of four swing states,” meaning Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and New Jersey.

“He’s mildly disturbed that the trends in New Jersey and Ohio have not come back as quickly as he thought they should,” the associate said.

He said Nixon cited results in local polls in New Jersey and Ohio to support his point, and noted that the former President still keeps track of dozens of local races.

Several Bush campaign officials said they are not yet ready to take Nixon’s advice on abandoning California, however.

“California is too big and too important for us not to go all out, all the way,” said Black. “If you’re a good chess player, and you know that the other player can’t win without a state, you go after that state.”

He noted that a recent San Francisco Examiner poll showed Bush 10 percentage points behind Clinton in California--a margin similar to that in other states.

“We’re not in any more trouble in California than we are in many other states,” agreed Bush campaign political director David Carney. “I honestly think California will be easier than Illinois.”