100 Business Leaders Join to Support Clinton

More than 100 top U.S. business leaders endorsed Bill Clinton Monday, including about 25 longtime Republicans, one of whom called the well-orchestrated event “an unprecedented show of support” for a Democratic presidential candidate.

At the same time, the campaign released a list of other business leaders who have endorsed the Arkansas governor, bringing the total to about 400.

Clinton was clearly uplifted by the endorsements, including that of Kathryn G. Thompson, who heads her own real estate development company in Aliso Viejo, Calif., in Orange County. She was a delegate to the GOP convention in 1988 and endorsed Clinton right after this year’s GOP convention.

“George Bush does not understand the complexities of our economic crisis,” Thompson declared, calling the President’s recent economic revival package “too little, too late and too political.”

Another woman, Jolyn Robichaux, who was presented the Minority Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 1983 by then-Vice President Bush, accused him of being “out of touch with the economy.”

Others hailed Clinton for his economic proposals that, one said, “will get America moving again.”

Despite such words of praise, Clinton said he is taking nothing for granted--his large lead in the polls notwithstanding.

And for good reason.

As Clinton began making his statement at a press conference in a Chicago hotel ballroom, the Democratic presidential candidate was interrupted by an intruder who shouted: “Did you stop cheating on your wife?”

Clinton did not appear to be rattled, and the man was led out of the room after about a minute, to the applause and cheers of Clinton’s supporters.

And, in a series of six satellite interviews with local television stations in Illinois and Michigan, Clinton faced a new barrage of questions about the draft, prompted by President Bush’s direct attack earlier in the day on a nationally broadcast radio talk show.

Clinton reiterated that he thinks “the facts are clear” on the matter and that those who still take issue with how he maneuvered to avoid the draft 23 years ago--or with his explanations of those actions--are free not to vote for him.

“This election ought to be about the future, not about that--or, for that matter, what Dan Quayle did to get into the National Guard,” Clinton said in a pointed reference to a Sunday New York Times story. That story alleged a “striking pattern” of favoritism that allowed Quayle to enroll in an elite unit within the Indiana National Guard at a time when there were few such opportunities for those without special connections.

Clinton acknowledged that he has had to issue a series of clarifications on the draft issue and said that the passage of time was part of the problem. “After 23 years, you forget some things. And that happened to me, and I’m sorry it happened to me. But the basic facts are clear.”

Clinton also accused Bush of flip-flopping on whether Clinton’s draft record should be an issue, noting that in February, when the matter first came up, the President said it should not matter.

In answering the incessant questions about the draft, Clinton also took the opportunity to publicize an endorsement he received on Saturday from retired Navy Adm. William J. Crowe Jr., who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for five years under Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bush until his October, 1989, retirement.

“Adm. Crowe has more credibility at truth telling than George Bush,” Clinton said.

Among those who endorsed him in Chicago Monday were Roger W. Johnson, chairman and CEO of Western Digital, a Fortune 500 company based in Irvine, Calif. Johnson said he intends to vote for a Democrat for President for the first time in more than 40 years because Bush “has not faced squarely the problems.”

Others included John H. Bryan, chairman of the Sara Lee Corp., based in Chicago, who said Clinton represents “a new generation of Democrats who appreciate the role of business in American life.”

“Over the past 12 years, I have on many occasions worked with and supported the Republican White House,” Bryan said. “I have met, and personally like, George Bush very much. However, the agenda which the Republicans have presented to us, the voters, is less reasoned, less defensible to the mainstream of America, than it has ever been before.”

James E. Acevedo, a hospital administrator from Huntington Park, Calif., called Clinton’s economic plan “the only realistic choice for business survival.”

These endorsements came a week after 30 chiefs of some of the nation’s leading high-tech companies announced their support for Clinton in San Jose, Calif.

For his part, the Arkansas governor vowed to offer “a much more disciplined, more focused economic strategy that has at its core private-sector growth--spurred by sensible public-private partnerships.”

He said containing health care costs will be at the center of his economic revival strategy. “Unless we control the costs of health care,” Clinton said, “there will be no control of the government’s budget deficit, and it will be very difficult to restore the health of the American economy.”

Clinton also injected a note of caution, warning that, if he is elected, his plan will not turn the economy around “overnight.”

“It’s going to take some time to turn it around,” he said.

With much attention focused on the fact that the first presidential debate of the general election campaign was to have taken place tonight in East Lansing, Mich.--until Bush rejected the format--Clinton took a new tack in trying to persuade his opponent to debate.

“George Bush has done well in these presidential debates in the past and in the vice presidential debates,” Clinton said. “Bush has tended to do very well when he was very well-prepared and has an aggressive strategy that will enable him to fire an arrow into the heart of his opponent.”

Bush has rejected the format proposed by the bipartisan Commission on Presidental Debates, which called for three debates that would include only the candidates and a moderator, and one debate between the vice presidential candidates.

Bush wants to use the rules negotiated in 1988. The debates would include three reporters and a moderator asking questions, and the campaigns would choose the questioners.