Battered Perotistas Are Aching for That Abusive Texan

CALLING ALL ROSS PEROT SUPPORTERS IN ORANGE COUNTY!

Come to your senses immediately.

You don’t like George Bush. Understandable.

You don’t like Bill Clinton. Understandable.

But to team up again with Perot?

How can you, as a self-respecting intelligent voter, possibly embrace him again? No matter how you’ve rationalized his decision in July to quit the race, the rest of us saw it clearly: He conned you, flat-out lied to you, kicked you around and didn’t bat an eye while doing it . . . and now he wants you to come home again.

And you’re doing it? You’re going back to him?

And we wonder why battered women go back to their tyrannical and abusive husbands.

“Ninety-nine point nine percent of the calls have been ‘Run, Ross, Run; Win, Ross, Win’ ” campaign worker Joel Vest said Tuesday at the suddenly hopping Perot headquarters in Irvine.

How can people be returning to the fold?

“Have you taken a look at the state of the economy and country lately?” Vest asked. “People are fed up, they’ve had it. They’re looking at this man as the only one with guts enough to fight an Establishment that’s been around much too long.”

How can you believe in him?

“The thing you have to ask yourself,” Vest said, “and one of the things that has kept me charged up and involved is, why would a man who was only on the ballot in 35 states continue to get in the other 15, 18 states? Why would he continue to spend $500,000 a month? Why would he place himself in a state that cost over a million dollars to get himself on the ballot--and that’s New York--why would he continue to spend this money if he weren’t planning to come out and run a credible campaign?”

So you think he never planned to stay out of the race?

Right, Vest said. “I think he’s an astute businessman, a shrewd strategist.”

I know the Perot people aren’t nutty, so help me God, but I no longer presume to understand them.

They argue that the other candidates aren’t saying much and that only Perot has the courage to speak his mind. It’s easy to have courage in politics if you don’t plan to get elected.

They condemn George Bush for raising taxes and Bill Clinton for probably raising taxes, yet laud Perot, who would also raise taxes.

That’s what he says now. While he was an actively campaigning candidate, Perot wobbled all over the map on whether he would raise taxes or not. Finally, he just got tired of the question and took a hike. Where was his courage then?

His supporters say they don’t trust Clinton or Bush to speak the truth, and yet they somehow suspend critical analysis over Perot’s flip-flops on the fundamental question of his own candidacy.

How quickly they forget: Perot didn’t suspend his campaign; he ended it. No matter how you want to recast his words, they were emphatic. He said he didn’t want to be President and nothing would change his mind.

Here’s what he told Newsweek magazine in July: “If I had run, it would have thrown the election into the House and would have led to gridlock. We don’t have time for that. . . . Getting out was the morally responsible thing for me to do.”

He either didn’t mean that when he said it, which makes him a liar, or he’s now being morally irresponsible by getting back in, because the possibility of electoral chaos remains.

Does he have the right to change his mind? Absolutely.

But, please, don’t charge Clinton or Bush with duplicity, when one of the best examples we have of it in recent political history belongs to H. Ross himself. Compared to Perot, Bush and Clinton look like Moses and Abraham when it comes to honesty.

In the weeks ahead, Perot may indeed sound like the last courageous American.

Please don’t fall for it. He will do it because he knows he has no chance to be President. With that knowledge secure, he can speak candidly and hope that historians buy it as courage instead of what it is: a salvage job on his reputation that was soiled when he quit in July.

Perot had his chance to be courageous when it could have made a difference to the country. Instead, he took a powder.

Now he’s trotting out the act again at a time when, under the worst-case scenario, it could skew electoral results.

By turns selfish and manipulative, then charming and regretful, Ross Perot is the battering husband of 1992 politics.

Please, folks, don’t go back to him again.

Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by writing to him at The Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, Calif. 92626, or calling (714) 966-7821.