Perot Tactics May Be Too Unconventional to Have an Impact

Even as independent presidential candidate Ross Perot aired his first television commercial on Tuesday, there were signs that his self-proclaimed “unconventional” campaign might be a bit too unconventional to capitalize upon voter dissatisfaction with President Bush and Democrat Bill Clinton.

Six days after re-entering the presidential race, the Texas billionaire has demonstrated none of the usual inclinations of a presidential candidate to consult with experts, press the flesh, traverse the country or even get coverage on the evening news.

Perot has made no public appearances--nor does he have any scheduled. Instead, he has closeted himself in his North Dallas office for most of the last six days, personally writing and rewriting his television commercials.

Although he has complained bitterly that the news media do not let him voice his opinions, he has declined at least one opportunity to discuss the issues on NBC’s “Today” show. He said he could not be interviewed on these subjects because he had to rush off to an important meeting.

At the same time, Perot has refused the help of political professionals, including speech writers. He has chosen to rely on his own unique phraseology, declaring that the North American Fair Trade Agreement would put “a giant sucking-sound vacuum on what used to be industrial America.”

Even his first television commercial--the centerpiece of his effort to appeal to disaffected voters--defied all political wisdom. Instead of a punchy 60-second spot, he aired a 30-minute video of himself sitting at a desk in front of an American flag and talking about the nation’s problems.

Perot, whose half-hour commercial aired in Los Angeles after the baseball playoff game Tuesday, used the opportunity to criticize officials of the Ronald Reagan Administration for using their positions as stepping stones to high-paying jobs in industry or as foreign lobbyists.

“If we get there,” he concluded, “we’re going to clean up this mess on day one.”

But polls show that he has failed to build the momentum that his dramatic re-entry into the race might have afforded a candidate who had been ready to mount an aggressive, full-blown campaign. The latest Times Poll gives Perot no more than 9% of the vote in a three-way race.

Perot’s actions have been so peculiarly self-defeating as to raise questions about his intentions.

“He clearly does not want to do what candidates do to make their case,” observed Stephen Hess, political scientist at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “Either he is incompetent and doesn’t know how to do it, or he’s frivolous and has no intention of doing it.”

Another close observer, former House Speaker Jim Wright, who lives in nearby Ft. Worth and has known Perot personally for many years, said the billionaire’s campaign strategy so far demonstrates that his objective is not to win the presidency.

“Somewhere in the back of his head he has a notion that what he’s doing is good for the country,” said Wright. “I don’t think, at this juncture, he really expects to be elected.”

Perot himself refuses to discuss his campaign strategy. But his volunteer spokesman, Orson G. Swindle III, acknowledges that the campaign so far has not measured up to the usual standards for a presidential candidate.

“I know this doesn’t sound like a grand strategy, folks,” Swindle told reporters recently. “I know it’s a disappointment. It’s not a conventional campaign. It’s all you’ve got with us.”

As Swindle sees it, Perot is relying primarily on the upcoming nationally televised presidential debates, as well as his television commercials, to appeal to voters.

Perot’s supporters around the country say they have invited the candidate to address rallies in their regions, but he has declined. Swindle insisted that Perot had not ruled out making appearances, but felt that trips beyond Dallas would distract him from his work on television advertising and his preparation for the debates.

Perot’s reluctance to press the flesh would be easier for his supporters to accept if he had not consistently criticized other candidates for failing to meet with “real people.” On Monday, for example, Perot advised Bush to “spend more time where the people are--go to Walmart, go to Home Depot, got to K mart, go to where the people are and listen.”

Perot’s first 30-minute video was filled with off-the-cuff, folksy observations that characterize Perot’s normal speaking style. Referring to government officials who become foreign lobbyists, he quipped: “Now this will break your heart, this is like a general switching armies in the middle of a war.”

By and large, Perot has spurned professional help, choosing instead to be his own campaign manager, scheduler and speech writer. Swindle frequently refers to this as “letting Mr. Perot be Mr. Perot.”

Some of Perot’s homespun sound bites are genuinely clever and effective. When asked if he was going to be a spoiler in the election, he quickly replied: “It was already spoiled.”

But when he was asked about the North American Free Trade Agreement, Perot uttered one of the clumsiest sound bites in the history of American politics:

“If you had a choice of having a one-time surge of jobs to help another country create factories and ship machinery to them or to have those factories and that machinery in your country and create jobs for decades, which is better? We’re going to get a bubble surge building an industrial Mexico and then we’re going to have a giant sucking-sound vacuum in what used to be industrial America.”

Perot’s campaign has sometimes been so amateurish that political professionals in both parties are dumbfounded. “It’s bizarre,” said a top Democratic strategist, who declined to be identified. “ . . . If there is a strategy there, it eludes me.”

Still, Perot and his people do not abide press criticism of their strategy, nor do they acknowledge the accuracy of national polls showing that their efforts could have no impact on the race between Clinton and Bush.

Perot has no pollster himself. But Swindle said he trusts straw polls taken by Perot supporters or radio talk show hosts, which give the Texan “something on the order of 26% to 35%, almost consistently.”

Times staff writers John Broder and Paul Richter, in Washington, contributed to this story.