The Search for A New Political Center : Looking to ‘96, Both Parties Should Seek an Oxymoron

Elections have a way of changing the political landscape. No matter what happens Tuesday, the old conventional wisdom about 1996 will be dead. The 1996 players will be sifting through the returns to find new wisdom.

The biggest player is, of course, President Bill Clinton. On Nov. 9, Clinton will either be the Comeback Kid or the Angel of Doom. He’ll look good if the Democrats’ losses are about average for the President’s party in a midterm--three or four Senate seats, 20-25 House seats.

Why would average losses be terrific news for the President? Because the Republicans have set him up for it. They’ve been fantasizing about a revolution. Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole! House Speaker Newt Gingrich! To the barricades!

It could happen. But it’s a reach. And if it doesn’t happen, Clinton will look like a hero. After all, every Republican is running against him. So every Democratic victory will be a Clinton save. He’ll be resurrected in the Democratic Party and a sure bet for renomination in ’96.

If the Democrats lose control of the House, however, all bets are off. The party will have lost the power base it has held in Washington for 40 years. The long knives will come out--aimed at Clinton.

Democrats will be terrified of running with Clinton at the top of the ticket in ’96. If Democrats do poorly in states with large black populations, like New York, Illinois and Georgia, Jesse Jackson will have a ready explanation: Clinton moved too far to the center and never delivered for urban voters and minorities. If Democrats get wiped out among Southern white voters, moderate Democrats like Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia will have a ready explanation: Clinton moved too far to the left and never kept his pledge to govern as a new Democrat.

Party elders will warn Clinton that if he runs for renomination, primary challenges will materialize and he’ll split the Democratic Party. Suppose he runs, anyway. Will he get the nomination? Probably. No incumbent President has ever been denied renomination by his own party, though it almost happened to Gerald R. Ford in 1976 and Jimmy Carter in 1980. Ford and Carter got renominated, but were fatally wounded for the general election. Clinton would be too.

On the Republican side, two senators have a great deal at stake in seeing the GOP win a Senate majority next week. One is Dole, who would become majority leader. But could Dole then run for President? Not without difficulty. He would assume the majority leadership in January, just in time to start raising money for his presidential campaign.

Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has an even bigger stake in the Senate outcome. He could take credit for engineering a GOP majority. But he wouldn’t have to run it. A perfect platform on which to run for President.

For other Republicans, 1994 will be a test of strength between two rising wings of the GOP. The party’s moderate wing would be strengthened by wins for governor in Massachusetts, New York, Illinois and California. Massachusetts Gov. William F. Weld is headed for a big reelection victory. And New Hampshire is right next door. But Weld has to figure out how to make himself acceptable to the religious right, which opposes him on abortion and gay rights.

Richard M. Nixon’s deathbed political prediction was that Gov. Pete Wilson would get reelected in California and go on to win the GOP presidential nomination. Wilson’s reelection now seems likely. But he has to figure out how to make himself acceptable to conservatives, who will not easily forgive him for signing a record tax hike in California.

Another potential candidate has a big stake in the California outcome--Jack Kemp. He’s for Wilson and against Proposition 187, the anti-illegal-immigration initiative that Wilson is running on. Kemp had better hope Wilson wins. If Wilson loses, whatever the outcome on Proposition 187, Republicans will never forgive Kemp for sabotaging a fellow Republican.

Dan Quayle will be looking for a religious-right surge at the polls on Tuesday. He’s aiming to become their favorite son. In fact, this election poses several tests of strength for the religious right--especially Oliver L. North’s race for senator from Virginia.

Would the election of North be good news for Quayle or any other potential GOP contender? North is not about to share the spotlight with anyone. If he got elected, North would immediately become a national hero to the right. To conservatives, North is red meat. Quayle is thin gruel.

Conservatives’ ultimate fantasy is to go to bed Tuesday night knowing that Edward M. Kennedy is out of the Senate, Mario M. Cuomo is out of the Albany statehouse, Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) is out of the speakership, and North is going to Congress.

Could it happen? The Republican base is mobilized. They’re coming out to vote against Clinton, against Congress, against liberals and against Democrats. The Democratic base--urban voters, liberals and minorities--is demoralized. Polls show a lot of them may stay home. Why?

For one thing, they’re disappointed in Clinton. He hasn’t delivered for them. He proposed comprehensive health-care reform, an economic-stimulus program, a broad-based energy tax, gays in the military, C. Lani Guinier in the Justice Department and big, new crime-prevention spending. Those proposals enraged conservatives. But he didn’t deliver on any of them.

What’s the Administration’s current agenda? Welfare reform, modest health-care reforms, deficit reduction and campaign reform. Those issues do not get Democrats to stand up and cheer.

Democratic candidates are sensing a GOP tidal wave. So they’re running as fast as they can to the center, positioning themselves as tough on crime, anti-spending, anti-tax and anti-government. That doesn’t do much to drive up Democrats’ enthusiasm, either.

In short, Democrats don’t see much to vote for. So last week, the President shifted gears and started talking about what Democrats should vote against. The President is warning that if the Republicans take over Congress, they’ll cut Social Security, student loans, veterans’ benefits and anti-poverty programs. The Democrats have put out a poster showing who would be in charge of a Republican Congress: Senate Majority Leader Dole, Banking Chairman Alfonse M. D’Amato, Foreign Affairs Chairman Jesse Helms and Speaker Gingrich. Happy Halloween!

That’s why this is such a negative campaign. Democrats are running on fear. Republicans are running on anger.

Both parties must indulge in oxymoronic thinking. No, an oxymoron is not what candidates call each other in attack ads. It’s a contradiction in terms--like “jumbo shrimp” or “working vacation.”

For 30 years, Democrats have been trying to find a tough liberal. Is that an oxymoron? Not really. Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson were big-government liberals. But they were also tough guys. They made things happen. Defy them, and you paid a price.

Since Johnson, Democrats have had a problem finding tough liberals. Hubert H. Humphrey? Not his own man. George McGovern? One thousand percent behind his running mate. Walter F. Mondale? The candidate of the special interests. Michael S. Dukakis? He got beaten up by the wimp.

The Democrats managed to elect Jimmy Carter because, after Watergate, the country was looking for a preacher. They elected one and discovered he wasn’t tough enough for the job.

Clinton looked tough in 1992. He faced down the press in the Gennifer Flowers and draft-letter controversies. He stood up to Jackson in the Sistah Souljah affair. Since taking office, however, Clinton’s image as “tough enough for the job” has deteriorated, according to the Gallup poll. Critics say Clinton has been too eager to please, too willing to compromise. His opponents, foreign and domestic, have taken advantage of him.

The impression of weakness invites aggression. It happened to Kuwait. It happened to Bosnia. And it happened to Clinton. At the end of the last Congress, his enemies overran him.

Kennedyism means tough liberalism. In the ‘70s, Democrats longed for another Kennedy to come and save them. But Ted Kennedy proved to be a flawed candidate. In the ‘80s, Democrats saw Cuomo as their savior--a tough, compassionate, street-smart liberal. Italian-American. Tough. But Cuomo declined to run in 1992. Now he’s fighting to survive.

Republicans need an oxymoron to solve their problem, too. Opposition to Clinton has energized the GOP. But it has also brutalized it. Nastiness is turning off some Republicans and splitting the GOP. In Pennsylvania, Teresa Heinz, widow of the late Republican Sen. John Heinz, called the GOP candidate running for her husband’s seat part of a “worrisome breed of politicians who mock, belittle and vilify those who disagree with them.”

Republicans need to find a nice conservative. Is that an oxymoron? Not really. Ronald Reagan was a nice conservative. And it saved him. Reagan could say harsh, divisive things. But the voters were confident he wouldn’t blow up the world or throw old people out in the snow. But with Dole or Gingrich or D’Amato or Gramm--well, you never know.

Can the Republicans find a nice conservative for 1996? Kemp qualifies. He has attacked Proposition 187 as a racist and nativist measure, not in the tradition of the party of Abraham Lincoln. Kemp’s problem is that conservatives may not trust him. If he’s so nice, they ask, can he really be a conservative?

There’s a lesson in this year’s election for both parties. Clinton has to toughen up his act and show his opponents they cannot defy him with impunity. Republicans have to stop being so mean all the time. Two years of a nasty, aggressive, Republican Congress running roughshod over a weak, ineffectual Democratic President won’t do either side any good.*