Buchanan Accepts Reform Party Nomination

Pat Buchanan accepted the Reform Party nomination for president Saturday night, vowing “to save our country from being sold down the river into some godless new world order” and welcoming his supporters to “the last red-meat convention in America.”

“At long last we have somewhere else to go. We have a home of our own,” he told the cheering crowd at the Long Beach Convention Center. From the stage festooned in red, white and blue, his face projected behind him on a large screen, Buchanan looked out on rows and rows of what he has dubbed his “peasant army.”

Addressing party founder H. Ross Perot, he said: “Without you, Ross, there would be no Reform Party; let’s go out and do battle together.”

Earlier in the day, his rival, John Hagelin, who has been nominated for the presidency by a dueling Reform Party convention just blocks away, chose multimillionaire Nat Goldhaber, an Internet entrepreneur, as his vice presidential running mate.

The choice of Goldhaber, 52, an Oakland resident and a devotee, like Hagelin, of transcendental meditation, should energize, at least financially, the party faction that bitterly split last week from the Buchanan supporters. Goldhaber has pledged the use of his two personal airplanes and some of his sizable fortune for the White House run.

The pledge, reminiscent of the Reform Party’s beginnings in the checkbook of Texas billionaire H. Ross Perot, may mean that the anyone-but-Buchanan faction will be able to go forward even without the $12.5 million in federal matching funds that are due to the Reform Party nominee.

Goldhaber drew a distinction, though, from Perot. “I think Perot has just a wee bit more money than I do,” he told reporters.

Buchanan backers and Hagelin supporters say they are the rightful recipients of the federal funds and will file claims for the money with the Federal Election Commission. The matter will go before an FEC board of three Democrats and three Republicans.

In an interview with Associated Press on Saturday, Buchanan acknowledged that without the matching funds and without coverage in the media it might be “impossible to win.”

Hagelin, in contrast, said he believed his portion of the Reform Party was in better shape, adding that “$12.5 million will not make or break the Reform Party of the United States of America.” To loud cheers he said, “It will break Buchanan, on the other hand.”

In Buchanan’s speech, he outlined his “America First” agenda, inviting “homeless conservatives locked up in the basement at the big Bush Family Reunion” to “come on over.”

Buchanan hit all his usual notes, from his staunch anti-abortion position to pledges to “chop down” the Internal Revenue Service and dismantle the Department of Education. To tremendous cheers, he said he would throw the U.N. out of America, end involvement with the World Trade Organization and guard the Mexican border with troops brought home from overseas.

He steered clear of the strident personal remarks on culture and morality he released in a written manifesto earlier in the week.

On Saturday night he spoke against affirmative action policies, saying, “No discrimination means no discrimination,” and vowing to end racial profiling and racial preferences.

He said of his adopted party: “There has to be one party willing to drive the money-changers out of the temples of our civilization.”