August 25, 1976

Ford Copying Truman: Attack, Attack, Attack

"Running scared" is supposed to be good politics - and the Republicans came out of the starting chute in Kansas City like jack rabbits.

A pair of events there demonstrates that President Gerald Ford takes seriously the popularity polls showing Jimmy Carter 20 points ahead of any GOP candidate.

First, Ford chose Senator Bob Dole as his vice-presidential running mate.  This was a surprise inasmuch as Senator Howard Baker was considered the front runner with his Southern appeal to counter-balance the Democrat nominee.

Dole has a reputation as a "cutting edge" campaigner.  His first reference to Carter was "A Southern-fried McGovern."  Not elegant phraseology, but it sticks in your mind.  He is a battler with acid tongue and sharp wit, characteristics Ford feels will complement his easy-going, nice-guy style.

Second, Ford agreed to debate Carter on national television.  Already, four meetings are being arranged.  Ford's decision to go this route astonished all students of political strategy.  It is rule one in the political primer that an incumbent has everything to lose and nothing to gain by giving the challenger equal billing.

Ford begins his campaign as if he is the little-known underdog striving for recognition with front-running Carter.  The president apparently has accepted the psychological position charted by the pollsters.

Republican pros are apprehensive over the prospect.  They remember too vividly the famous Nixon-Kennedy debate in which Nixon presented the most reasoned arguments but lost the election because 50 million viewers were more fascinated with the drops of perspiration trickling down five-o'clock shadow cheeks.

Personally, I dislike political debates.  They place too much emphasis on personality, charisma, good looks.  I believe in issues.  The most important ones are much too complex to be decided by catchy rhetoric or a pretty smile.

Some place in our elementary schooling we pick up a phobia for political debates - probably from the prominence given in history lessons to the Lincoln-Douglas debates which, incidentally, failed to elect Lincoln.

People who like to pull wings off flies, or prick their fingers with pins, certainly find political debates entertaining.  They enjoy seeing candidates suffer.  I find confrontations distracting, like worrying whether the beautiful performance of a trapeze artist will be marred by a fall.

Yet, the political debate may be a gamble that Ford has to take.

That famous Carter smile carried the former Georgia governor through the early primaries where his opposition was a dozen fellow Democrats of various liberal shades.

In the last eight primaries, in which he had real opposition, Carter lost six of the contests.

When he was challenged on specific national and international problems by Moe Udal and Governor Jerry Brown, Carter wilted.  All we know for sure is that Carter says his views are "compatible" with those of super-liberal Walter Mondale.

During the past two years, President Ford has had to take exact positions on some tough issues.  Like him or not, the voters know where he stands.

Ford believes that the dominant mood of Americans today is conservative, even though most shun the label.  If so, and many political observers agree, then an expose of Carter's liberal tendencies would alert the voter majority.

The president is not scintillating in his speech making - his acceptance speech being a notable exception - but he knows his subject in great detail.  Challenger Carter will have difficulty stretching his limited knowledge and experience to match Ford's.

On the other hand, there is a strange mood for change in the country.  In the past, a period of peace and prosperity meant four more years for the incumbent.  Perhaps a desire for old values of integrity, which Carter espouses, may now outweigh the traditional "gut issues" of individual pocket money.

President Harry Truman faced the same kind of mood and same kind of odds when he ran for election to his first full term.  He whistle-stopped the country lambasting a "do nothing" Congress.  His slashing campaign turned the voters around and he won by a narrow margin.

Undoubtedly this strategy is uppermost in the mind of President Ford as he seeks election to his first full term also.

He hopes history will repeat, and Ford gives every indication of copying Truman's winning formula: attack your opponent, attack Congress and attack the complacent mood of the voters.

Author: Lindsey Williams