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Jewish World Review July 3, 2000 / 30 Sivan, 5760

Chris Matthews

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AlGore's latest hazard


http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- WHAT WILL AL GORE say about the Republicans to avoid defeat in November? That they will destroy Social Security, outlaw abortion, bring back the Cold War?

He's already saying that. The question is how much further he will go to win the office on which he long ago set his heart.

The polls are ominous. CNN reports him trailing Republican George W. Bush 39 to 52 percent. An absolute majority of likely voters now prefer the sunny Texas governor. A quarter of Gore's own party says it would prefer some other Democratic candidate this November.

Gore's latest hazard is that voters don't buy his denials of collaboration in the Dick Morris-Bill Clinton scam to pay for the 1996 re-election. They think he went to that Buddhist temple to get what he got: the money. They don't buy the "iced tea" defense that he was in the john when chief of staff Leon Panetta watched him being briefed on the White House "coffees" and dialing-for-dollars operation.

Gore's hope is that he can do what another Democrat did when suffering from a whiff of corruption.

In 1948, UC-Berkeley invited President Harry Truman to give its commencement address. Suffering from a 36-percent job approval rating and strapped party finances, Truman jumped at the excuse to travel cross-country at taxpayer expense.

That June, the man who rose to the presidency through the kindness of Democratic bosses and the death of Franklin Roosevelt, made history.

"I am going down to Berkeley to get me a degree," he joked to the thousand Ohio loyalists who greeted him at his first, 5:45 a.m. train stop. The trip, he assured them, was purely "non-partisan," in fact "bipartisan." It was nothing of the kind. Expected by everyone to lose the election in November, the simple man from Missouri was using the two weapons of his limited arsenal: the perks of the office and a shameless readiness to "Give 'em hell" — to say anything bad about the rival Republicans that a wavering voter might believe.

The welcome Truman received was impossible to imagine by today's standards. Forty-five thousand people came out for him at Berkeley. A million lined the streets of Los Angeles. Harder to measure was the impact in all those heartland "whistle stops" when the president of the United States himself came to visit.

Add to this the power of Truman's rhetoric in that unforgettable '48 campaign.

"The Republican gluttons of privilege are cold men. They are cunning men," he warned. "And it is their constant aim to put the government of the United States under the control of men like themselves. They want a return of the Wall Street economic dictatorship."

"Dictatorship!"

"Before Hitler came to power," Truman told voters, "control over the German economy had passed into the hands of a small group of rich manufacturers, bankers and landowners. These men decided that Germany had to have a tough, ruthless dictator who would play their game and crush the strong German labor unions. So they put their money and influence behind Adolf Hitler. We know the rest of the story.

"Dewey's election threatens the same in America!

"The lobbies which work for big business found that they could get what their bosses wanted from the Republican leaders. Is that the kind of future you want?"

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Historian Zachary Karabell, in his new book, The Last Campaign,"," writes: "For all the complaints about negative campaigning in the television age, no subsequent major candidate compares with Truman for sheer demagogy and character assassination."

"Decrying that one party is out of sync with the country is not the same as saying that one party has betrayed, robbed and defrauded the American people," Karabell adds.

On election day, California joined the Midwest and the then-Democratic South to offset defeat in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, to give Truman his victory.

This fall, another Democrat faces the danger of humiliating defeat. As in '48, many Democrats are saying they wish they had a better candidate.

Is Al Gore ready to wield the same doomsday rhetoric to avoid the harrowing unknown of defeat? Is he ready to scare voters with the same caliber of terror Truman used to dismember Dewey?

Knowing Gore, the question answers itself.



JWR contributor Chris Matthews is the author of Hardball. and hosts a CNBC show of the same name. Send your comments to him by clicking here.

Up

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06/21/00: Jerry Brown tells AlGore how to 'wage' campaign
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04/24/00: Vietnam 25 -- The good, bad and ugly
04/19/00: Nader's threat to Gore in California
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03/22/00: 'We're suckers for underdogs'
03/20/00: Bush's California dream vs. reality
03/06/00: Scary Gore vs. hopeful Bush
03/06/00: McCain's appeal to 'Reagan Democrats'
03/01/00: John McCain fits a hero's profile
02/28/00: Grading the American presidents
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02/18/00: McCain faces fury of GOP establishment
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02/14/00: McCainia and the frisky independents
02/07/00: A prime-time primary for California
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01/31/00: Which GOPer is willing to pay for his positions?
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12/30/99: Churchill's fighting words saved the century
12/28/99: Candidate Gore's separation anxiety
12/17/99: Catch 22: Leading candidates don't lead
12/17/99: New Democratic leader on the horizon
12/15/99: Is Hillary clueless?
12/08/99: Taking Buchananism to the streets
12/03/99: Why are we so obsessed with 'spin'?
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11/23/99: After the fall
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10/21/99: GOP gives Clinton his finest hour
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08/26/99: Bill's guilt fuels Hill's race
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08/23/99: GOP candidates are weak also-rans
08/16/99: Bubba on Bubba
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08/09/99: With warm regards, Richard Nixon
08/04/99: Weicker: real third party is on the Left
08/02/99: Dubyah's last hangover
07/27/99: Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh; capitalism is gonna win

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