GrammNet
Issue 4/3/97.1

Dear Friend of Phil Gramm,

I lost the most recent GrammNet list in a computer crash, and had to go back
to a list from December of 1995.  I apologize if you had previously requested
removal from the list.  The following is the first of a series of occasional
and irregular GrammNet messages I plan to send with information of interest
to conservatives, libertarians, and other supporters of Phil Gramm.

I frequently get asked, "Is Phil Gramm going to run in 2000."  Unfortunately,
I don't know, because so far as I know, he doesn't know himself.  There is
talk that a possible presidential bid by governor George Bush, Jr., of Texas
could undermine Gramm's home base of support.  That may be true.  It may also
be the case that, without a national reputation of his own, and with his name
tainted by his father's Big Government policies, that Bush may not have much
appeal outside of Texas.

Other frequently mentioned candidates include Jack Kemp, Supreme Court
Justice Antonio Scalia, Patrick Buchanan, Lamar Alexander, Steve Forbes,
Colin Powell, Dan Quayle, and Senator Fred Thompson of Tennessee.

I thought back in December of 1994 that Jack Kemp's time had come and gone,
and while his selection as Bob Dole's running mate seemed briefly to revive
Kemp's career, his dreadful defeat at the hands of the wooden Al Gore seems
to reconfirm the notion that Kemp is no longer viable.

While Scalia might be a good pick, I think that the notion of him running
again is mostly a pipe-dream of conservative black economist and syndicated
columnist Thomas Sowell.  On the other hand, the Steve Forbes candidacy began
primarily as the pipe-dream of another syndicated columnist, Robert Novak.
 Yet Scalia, unlike Forbes, probably has more power remaining on the Court;
why would he resign that power for what would be simply a shot at--not a
guarantee of--the presidency?  This is an unlikely candidacy.  

Buchanan will doubtless be back with another round of blaming the nation's
woes--both real and invented--on dark-skinned foreigners, large corporations,
and Jews.  That's too bad, because Buchanan is the candidate most likely once
again to ensure that no conservative candidate can get a majority of
Republican primary votes, handing the nomination to another Big Government
Republican like Bob Dole. One can only hope that after the lies Buchanan told
about Alan Keyes, Medicare (which lies he stole directly from Clinton), and
American Jews that most conservatives will dismiss Buchanan as the
hate-mongering demagogue that he is.

Alexander did reasonably well in the early primaries by pretending to be
conservative on economic issues while hedging his positions on social
issues--not to mention by coming off as a nice guy, which played particularly
well here in Iowa.  With no Dole or other Big Government Republican as heir
apparent, Alexander could do quit well in 2000 if he were to run.  And with
Buchanan in the race splitting the social conservative vote and scaring
economic conservatives into supporting someone with a murky position on
social issues, Alexander could be poised to get the 2000 nomination.

Although Forbes has some good economic views, his socially liberal history
coupled with his waffling on gun control makes him at best suspect to social
conservatives and even some libertarian conservatives.  Ultimately, his
obsession with the flat tax as a cure-all for the ills of society made him
unattractive as a candidate, and brought the notion of a flat tax under fire.
 Although the conventional wisdom in 1996 held that he would definitely run
again in 2000, and it could still be right, I've heard almost nothing about
it happening again.  Frankly, Forbes could do more to forward the flat tax by
remaining a neutral supporter of the proposal.

The only one about whom I've heard less than I have about Forbes is Colin
Powell.  Colin who?  I suspected that if he didn't run in 1996 he'd find his
window of opportunity closed because American have such sort memories.  The
Gulf War will be almost ten years old by the time the primaries roll around
again in 2000, suggesting that Powell's popularity will have evaporated to a
large degree.  Furthermore the reasons he didn't run in 1996 will still be
relevant in 2000: he's willing to be the nominee if the GOP will anoint him,
but he isn't willing to suffer the scrutiny and criticism of economic and
especially social conservatives.  Although liberals in the media will
probably start talking him up again, in hopes of getting a stealth liberal
candidate, I suspect that once again he won't run.

Quayle, on the other hand, has seen his reasons for not running in 1996
disappear.  His children are older now, and the prospect of not being able to
overcome Gramm's money advantage has been dulled, if not dismissed entirely,
by Gramm's poor showing against poorer candidates in 1996.  Furthermore,
Quayle remains popular with social conservatives despite--or perhaps
because--of his pummelling at the hands of the liberal media.  Quayle
particularly appeals to the more mainstream social conservatives who might
not care too much about limiting government, but also don't care for
Buchanan's hate-mongering demagoguery.  Quayle could easily emerge as the
candidate of mainstream social conservatives if Gramm declines to run in
2000.  

Quayle's main drawbacks are his lack of sophistication and apparent
commitment on economic liberty issues, and his inarticulateness.  His
inarticulateness makes Republicans think twice about his electability in a
general election.

However, I saw Quayle put in an excellent performance as moderator of the
Iowa Straw Poll in August of 1995.  It's clear that when he has a good
speech-writer and rehearses well that he can come across quite favorably, in
part by making fun of his own shortcomings.  The self-deprecating strategy
has worked wonders for Al Gore, and so far seems to work for Quayle too.  If
Quayle retained a good speech writer and a heavy-hitting economic team, he
could actually emerge as the mainstream conservative candidate, assuming the
Gramm doesn't run.

Fred Thompson, a pro-life libertarian-conservative, was once equally popular
among the pro-life activists and the mainstream libertarian voters who read
REASON magazine.  However, so apparent waffling on abortion has injured his
socially conservative base, while his recent decision to investigate legal
Republican fund-raising along with illegal Democratic fund-raising has
probably slit his throat with most Republicans, conservative or not.  Of
course, by 2000 many voters may have forgotten about it, but don't count on
the conservative activists forgetting.

What about Gramm himself?  If he wants to run again, he needs to learn from
his past mistakes.  While the Dole-Buchanan axis ambushed him in Louisiana,
the Gramm campaign made a number of strategic errors which helped set the
stage for that ambush.  Gramm made his first mistake early on, going to Cato
Institute--an influence libertarian think-tank in Washington--and talking
about how much money he had and could raise.  (So far as I know, Gramm still
holds the one-night fund-raising record of $4.1 million.)  Gramm thought he
needed to prove he was a serious candidate, and didn't realize they already
took him seriously and wanted a rousing policy speech.  His attempt to
impress them with his viability therefore backfired, making him look like a
crass politician instead of the committed conservative that he has always
been.

The Cato debacle had wide-ranging consequences.  Not only were the Cato folks
turned off by Gramm's performance, but so were the entire Beltway and
syndicated columnist community of conservatives who do so much to shape
conservative voters' opinions of national figures.  The Cato debacle added to
the perception that many conservative elites had about Gramm that he wasn't
likeable--an impression taken from the fact that he'd rather spend time in
his district with constituents or at home with his family then hobnobbing
with them.
  
Thus for instance, Robert Novak began a long series of columns in which he
praised Gramm's policy views but trashed Gramm's personality and pushed for
the candidacy of Steve Forbes.  The Forbes candidacy clearly tore away from
Gramm a significant portion of Gramm's economic conservative supporters, just
as the Buchanan candidacy--also supported to a lesser degree by Novak--tore
away from Gramm a chunk of Gramm's social conservative support.  (Ironically,
Buchanan supporters were accusing Gramm of being too interested in economics,
while Forbes supporters were saying that Gramm was "in bed" with social
conservatives.) If Gramm is going to run again, he is just going to have to
hobnob with the conservative elite and stroke their egos.

Gramm's strategy regarding the contests before Iowa was also flawed.  He
should either have ignored Alaska and Louisiana as most of the candidates
did, or lived in each state until it's contest like Buchanan did.  Going
half-hog in both states just guaranteed that when Buchanan won in both places
it would look like he'd actually beaten Gramm, rather than that Buchanan
mobilized a hand full of unrepresentative supporters in irrelevant contests.
 This change of strategy is particularly perplexing given the extreme
emphasis Gramm put on doing well in straw polls.

Louisiana more than anything probably killed Gramm's candidacy, and the story
there is complex.  It began with the Louisiana GOP conservative establishment
deciding that they could give Gramm a boost in Iowa by having a caucus before
Iowa in which Gramm would wins hands-down.  They figured that they'd hold a
handful of district caucuses which only they would be able to find, and give
Gramm all the state delegates.  They didn't count on Buchanan using money
contributed by Dole's supporters to mobilize the Ku Klux Klan vote and get
them to the caucus meeting places.  So what looked like and easy victory for
Gramm turned into a marginal victory for Buchanan, which in the calculous of
politics translated into a rout, allowing the liberal media to give the
impression that Buchanan, not Gramm, was the real conservative alternative to
Dole.  Not until the day that Gramm dropped out of the race did the liberal
media reveal the Buchanan-KKK connection.

Furthermore, with Dole pretending to stay out of the Louisiana caucus, all
Gramm's supporters in Louisiana did was alienate Iowa Republicans who are
defensive about our first in the nation status--after all, if we weren't
first, who would come and spend their money campaigning in IOWA?
 Furthermore, as Senate Majority Leader, Dole was positioned to schedule a
vote on the farm bill on the day of the Louisiana caucuses, forcing Gramm to
choose between abandoning the state to Buchanan on the most important day of
campaigning, or missing the vote.  When Gramm missed the vote--he vote was
needed to pass the bill--Dole, aided by his friends in the liberal media,
made a big story out of Gramm supposedly not caring about farmers.  

Of course, that was sheer nonsense, as Gramm voted for the bill when Dole
re-scheduled it--cleverly AFTER the Iowa Caucuses so that Gramm couldn't
claim before the Caucuses that he'd voted for it.  Dole's manipulation of the
farm bill was devastating for Gramm in Iowa.  Gramm's Iowa campaign
headquarters was so inundated with calls about the farm bill vote that Gramm
had to switch to an automated phone system less than a week before the Iowa
vote.  So the lessons for Gramm in 2000 are: don't mess with the primary
schedule and; don't assume that just because the conservative GOP
establishment of a state supports you that they can deliver a victory for
you.  Next time around he'd be better off to focus on Iowa as the first test
and forget about the upstart wannabe contests.

Gramm also erred seriously in his TV ad campaign here in Iowa.  For one
thing, he hoarded his money until the end under the theory that only the
last-minute spending affects the outcome of the vote.  However, with other
candidates advertising early and with voters fed up with "negative
campaigning," his late ads had little impact.  Furthermore, his ads were very
serious, policy-oriented spots at a time when the most effective ads were
Alexander's feel-good goofy ads.  I wrote repeatedly to the Gramm campaign in
Washington and begged them to produce two of their own feel-good ads: one
showing Gramm in loving embrace with his wife, and the other showing what
popular Republicans like Ronald Reagan and Charleton Heston have said in
praise of Gramm.  

Only three days before the Iowa vote did they actually run the first ad, by
which time it was too little, too late.  They were never able to create the
"warm-fuzzy" feelings about Gramm that Alexander engendered with his own ads.
 Now supposedly Gramm is uncomfortable with his smile and that accounts for
his serious demeanor in his ads.  If Gramm really wants to run again, he has
to add a very high proportion of feel-good ads to his repertoire.  He's got
so show that charming, teddy-bear smile and disarming sense of humor which
work so well in person.

Another critical error came about as a result of hiring a pollster rather
than a seasoned campaigner to run his campaign in Iowa.  The pollster focused
on getting volunteers to call huge lists of registered Republicans in an
effort to drum up support.  He also relied on members of the NRA and national
right-to-life organizations to get out the gun-owners and pro-life people in
Iowa.  This too was a failing strategy.  By contrast, the Buchanan and Keyes
campaigns worked through the churches, where they were actually able to
mobilize the grassroots of the pro-life movement.  Next time around Gramm
needs to mobilize the grassroots himself with a similar strategy, and not
concede the church vote to single-issue candidates.  And he needs to take the
same grassroots strategy out to the gun clubs in Iowa as well.

A final mistake Gramm made was refusing to attack any candidate except for
Dole.  In the beginning the strategy made some sense--attack only the
front-runner or you make the other candidates you attack seem more viable.
 But once Buchanan started lying outright about Gramm (and Keyes, and Forbes,
and even Dole, whose record was so poor that one hardly needed to lie to trash
 Dole) and gaining a great deal of attention from Buchanan's buddies in the
liberal media, Gramm needed to counterattack.  He needed to point out the
180-degree turns that Buchanan had done on policies, including Buchanan's
support for the author of Roe v. Wade.  But, contrary to the liberal media
myth of Gramm, he's too darn nice.  He just wouldn't go after Buchanan, or
later, Forbes.  Next time around, if he wants to run and win, Gramm is going
to have to not pull any punches when he gets attacked.

One of the reasons I supported Gramm in 1996 and would like to see him run
again in 2000 is because he's one of the few national Republican figures who
appeals to all the different sorts of conservatives: social conservatives,
economic conservatives, libertarian conservatives and fiscal-only
conservatives.  The last Republican with that sort of appeal was Ronald
Reagan.  But back in 1980, we conservatives were mature enough to know that
we needed each other to win, and were willing to settle on a candidate we all
liked, even though he didn't march in lock step with any one of our
conservative subgroups.  

By 1996, having tasted victory in 1994 and impatient with the Bush-Clinton
roll backs of the Reagan Revolution, we had regressed to a state of political
immaturity.  The 1994 elections weren't won by pro-lifers, pro-gunners,
supply-siders, deficit-reducers, or any other conservatives single-handedly,
although many of us seemed to think we alone handed the GOP victory in 1994.
 So in 1996 many, many of us demanded a candidate who would give us chapter
and verse, and say nothing we didn't want to hear.  In other words, we acted
like Democrats. Is it any wonder that when we acted like Democrats we got a
candidate who couldn't beat the Democrats?  

We will never beat them by being like they are.  We win when we all get
together behind a candidate who offers us much, but not all of what we'd each
like in an ideal world--a ideological yet pragmatic conservative who can win
the general election, someone like Phil Gramm.

Sincerely,

David B. Levenstam, CPA, MT, MA
Gramm in 2000!