Subject: (Editorial):  Lessons for Republicans
Date: Published: 11/9/89 (61 lines)
Source:  Wall Street Journal.  Copyright Dow Jones & Co. Inc. 

    REVIEW & OUTLOOK (Editorial):
    Lessons for Republicans

    We've said it before, we'll say it again:  First thing we
 do, let's kill all the consultants.
    The problem with political consultants is that everyone
 knows that the dummy on his knee is made of wood.  The problem
 with the Jim Courters, Pete Dawkins, George Voinovichs and
 Rudy Giulianis is that the average voter can instinctively
 sense that the words, policies and soundbites pouring out of
 their mouths were poured into their heads by someone else.
    The politics of hollowness is hardly the sole province of
 Republican candidates now.  No one we know is ordaining as
 national leaders yesterday's Democratic victors in New York
 City or New Jersey.  But if campaigns today are waged
 increasingly by men whose ambition upstages their ideas or
 beliefs, then Republicans are usually going to lose.  They and
 their handlers better take a long look at the way Republicans
 run for office.
    Why not start by looking at a candidate who knew who he
 was and what he believed in -- Ronald Reagan.  It is one of
 the great ironies of American politics that Ronald Reagan was
 for eight years described by the press as a stage-managed
 President, someone whose politics were fashioned by Dick
 Wirthlin's polls and Mike Deaver's camera angles.  This is the
 man who is remembered by the public, as candidate and as
 President, for his constantly stated promise to deliver on
 the same set of issues:  lower taxes, less government, more
 economic growth and pride in U. S. citizenship.  If they run
 hard on real issues and with genuine rather than feigned
 conviction, Republicans can win.
    Yes, Ronald Reagan opposed abortion and supported the
 conservative "social issues" that the pundits said would
 drive away the mythical Moderate Voter.  What was missed by
 the pundits and now by Republicans is that Ronald Reagan kept
 faith with his values but also stuck the quixotic social
 campaigns in the back of the bus and put the positive
 Republican agenda up front in the public eye.  (The pro-life
 activists, meanwhile, might want to consider whether their
 litmus test and their electoral efforts are going to result
 in fewer abortions or more abortions.  Tactics matter.)  
    But nothing so plainly positive as campaigning for
 economic strength will suffice for the modern Republican
 candidate.  Jim Courter is the candidate who said he would
 fire a public-school teacher known to have AIDS.  He is the
 candidate who tried to outbid his opponent for the state's
 environmental vote by citing Southern California's antigrowth
 pollution-control program as a potential solution to New
 Jersey's congested traffic.  And along the way he was also
 against taxes and for auto-insurance deregulation.
 Republicans have to learn the difference between a political
 position and a clay pigeon.

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