Media Panelists Critique Clinton, Dole p. 17

By: Stacey Jones

ALTHOUGH BILL CLINTON is the first Democratic president to win a second term since Lyndon Johnson, he did so without a majority of the popular vote.
A panel discussion at the 93rd annual Southern Newspaper Publishers Association convention on the 1996 presidential election proved Clinton's campaign spins didn't muster much support from the press either.
Gathered in the Great Hall at the posh Boca Raton Resort and Club, the SNPA assembled a panel comprised of Associated Press Vice President Walter R. Mears; Susan Feeney, Washington correspondent for the Dallas Morning News and syndicated political columnist Jules Witcover.
The group wasted no time in voicing their criticisms of Clinton, the party conventions and the campaign strategy of Bob Dole.
Mears, serving as moderator, opened the discussion by describing the presidential campaign as "listless" and stated that the president "had no substance."
"He's running on 'a bridge to the future' as though he were running for national engineer," said Mears, referring to Clinton's campaign slogan.
Feeney focused on a common post-election malady: broken promises.
"A lot of Clinton promises were dumped overboard before he ever took office in 1992," explained Feeney. "The promises Clinton made and kept is a very short list indeed."
Some of the forgotten projects, according to Feeney, include a middle class tax cut, the return of Haitian refugees to their country and prioritizing trade over human rights in China.
Feeney explained Clinton's continued success despite numerous legal and legislative blotches this way: "The skill and the talent that it takes to run a campaign is very different from what it takes to lay the groundwork for successful governing."
Dole should have had such a problem.
Lacking the slickness and personality of Clinton, Dole's White House run was a series of false starts and disappointments buoyed by momentary lifts, such as the naming of Jack Kemp as his running mate, concluded the panel.
"He was more eloquent the day he resigned from Congress than he was before or after it," chimed Mears.