PEROT WAS A WEASEL, NOT A THOROUGHBRED

Published: Sunday, July 26, 1992
Section: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON

, page 06
Type of story: Editorial

Source: Jerry Alley

© 1992 Landmark Communications Inc.

The only thing more bizarre than Ross Perot's entry into the presidential race was his exit. His supporters thought they had found a thoroughbred. Instead they got a weasel.

Perot supporters met in Virginia Beach the other night to discuss the turbulent Texan's sudden and incomprehensible withdrawal. They vowed to fight on. What they're fighting for - a change in the way politicians do our business - is easy to comprehend. What motivated Perot isn't.

First he announced on talk television that he would be happy to run for president if volunteers got his name on the ballot in all 50 states. This triggered an avalanche of support from people, apparently dedicated to the proposition that any famous billionaire with a staccato delivery and lines like ``It's time to clean out the barn'' can grow up to be president.

Perot converts plowed the fertile fields of discontent and were on their way to giving Americans a choice between three men in November. Then the man from Texas said he was quitting.

I have watched him being interviewed on television several times since he quit. I've read what he has to say. I still don't have the slightest idea what the man is talking about. My guess is that his ego got in the way.

Taking on the media in a presidential campaign can be tougher in some ways than a boardroom brawl with IBM or General Motors. Perot might have thought he could get away with floating around on a non-political cloud that eventually would deposit him gently in the Oval Office.

It didn't happen. Reporters, as they're supposed to, began asking questions.

Perot's skin wasn't tough. It was thin, and he bristled at the thought of anyone being curious about the man who would lead our nation out of darkness.

Had Perot been allowed to ascend to the throne and crowned president, he would have been happy.

But he had no stomach for the system. Granted much of the system stinks, as Perot says. But you can't be elected president without coming to grips with it. A presidential campaign is messy. Perot was naive enough to think he could avoid dirtying his hands.

Now he tells his supporters to hang in there. Keep pushing the petitions. Make your voices heard. He meets with organizers in private and lays plans for. . . well, we don't know. Is he a candidate? Will his name be on the ballot in November? If by some miracle he got elected, would he serve? Let's hope not.

I liked Ross Perot in the beginning. I probably wouldn't have voted for him. But he was refreshing for awhile and he energized, as they say, a lot of people who were turned off by politics as usual. It is those people I feel sorry for. I hope they stay interested, keep working to fine-tune government so it functions more effectively for everyone.

But Ross Perot was never meant to lead this country. He fell apart under pressure. A president can't be that way. He couldn't take advice. A president must. He was impatient. A president must not be. He treated loyalty as if it were a piece of chewing gum, something to be used until the sweetness is gone and then tossed in the gutter. Presidents don't usually behave that way.

Perot's style reminded me of someone like George Raft in an old gangster movie. He punctuated his remarks with ``see'' - as in ``See, you guys don't get it,'' when being interviewed by the media.

He was right. We don't get it. And neither do the millions of people who found hope in him. On television, they wept, denounced Perot in anger, said they were dropping out of politics altogether. Others, a majority I suspect, have been bitten by the bug of activism and will find its itch impossible not to scratch.

Michael Rau, a Perot spokesman at the Virginia Beach meeting, said, ``We don't want to be considered a lobby, but in practical terms, that's probably what it is.''

That's OK.

Practically everyone has a lobby of some sort working either for them or against them. The Perot troops, even if they march to the beat of a drummer who went AWOL at the first sign a battle was coming, are apt to be a force to reckon with in November and beyond.