Political Hindsight Isn’t Always 20-20

SAN FRANCISCO — Forced to the sidelines as a reluctant spectator, this is how Gov. Pete Wilson handicaps the 1996 presidential race: Colin Powell doesn’t run. Neither does Speaker Newt Gingrich. Sens. Bob Dole and Phil Gramm fight it out for the Republican nomination. And Dole--”a very decent man”--wins.

Then Dole and President Clinton battle for the White House. “That should be a good one,” he says. But no prediction.

And “yes,” he answers with a one-word declaration, he’ll rule out accepting the vice presidency. We’ve heard that one before, of course, when the governor last year repeatedly said, “yes,” he’d rule out running for President.

But this is a particular promise he likely will not be tempted to break. California’s governor now has the semblance of a political corpse. And barring a quick, miraculous resurrection, it’s inconceivable any presidential nominee would desire him as a running mate.

Wilson played Pete the Prophet--and also Pete the Principled--during an audience question-answer session following an address Tuesday to San Francisco’s Commonwealth Club. It was only his second speech since dropping out of the presidential race three weeks ago Friday.

He was mellow and subdued compared to the militant, strained orator of the campaign trail. The fire had dimmed. He seemed a man still in shock and trying to deal with defeat.

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Now neutral in the 10-man Republican race, Wilson predicted that:

* Powell will decide not to run. He bases this “guess” on a private conversation with the retired general about a month ago, before Powell’s book-signing tour made him a household word.

“He said he admired people like me and Bob Dole because . . . we’ve got fire in the belly and he wasn’t sure he did,” Wilson recalled. “And he also said something else: He said, ‘I really don’t feel I have to be President to make a contribution.’ God knows that’s true.”

* Gingrich will conclude “that the odds [of winning] are not good enough for him to give up [the Speakership and] opportunity to exercise power in a way Republicans have been unable to do for the last 40 years.”

* “Therefore, we will have essentially the same field that we have now. . . . It will turn out to be a race between Sen. Dole and Sen. Gramm. And my off-the-cuff prediction is that Dole will win it.”

If Wilson had stopped there, he wouldn’t have raised eyebrows. But he started moralizing about political principle.

The governor said he hopes the Dole-Clinton race will “focus upon genuine choices offered to the voters on philosophy and programs.” But “too often [these] are subverted by false, collateral issues that have to do with character, with ethical issues. I think the public is very tired of that.”

Wilson blamed political consultants for causing campaigns to “degenerate,” but quickly added he is “pleased and proud that over these many years our team has really focused on issues.”

We’ll let that one alone--other than to note certain issues can be demagogued--and proceed straight to the punch line:

“The nation is growing more cynical. . . . There is not the belief that existed when I was a child that while politics was . . . proper sport for people like Will Rogers . . . there was at least some belief in American institutions. We’ve got to get that back. We’ve really got to get it back.

“It’s much more important than anybody’s individual political career.”

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Whoa! Talk about a politician who doesn’t get it.

Voters grow more cynical when a governor campaigning for reelection repeatedly promises to serve a full term, then after he is sworn in breaks his pledge and makes the ultimate career move. Adding to the insult, he was willing to turn over the state to a lieutenant governor of the other party.

After Wilson’s speech, reporters went to the podium and asked whether he had any regrets about his aborted race. “The regrets,” he replied, “are that we had to stop.”

“I’m convinced there is much more a President from California could do for the state than even a governor,” he continued. “The thing that I find frustrating is that most Californians really are not aware of the needless hardships they have suffered” under Clinton.

Any regrets about breaking the pledge? “I changed my mind for exactly the reasons I told you. . . . If I hadn’t believed that, I couldn’t have run.”

Wilson may have a keen perspective on the present race. But he still doesn’t have a realistic perspective on his former candidacy. Whether he’ll admit it, the governor ran because he believed the odds of winning were worth the risk--and better than they would be in 2000. Now he’s either being disingenuous or in denial.