European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - January 16, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 10 the stars and stripes thursday january 16, 1986 George will Hart shuns Colorado vote focuses on ova office i he Mart n forgiving fallow is moving with measured strides to give inc National electorate .1 second . I Lii first step is to deny Colorado i third Chance. Marl Ulso a prudent fellow is the second Democrat to inn la much of announcing Whyl he is not going to a. A our leaders Are. Of course Brave resourceful und Gallant but Sens him and Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts nude withdrawal statements that the food Neil drug administration should Label do not Kennedy s sufficient by unspoken reason far not run Ning fur president is Hinl he cannot win Hart s unspoken reason for inn running for Ilie semite in color Ndu is that vie Iory would be problematic. Even if he won with say 52 percent of the vote about 2 percentage Points better it inn he did in 1980such narrow escapes in one s harm suite do not impart much National momentum his l�74 Victory came Over an incumbent Peter Dominick who was incapacitated by the medication he was taking fur the illness that was to kill him Mart has often been n Yulii Bulc senator us when he opposed the Stampede in support of Floc Gramm Rudian fully i saw inc unseen Liness of senators tend Congress men constructing a mechanism to insulate them from accountability fur painful Biu but tit Tang choices. To help them keep office they have diluted the dignity of that office to preserve personal Power they have yielded institutional Power wholesale. Hart says i be never seen a Lipics As a Bui he plans to leave the presidency after to terms Al the Inge of it i never having had any career but politics. Kennedy s withdrawal casts Hart in the dreaded Rule of Bruni runner. The ii Nasty work but someone must do it so Why not someone who fas 1,200 Delegate last Lime besides Frundl runner ship is a function of name recognition. Two years before the i960 election the leading democratic contenders were Adlai Stevenson with 21 percent John of Kennedy with 23 percent and Estes Kefauver with 11 percent. What one democratic professional says of another possible presidential candidate rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri could be said of , too there is no mag in the Guy no yet Hun s personality has for Many people u kind of disagreeable bite. He makes Many people vaguely uneasy. A comfortable feeling about a candidate May be an inappropriate criterion for voters to use. But Hart May he exactly the wrong kind of candidate fur the first Post Reagan election. Reagan has accustomed the coun try to Ait t Usy intimacy the comfortable old Slipper feeling with its head of government. The a tributes suit Harl to inc Senate May inca David Broder now he Lefik hi9&f off it few a Colatc him As a presidential candidate. He is Cool technical and analytical utterly unlike the Man who in a Span of 4b months carried 03 mules. Marl says he is shy in Odd description for a fellow who has spent years pressing himself on inc Public without the motivation of any pressing Agenda of the sort that has animated Reagan. However Hart has enough self knowledge and perhaps plural selves to be referring to something As real As shyness an inner motor that seems disconcertingly unconnected from Public passions. What derailed his express in 1984 was the voters unarticulated worry that Hart might be working out private turmoils in Public action his vulnerability to the question where s the been was inherent in his new generation nonsense. Any Campaign with a generational theme is Apt to be intellectually vacuous in its attempt to make a virtue of Mere membership in a particular demographic group. Worse a generational theme adopted by someone who came to political consciousness in the 1960s is Apt to express the insufferable narcissism of a Small portion Harf s decision reflects vulnerability not strength three years ago when sen. Gary Hart. D-colo., began what seemed u quixotic quest for the 1984 democratic presidential nomination he told reporters thai there was Good reason for dim to ignore the Odds and move so curly. By 1988," he would say the Woods will be full of Gary what Hart discerned quite accurately and earlier than most was that inc decade of the b0.5 would be a Lime of generational change for the democratic parly. If he did t slake on Early claim to speak for thai new generation. Hart knew of hrs would be ready and willing to appoint themselves As its Leader. So far. Hurt s strategy Lias worked. While tie could not wrest the 1984 Nomi nation from Walter f. Mondale he ran Well enough to secure a higher name recognition and bigger corps of supporters around the country than any other demo cratic hopeful going into 1988. On the surface. Hart s announcement Hal he will no run for re election in col Orado this year can be read As a sign of Confidence that his Gamble of 1983 will finally pay off in a presidential Nomi nation. Why else would he give up his Senate Ecat Well there Are three reasons and each of them i think indicates underly ing weaknesses rather than strength the first is financial. Hart is carry ing a 3.4-million debt from 1984 and despite strenuous efforts was Able to pare it by Only j90d,000 last year. To pay it off raise n couple of million More for the Colorado Senate race and Hen plunge immediately in 1987 into financing an other presidential bid might have Over reached his abilities especially since he has refused since 1933 to accept political action commute contributions. The second reason is political the Colora do Senate race offered Little likelihood of producing an impressive Victory and some risk of outright defeat. Hart won by Only 19,20 5 Voles in 1980 in his pro Reagan stale. The latest Public poll a december Survey for inc Denver Post gave Hart Only a 47 percent approval rating. That was 22 Points below that for his colleague sen. Bill Armstrong. R-colo., who May have his own presidential notions. A close Victory would do Hart no Good for 1988, especially when potential demo cratic rival Mario m. Cuomo is looking Al a Likely landslide in his re election race As governor of new York. And with the poll showing Hart holding no More than 54 percent of the Vole against any of three lire known Republican challengers the risk of a lost could not be dismissed. Third Hart clearly to hints that he has a Betler Chance to achieve distinction in the next iwo years by campaigning around the country than by working in the Senate which has not been particularly hospitable to his new Only Jesse Jackson among the 1984 democratic contenders is Likely to fact Hart in the 198s primaries and caucuses. But Harl can hear the fools cps of Cuomo and half a dozen other governors and members of Congress All encouraged by the Early withdrawal of Ted Kennedy racing toward the 1988 starting line. To hold the advantage he gained by running in 19b4, Harl a Carly figures he has to be the first nearly full Lime campaigner for 1988. Bui there ii real risk in this decision in seeking to isolate himself once again from his competitors in abandoning his electoral base in Colorado and his institutional base in the Senate Hart May simply dramatize what an isolate political figure he is. Hart is the most introspective and intellectual presidential contender since Jimmy Carter aloofness Noi mental flu bib Ness has always been his real vulnerability us a politician. Mondale was akm a cheap shot when he implied Dur ing the primaries of 1984, thai Hart was Cial iau7ti=�m 4
