Midday; The voting patterns of Super Tuesday

It's our down point ninety five. You're listening to midday over Minnesota Public Radio this is a member supported broadcast service. You're tuned to chaos Jan. 13 30 Minneapolis St. Paul currently in the twin cities mostly sunny skies 41 degrees the wind northwest at 9:00 12:00 o'clock exactly is the time we'll get to our conversation about Super Tuesday and the way we pick our presidential candidates with Jerry Joseph and Bill Morris in just a minute. But now that it is 12 o'clock I can pass on some of the information from the Legislative Auditor the Associated Press got a hold of the copy of the auditor's report on the renovation of east cliff and. Asked us not to say anything about it until the embargo time of 12 O'clock in Seoul. Here it is. The auditor's report says that the University of Minnesota Board of Regents should have asked questions about the remodeling of east cliff the university president's residence. The report also said President Kenneth Keller and his wife should not have become so directly involved in the project. The audit of spending on each cliff in the cost of remodeling Keller's campus office suite is being presented right

now at a meeting of the legislative Audit Commission eclipse renovation totaled nearly one and a half million dollars more than twice the original budget while the remodeling of Keller's office cost nearly $200000. Among the auditors conclusions are that university procedures and controls for reporting building projects to the board of regents are inadequate and were not followed by administrative staff. The report also concludes that the regents should have an ambiguously approved a work plan and a budget for the east cliff project before any work began. And even without clear approval the report said the university administration should have periodically reported back to the regents about the status of the project. We'll have more about the east cliff renovation project later in some of our news broadcast but I wanted to bring you up to date on that report which just made available for release right now. Well we had a lot of information in the news about the Super Tuesday results and some analysis of those results and we're going to continue in that vein during the hour today.

Our conversation will evolve I hope into a discussion not just about yesterday's results but about whether this system we have of picking presidential candidates is a good one. How well it works what some alternatives might be and what the practical political roadblocks to some changes might be as well. My guests are Jerry Joseph a senior fellow at the Humphrey Institute at the University of Minnesota and Bill Morris president of Decision resources limited and independent polling firm folks it's nice to have you in studio thanks for coming in. Jerry Joseph has served as a member of the Democratic National Committee former vice chairman of that group. She was a national committee woman for 12 years at a time in fact when a number of party reforms were being discussed and adopted. Bill Morris is also a lecturer in political science at Augsburg College. He has been state chairman of the party in Minnesota from 1983 and he served as a member of the Republican National Committee.

Well let's get your thoughts first on the Super Tuesday results on the Republican side first of all. Bill let me ask you Is there any stopping George Bush at this point. Highly doubtful at this point. When a candidate is able to assemble half of the votes needed at the convention it usually requires a major disaster to get him off track. And unless something pops on the perhaps on the Iran-Contra controversy or something else of the moment George Bush looks like the inevitable nominee. Jerry do you agree with that. Yeah. For your book it was a super Super Tuesday. Well what does what does Bob Dole do now is there anything that he can do to salvage his candidacy. Well the kinds of themes that Dole has run up until now haven't been playing all that well. He's brought up some very interesting questions about leadership. Brought up some fairly telling points on the Iran-Contra for the

Iran-Contra controversy. But beyond that he really hasn't had a major impact outside of the Midwest. One could also generalize a little bit he tends to do better in the Super Tuesday primaries in the agricultural areas in North Carolina come to mind. So he seems to be a regional almost special interest. In some ways a candidate unless he can broaden that by a fairly divisive decisive showing in Illinois I'd say that little campaign is pretty much over. We heard in the news report that Jim Engle did from National Public Radio a little while ago that Pat Robertson insists he's in it right down to the convention. Why do you suppose he's doing that what's his goal. Well I think zealots tend to look at these kinds of things as Crusades and Robertson clearly has in mind not only seeking the nomination but impacting the platform. And clearly with the platform being at stake you know where to maximize his impact he's going to have to stay and collect those

delegates in the upcoming caucus states. And Jack Kemp if you think he'll drop out. I think currently what people ought to be doing is putting a mirror under Jack Kemp's nose. For. In terms of his organization Jack Kemp really was the big loser. I think both sides and Super Tuesday to the point where many people I think are beginning to wonder whether or not he'd be a credible addition to the ticket as vice president which was mentioned earlier. Just what if a Democrat can can pass into that Republican conversation. I think there are a couple of very interesting and revealing things about the Dole campaign a number of people I know thought he would do extremely well and were very interested in his candidacy. And these are Democrats I'm talking about. They were amazed that his organization seemed to do so poorly or that there seemed to be a lack of organization and they also were disturbed by his after the New Hampshire defeat. He was he became angry and sort of sulky and which would indicate

a kind of Finn's Kyung that you just better not have at this stage in presidential politics. I think that they were disappointed in the kind of campaign that he ran but there was another I heard this morning another other interesting fact that I guess I would not have anticipated and that is that in the exit polls. The IMF treaty and Bush's instant support in wrapping himself around it and staying close to Reagan on that issue the possible signing of an I and if treaty worked in his favor. So obviously people were paying close attention to an arms control issue in the Bush and Dole if you remember instead of immediately saying yes the thought this was terrific he wanted to take some time to study what the agreement was all about. Very rational approach but it didn't help him politically. You know I would agree if you look temporizing at the the early stages really didn't you mention the

Democrats which brings up an interesting point the exit polls also show that there was very little crossover against Democrats to the Republican side. And I saw that and in fact 10 percent of the Republicans actually crossed over into the Democratic primaries. That's a very very disturbing for us for November irrespective of who the other nominee is. Let's talk about the Democratic results and that's pretty much split between three candidates Dukakis Gore and Jesse Jackson. Jerry what do make of that any surprises there as far as you're concerned. Oh I don't think there are any really big surprises. There was certainly a focusing on segments of the population in order to do it which is one of the things that I don't particularly like about the way we're now running this whole presidential selection process. DUKAKIS focused on those people he thought he could win and I think he won them. Jackson certainly did the same. And as did Gore. So they're all going into the rest of the country and taking their message with them I think that Gore will have the hardest time. It wouldn't surprise me

to see him do much less well and you know other parts of the country. DUKAKIS seems to be emerging as a possible frontrunner. He is very slightly the front runner now but he clearly he's gone to the various parts of the country he has presented his message and he has been supported by a large number of Democrats. So he may be the person to beat or the person to win. All right. 6:58 6000 that's our telephone number if you would like to join this conversation with Joseph and Bill Morris in other parts of Minnesota our toll free number is 1 800 6 5 2 9 7 0 0. And in the surrounding states you can call us directly at area code 6 12 2 2 7 6000. Bill any thoughts on the results of the Democratic side. I tend to agree with Gerry. I think that Dukakis now is going to be advantaged by virtue of the calendar coming up for the primaries as we go into the industrial states. That ought to be Dukakis territory.

One of the interesting things that I think I saw in this it might have been on ABC last night where somebody was talking about the results of a poll in California. That showed that almost any Democrat could beat George Bush. Where as Bob Dole would win in California are the Republicans going to nominate somebody who really can't win on the broad scale come November. Let's say that he can win and George Bush can't. That's his theme and does it point out some deficiency in the way we're going about selecting candidates. Well I think there's always been that problem electability when we're talking about that of the nomination process has never been a major concern I think for either party as as things progress though clearly the California results of the Field Poll. I have to give one pause a Republican can't win nationally without California. And with with bush behind both Gephardt I believe and Dukakis were the two that were mentioned that really does lend

some strength to the Robert Oulds argument. The problem is that I don't think that's a major factor in most people's decision within a primary. But you know there's one other thing that is quite interesting as a result of those exit polls and it's you know that there are a lot of Democrats no matter who they had voted for in that Super Tuesday. It would have no difficulty crossing over to vote for one of the not for ROBERTSON But for Bush for doing so. The loyalty to the parties is minimal in my opinion. Let's take some questions from folks and continue our conversation here Jerry Joseph and Bill Morris are with us were talking a little bit about Super Tuesday but I hope more about the way we go about choosing presidential candidates and what some alternatives might be and what's wrong with the system that we currently have. Hi you're on the air first go ahead please. Hence my question exactly because the four caucuses ago I got involved and this year

didn't it and it seemed it was pretty much a railroad because people would have coffee parties and they would decide all of these things and then it was a boring process there to have a primary election. Not many people participate. I guess that's we've gotten the soul of that town meeting and cleaning that apartment with this list. Having not from the majority to vote for much. Still Brooks made at this point when instant communication maybe as much to use. Right up to. How can you get from the right.

Well there's there's a few things to talk about the grass is always greener. Well who wants to start. JERRY Well it's. I am assuming as question is is primarily about the Electoral College you are nowhere near nor not even a dog in the in this whole process and while there certainly has been a good deal of discussion in the past and that the Electoral College is an anachronism you no longer really need it. I'd be surprised if there'd be a great deal of support for eliminating it. You know the state of the game it's hard enough to get comparatively minor changes in you know how we go about finding our candidates I don't think that that would be. That would be a possibility at this time but there certainly he mentioned that he didn't go to his caucus this time. I went to my caucus and I hadn't been in a caucus in a while. I'd been out of the country and for a variety of reasons I had not been to a caucus. I wanted to see what we had wrought. Frankly in my caucus there was a good turnout I would guess that there must have been about 130 hundred thirty

five people. I think that the that the process was quite confusing there were a number of new people there and it was you people kept getting up to ask questions will about this or that or how did you do the other thing. And the caucus chair always had to look at some papers he had in front of him as to what were the rules pertaining to this it was a very was very complicated procedure and of course we went into the some caucuses. What I found most interesting however is that the chair circulated a paper on which it was requested that whoever would be willing to help to do that. That hard political work in the precinct caucus. Please sign name address phone number. I was sitting towards the rear of the room so most people had already had that sheet of paper by the time I got it. There were two names on that sheet which would certainly indicate that it's not the party in which people have an interest. And of course I happen to feel that that selecting candidates through the

skinniest the screening and in endorsing process where where the candidate has to get known through a party process is by far to be preferred than whatever the strange kind of cooperation is that we now have. But two people signed up to really take part in party activities that I think that's pretty revealing. Bill I think carrying on with Jerry's comments the last couple of state conventions is our call on the Republican side show that a majority of delegates were not even contributors to the parties. I tend to disagree with you somewhat. I have a very very strong critic of the precinct caucus system and would much prefer to see a primary system enacted here because far too few people are involved in the selection of candidates and it's just much easier as we're seeing in some of the states now to take over with a very very disciplined minority. Getting back to the gentleman's comments on the Electoral College reform in the future

I would agree with Jerry is probably impossible. Political scientists though have to accept some of the responsibility for that we have studies that show that small states are advantage that the large states are advantaged that states which suburbs are advantaged. And it all depends on how you want to define terms. No one really knows what the problem is but I think everybody realizes that there is a problem. And clearly the potential of reversing a verdict in the popular vote is a gun being held to the head of the political system. Independent polling consultant Bill Morris and Jerry Joseph from the Humphrey Institute of university are with us today to talk about the way we select presidential candidates in this country go ahead please with your question how will you know. I'm mystified at the way the press has done everything they could to ignore Al Gore. You had the least attention paid to him of any of the Democrats. Bruce Babbitt had more attention. He is the most credible Democratic candidate he always has been since he got into the race in June. He is the candidate who best represents the mainstream of the

American people. Yes a serious chance of taking to a caucus and getting the nomination he can beat Bush when you guys go wake up and smell the coffee. Yeah that must be a Gore supporter would you think. Yes well well he is what you think about it has the press been ignoring Al Gore not. No I don't think so I mean it's always easy to turn on the media when there are certainly reasons to turn on the media. I don't happen to think that that's one of them I know there are a lot of Jackson people up until very recently who were making the same kind of complaint that their candidate was not getting sufficient coverage by the media. I think there's a point to be made however about the media here. I was talking to Bill a little earlier about this. If you noticed in all the discussion last night about Super Tuesday and there was a lot in this morning as well you didn't have either chair of either National Party being asked for any point of view for any comment about what comes next. Instead you were getting all this interpretation coming

from the experts or so-called experts in the media. Last night I think one of the programs they did go so far as to Richard dragon Bob Strauss You know whom I mean they like him he's a Washington character. He says interesting things and he was formerly the Democratic Party chair. Nonetheless I mean it really tells you how out of it the parties are. And I think that that's really quite quite significant. The media tells you who's one who's lost who's out of it who can't possibly win anymore. None of those decisions are coming through a part of the party process. What do you like Bill about what the media does and what the media ought to do differently about covering presidential campaigns. Well I think that the coverage when all is said and done tends to be fairly unbiased. A lot of people in my party I think would disagree with me on that. But in terms of studies that have been done by reputable political scientists if we take a look at the positives and negatives we find that it tends

to wash out that by and large the media does a good job in capturing the political situation. What I think they do that they shouldn't be doing however is establishing expectation levels so that a victory isn't a victory anymore because the media doesn't say that it's a victory it wasn't strong enough that kind of thing and that's that's a little bit dangerous in the political system. But don't the candidates do that too I mean last night you heard any anytime a candidate comes in second or third or fourth they're declaring it a victory for themselves. Well certainly that's that's part of the game but what I'm talking about is is setting up the handicap card and that kind of thing in the early going is that that a Mike Dukakis has to receive 66 percent of the vote in New Hampshire. Well worded that magical figure come from. What what exactly what where was that derived from. Why does it have to be two out of three why not 60 percent why not a flat majority. Those are the kinds of games that they engage in that I think goes a little bit beyond the pale.

There is still one more example and I would agree with you about that. I think some weeks after the Iowa caucuses. There they are there was some analysis on what had really happened. And I believe that Gephardt had had beaten Simon by something like 600 some votes. You would never have known it. I mean you would never have known that. If you listen to everything that was going on and they do tend to make their judgments I think on the basis of rather small turnouts always if you compare the number of people who turn out for a caucus or primary to the number of registered voters even you get a pretty good turnout as they do usually and I would think they get something like 15 percent of the registered voters. That's still that's a very tiny percentage of those who are who are really concerned about what's going to happen in this presidential selection process. And yet on the basis of those small numbers they never caution us that this is based on very very small numbers.

They all make these these very large predictions with conclusions. All right let's move on to smart folks with questions as we continue with Jerry Joseph and Bill Morris. Hi you're on the air. I guess I'm a terrible problem but the legacy of Harvard that would be the legacy of this actor president especially at a deficit of the human service. Don't you agree that the Republicans should have win this election and have to cope with everything you add to that bill. Perhaps for the former part of your statement clearly there is a concern among members of both parties over the national deficit and unfortunately that doesn't tend to be a voting issue for most people. If it had been Republicans would have been far far more successful after the new deal rather than having to wait for Eisenhower to come along. But those kinds of issues I think are coming more and more to the fore. We're seeing far more discussion at least among the

opposition Democrats about economic policy and eventually the Republican candidate is going to have to stand and fall somewhat on the economic record of the times. You know interestingly enough I've heard a number of Democrats good Democrats in talking about what will be the outcome of this election. You know it might be better to have the Republicans win or let them deal with all the really enormous problems facing the country in the next four years. I rather doubt that they're going to they're going to lead to the Republican candidate when but but it is true that I think there is very little passion for any candidate with the possible exception of Jesse Jackson at this stage of the game. Jerry we have been getting some sort of feeling from you about what you don't like about the way we select our presidential candidates but why don't you just come right out and say it in about three or four succinct sentences and then we'll maybe move on to someone with questions. Well if we can do that in three or four succinct sentences that would be great there are a whole

lot of articles written about this in the in the political science journals and even the very popular magazines. I suppose my major concern is that the role of the parties which I have which I have already said I really I think is quite important is vastly diminished. It may have been an unintended consequence of all the reforms of the late 60s in the early 70s in the Democratic Party but whether it was unintended or not that is exactly what has happened. You see the rise of the so-called campaign specialists of people who are more or less take over the campaigns they really haven't been involved in politics but they they know how to use the media they know how to do the polling they know how to do it. Do the sort of automated telephoning to get out the vote. The direct mail activity to raise money. So now you hire people to do all of these things which in the past were done by your party volunteers by people who supported

you. There is no doubt that technology plays a big part in this is as well the in the course. You see that in how fast the media can communicate. I think I was amazed to turn on my television set last night at 8 o'clock and to find that they were already telling me what had happened throughout the south. You know 20 states and they knew they had all the answers or just about all the answers. I think that the than in the past the parties recruited candidates they screened candidates they helped to develop candidates for public office as well as to staff the party organizations. And I think that is still true. You know in other democratic nations but in this country the parties have just seem to disintegrate. So your major concern is the decline of the parties. BILL Well they do. Nobody defines the issues either. Who defines the issues. Bill what are your thoughts about this what are your biggest gripes about the way we choose our presidential candidates. I would agree with Jerry that the role of the political parties is a key question. And as a

former state party chairman one really has to come to grips with that. You can't turn the clock back technology. And I would add the appearance of the single issue groups that are extremely well organized I'd agree really do compete with the political parties. So as a result parties are kind of out there trying to figure out exactly how best to impact the system. And that's a tough tough issue. And there's really no consensus on what they ought to be doing. I think in terms of the way in which we select our candidates it's a little bit too too helter skelter in some ways for my liking. I also don't like the disproportionate weight being given to Iowa New Hampshire repeatedly. If I had my druthers I'd rather see a regional primary system and acted in which the regions are chosen on a random basis beforehand so that rather than New Hampshire having the luxury of being able to set the tone for both parties we might find in fact that with the West Coast states if that were region playing that role. But by and large trying to bring some rationality into the system

much more than we see currently. Instead you have all of the states now trying to rush in there and do their thing early so that they can get a lot of attention so that all the candidates will come into their states so that all the media people come in and spend money in their state and so they can be said to have had an influence on the campaign. It's fascinating to me for example that California which for the Democrats has well over 300 delegates at 10000 I think that's the largest number of delegates from any state. They're not even going to get into the act until June. And Michigan is another good example. At least on the Republican side they started their delegate selection process very very early and wrought the whirlwind to the point now where the Michigan Republican Party is more fit for political hospitalisation than it is for finding an election in November. All right on that note let's move on to another question from a listener or chatting with Bill Maher a sin Jerry Joseph. Bill former Republican chairman in Minnesota member of the Republican National Committee. Jerry Joseph a former vice chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee and she's with the Humphrey

Institute now. Hi there you're on the air. I have a comment that really relates to the role of the party in Great Britain in the parliamentary system the opposition party the people on the out have a clearly identified leader and they have a clearly identified shadow cabinet which throughout the time Prince of Maggie Thatcher is in right now the Labor Party has had people designated as secretary of state secretary of whatever who come out with position papers that say what the opposition would do in that particular situation by the time an election comes around the people in the country have a very clear idea not only who the leader is of the opposition party but what kind of a cabinet he would bring into office. Now in our system we have. People move. That Reagan was going to bring in people like me and James Watt. It might have had some different made some difference in the election why can't other parties identify their leaders

somewhat sooner than six months before an election. BILL MORRIS Let's start with you. Well I think that you know there are cosmetic changes that might be doable in terms of there's been a lot of talk of shadow cabinet within the Congress. But the main difference between the British system the American system is that Britain is a unitary governmental structure with the with the power being held by Westminster in the American system we have the states we have the localities we have a very very different and very power sources with elected officials being elected by different types of constituencies. So how then do you get let's say a senator from Mississippi on the Democratic side to sit down with the senator from New York and hammer out a coherent policy. The the entire issue in terms of adopting a British like party system would almost require a rethinking of the federal structure. And I doubt if that question were put to the electorate today they would be willing to

forego the strong state system that we currently have. I think the size in the diversity of this country also make it very difficult if we could think of some way of going. An American style parliamentary system whatever that would be that would do some of the things that this caller just mentioned I think would be a lot of people who would like it because now you have a system that could give you a candidate who may never have been in Washington much less have had any experience in running a government or in or in handling national defense or foreign affairs at that. That is definitely a possibility. I think it is also something to ponder that you have now in the race at least two candidates who have never run for public office and who choose to run not at a local or a state level where one might gain some experience which in my view is quite important. But immediately decide

they're going to go for the gold ring they're going to go for the big one they're going to run for president so they will go from from never really having been involved in the political process as it is we're in debt now discussing it to running for president of the United States I mean that takes an awful lot of self-confidence. And it seems as if the traditional ways of coming up through the ranks aren't working so much anymore in the United States Senate is not a stepping stone to the presidency that it was thought to have been at one time and caring that a bit further the Congress certainly isn't the stepping stones of the U.S. Senate. State legislatures are not a stepping stone to Congress anymore and so on and so forth. Now in a curious way you know all of these candidates seem to develop their own little coterie so they all in a sense have their own little political parties. Each one and if you can raise enough money and if you can happen to hit on the right issues then you can get out there and you're attractive and you know how to use television. You can win. I've heard some people say well isn't that better because after all they're then they're really responsible to the

people. I think that really means you're responsible to nobody. There's no one who's going to hold your feet to the fire if you go on out there and campaign it on your own and you the people are for you. You know it sounds lovely. But I think we have to take a look at whether that really give us the kind of result we want. Do we really get the best candidates. To put it differently I think that one also has to wonder exactly what the impact is on coherent policy making. That when we elect a Democrat or Republican by and large now it's almost a little bit of a surprise in terms of what kind of policies are going to be enacted very very few candidates I think are as as clear as let's say Ronald Reagan was coming in one thousand eighty one or one knew exactly what the agenda was and what Jerry was referring to in terms of the candidate as political party being his or her own political party certainly contributes to the lack of coherence in policy making.

Let's move on to some more folks with questions as we continue with Bill Morris and Jared Joseph today Hi you're on the air what's your question. Good afternoon. First of all I'd like to support the concern of the last caller. My concern never goes to the mourning on the part of the speakers of the decline of party and I must say I don't welcome that their department should be abolished. If you will recall I believe it was Jefferson that said. If I could. Want to go to heaven within a party of what is going to happen at all. And I'd like to ask to your speakers so hopefully they wouldn't like their own biased support of the party system but I'd like to ask them to get their genuine concern about abolishing the party system and elect candidates on the basis of how they stand on the issue. All right who wants that one first. Well that is a huge huge kind of question to which to respond it is not an easy one to respond to I don't think either. Take that you take the size of this country I just talked about the size and diversity of this country. Can you

imagine what kind of a free for all this would be if just if everybody anyone who thought that he was capable of being president which incidentally is a real exercise in chutzpah in my opinion I think you ought to have been judged by a few other people before you decide to run for president instead of telling us all that you really can do it. You're perfect you know you can you you can do the job. There ought to be some other people who are saying that if you had it tremendously right now I think that part of our difficulty in coming to grips with issues in knowing you know what what are people saying as a fact we've got so many candidates in the running you can hardly keep track of the mule with a scorecard. And whoever picks those candidates they pick themselves. So I guess I feel that the screening process is. I'm not moaning about the party. I don't think Bill is either. No I think that our concern is helping to come to a system that truly does the best for the United States of America. And I think if I may

speak for you too Bill I don't think either one of us believes that that is the case right now. Exactly. I find it interesting the caller pointed to Jefferson who was basically regarded as one of the fathers of the Democratic Party. But in addition I'd like to point to the lessons we've learned from nonpartizan systems and that is if there's one regularity nature abhors a vacuum and we may not call it partisan politics and many of those nonpartisan systems but we certainly have things that really look like political parties clean government groups Chamber of Commerce groups are offshoots of them. So as a result even in those areas in which the parties are forbidden from taking an active part there are quasi party type organizations in place and that would tend to mitigate them against the pure form of of survival of the fittest which I think the the foreigner was I was alluding to. Don't you think Bill and the you know party you now have all these individual groups as you indicated the environmentalist and those who

are interested in this the abortionist and so on. I think that a major reason for the development of these single issue groups is a feeling that that's the way they can get their cause through that that's the way they could get the most attention in a party. I think you are forced to reconcile the different issues you have to come to some kind of consensus I can remember shall I say the old days when they talked about the Democratic Party as a kind of umbrella that sheltered a very wide range of views. I mean and that was always true of the Democratic Party. Now instead all those views have sort of shoved the umbrella aside and they're all clamoring for individual attention rather than attempting to reconcile them with a political party. And if and then to find an electable candidate. OK let's move on to our next questioner Thanks for waiting you're on the air Hello. Yes. Just one comment and then I have a question exactly what they were talking about is that 450 times or was your work here is that I've been going to the democratic practices and.

They've gotten more and more sort of antagonistic and the people there are single. It was in there I was ready to do harm to one another. And finally this year I went to the Republican caucus and then they want to bring in the runoff was overwhelming and everybody just seemed to be pro-life pro-family and it was a pro family and it was a right situation. Now my question is how was it that Jesse Jackson has given so much attention and so much power. I don't believe his numbers are really there and the media and everybody thinks that he has power and if they make concessions that Jesse Jackson run they're good Buswell party will suffer because when they give to him they're going to lose on the other end. Are they going to handle Jesse Jackson. Well who wants to take that one I can tell you that based on the results of Super Tuesday Jesse Jackson won 370 delegates Dukakis won three hundred ninety four.

So he's got some real strength there. Jesse Jackson is articulating the concerns of a lot of people. Clearly one of the shortcomings of the Reagan administration that bothers people I think in both parties is the development of the much more established underclass. And Jackson has clearly tapped into that sentiment. Not only does he have his base among black voters but one has to remember that in the state of Vermont in the state of Maine he was able to come out of a quarter of the delegates and Warner and Minnesota got quite a substantial. Caucus vote. And as a result he really does represent a segment of the population. Clearly if he continues on which he intends to to the convention he's going to be quite a power to deal with in the Democratic Party. And I would expect to see him attempting to pull the party to the left on certain social issues on certain welfare issues. But in terms of what we've seen of the Jesse

Jackson of this year versus four years ago I believe that he's going to go to the Democratic convention and be a responsible power broker. Certainly holding candidates feet to the fire on issues but not jeopardizing the party in terms of pulling it so far that it loses in November. Kerry Joseph Interestingly enough you know Jackson complained a lot about this. This kind of process back in 1984 and felt that it really worked against minorities in their interests. This time he's learned how to make it work for him and he's done it by really targeting his his people and these are I think if my caucus was any example of the northern states and how they tend to be liberal they tend to be young. There were some labor people they're concerned about jobs and his themes are themes that play very well they are economic injustice. They heat enormous problem of drugs. His concern with with the cuts in education and the fact that a lot of people are concerned that

education really isn't isn't up to me to the kind of challenges that this country now faces from from countries abroad. I mean he really is hitting on the issues and because the other candidates are not attacking him. He has been freer to make those issues very clear. He was talking last night in this morning about the fact that he had spent so little money he only spent I think about $100000 in contrast to millions of the other Democrats and spent in the south. But the reason he's able to do that is that he has been so identified with these particular issues that his voters and each of those states who those who care about those issues are going to turn out and then he got an enormous black vote. I think that as they said something about 97 percent. The black voters who turned out in their in those southern primary and caucuses went for Jesse Jackson.

Well to put it bluntly how can you attack Jesse Jackson without appearing to be a racist how could you run a negative ad. Twenty states are having primaries and not a terrible backlash. Jesse Jackson's weak point just from a strategic point of view. That would be attackable by let's say Al Gore would be the foreign policy kinds of things. Certainly raising the kinds of issues with respect to the dealings with Yasser Arafat with his perceptions of closer ties with Fidel Castro those kinds of things I think could be brought up in a way in which one would not appear as a racist. But you're right there's always the potential backlash of attacking an individual like Jesse Jackson. But maybe maybe Bob it's important for other candidates to ask him questions about how he's going to get where he wants to go in terms of correcting all of these these problems. That is a fair question to ask him. And I think we're going to have to we're going to have more and more black candidates and candidates of other minority groups Mexican-Americans and so on. And if we're always going to feel somewhat intimidated it's simply not it doesn't it doesn't

really compliment them. It doesn't pay them the kind of respect that's due them. And I think what I think we'll learn how to do that I think initially there will be the concern about oh well I'm going to be called a racist and so I don't dare open my mouth against this candidate. I think that that will pass with time particularly as we get more and more candidates from minority groups running for public office on which I which I foresee I think that's clearly going to happen. It is happening. Jerry Joseph from the Humphrey Institute and independent polling consultant Bill Morris are with us today as we talk about Super Tuesday and more generally the way we pick our presidential candidates lots of people with questions we're going kind of slowly because there's a lot to say but we'll take you next time there thanks for waiting. So what about Mario Cuomo. You were NEVER position the length of this presidential campaign from one election to the next. If you sat back I came and didn't spend any money. The convention was deadlocked and they would say well

remember our you talked of the last convention that night she was barred. All right let's get an answer What about Mario Cuomo. KERRY Well I think he is pretty effectively taken himself out of but I know he's done a number of things that have at least made people suspicious about his intentions. But I think I would be very difficult at this stage of the game for Cuomo to announce that he will come in as the as the great savior and will pull the party together and we'll all go forward happily into the campaign for the election in November. I just don't see that barring some incredible thing obviously and anything can happen in politics of course events. You can't predict events and they really can make a big difference but I can't really foresee anything that could bring Cuomo or any of the others who have been mentioned. I mean people are looking to you know. In part because they have no strong feelings about most of the other candidates you know they keep saying oh gee isn't there somebody else that it's that really that grass is always greener it's the candidate who's not

the candidate you want. Well the fent are we in fact getting the best candidates we can. If you look at how if the complexity of the federal government should be looking perhaps to somebody with some strong business experience at running a big organization I mean we're looking at people who. In some cases have no federal experience at all in some cases as you said earlier Jerry absolutely no elected office experience whatever bill. What from what rank should we be looking for presidential candidates. Well I think what you're what you're alluding to there is the Iacocca phenomenon with a lot of people hoping at one point or another that Lee Iacocca would get in and lend that business expertise to it. The background ought to of a viable candidate ought to suggest an ability to govern. To suggest a familiarity with the system and an ability to get things done. Going beyond that I think it really becomes your druthers versus my druthers versus Jerry's drillers in terms of what quote the best unquote candidate is.

OK Shelley move on. At that point with about 15 minutes to go let's take your question either oh you touched on my question had to do with the amount of money spent on campaigns and the relative amount spent by your caucus Gephardt Gore and Jackson and I wonder if you could talk more about that. Didn't the other candidates have as much opportunity to raise issues the way Jackson did. It's really startlingly limited about people. All right. Certainly one of the advantages that Jackson has is that he has a very loyal passionate following very identifiable following. And as a result in order to mobilize that following he really doesn't have to spend as much as the other candidates. He also has a track record of sorts from 1984 and the ability to mobilize public officials across

many of the states in his favor. I think though that if we start talking about placing limits on the amount of spending that can be done and driving those limits down which I think is part of the argument that's on said we're going to be looking at providing an advantage to the better known candidates. That's one of my problems with campaign expenditure limits the advantage that accrues to incumbents. Gephardt for example certainly he got some play in terms of the trade issue. But by and large was a fairly unknown St. Louis congressman before this campaign started. Dukakis I'm sure he wasn't a household name in the Midwest. So as a result these individuals are going to have to spend more money in order to activate a coalition they don't have that ready made identifiable group at their disposal that are Jesse Jackson or Pat Robertson has to radios with. Well you know. I don't know how you go about controlling

campaign spending. And I recognize the problem that Bill brought up to that. But the incumbent always has the advantage or just no doubt about that. The incumbent would have the advantage no matter what the rules were of course. But when you take a look at I think that in the you know in the last campaign the last presidential election in 84 something like one hundred eight million dollars were spent up to this point in this political campaign and I saw figures the other day that sort of made my hair stand on end before we even got to the New Hampshire primary. Eighty five million dollars had been spent well so Heaven only knows what that's going to be by the time we finish. And a lot of that money is wasted I don't think there's any doubt about that I've been involved in at least three presidential campaigns. Money is wasted. It's unbelievable how much how it is wasted. I mean there is there's none of the you know the good people try to do careful budgeting but as things tighten up and you see that your campaign may not be moving the way you wanted to move you start throwing money

at it all kinds of things in an effort to in an effort to win. So I think we really do have to look at that. Money is a huge factor you talk about Gephardt having had money to get himself known. He claims and we don't know enough yet to be able to say whether this is so. He claims that one reason he didn't do as well in the South as he would have liked. Well there are two reasons one the Gore seeing that he wasn't getting anywhere getting anywhere in talking about a strong military defense in the cell suddenly switched to some of the messages that Gephardt had been using. Also Gephardt said he simply didn't have enough money to make his message known. You know all of the 20 states. So money is really it's a tremendous factor in how you deal with that without having those who are new to the scene say oh it's unfair I don't if you're going to limit it you're going to limit me. I don't know but it certainly needs to be looked at long and hard there have been a lot of people who have looked at it long and hard but maybe we need to look at it even more seriously as we see those figures

going up. OK moving on to another caller with a question for our guests. Hi you're on the air and I'll have the last comment for privacy. There are I don't know. But it could have. Anyone way to eliminate that is to not have any income but I don't allow them to be re-elected. The question I wanted to ask was in the long run would we be better off with a. Nationwide single day primary because for instance the center of town. I'm from Minnesota and when we had our precinct caucus by the time our caucus was held some of the candidates that in fact the one that I thought was my favorite was gone already. And so I didn't even get a chance to express my opinion on that man and he just he had the full days to go before that before Minnesota even had their caucuses so I think maybe looking at a nationwide one day primary another thing that might do is

if it was happening and you know at one time they'd have to find you know more. Interesting way to better body to cover the bases. OK a nationwide single day primary what do you think of that bill. There are certainly it's certainly an attractive type of thought at first blush However there are a lot of problems with it from a campaign point of view. You're clearly advantaging those people with a lot of money at their disposal or with a great amount of prior identification name identification. In addition you're really losing the momentum factor which has propelled a lot of our more recent nominees into the nomination by their parties. That's one of the reasons that I take that the midpoint between the current system and a one day national primary. In looking at the regional alternative providing candidates some options rather than having them fight everywhere toward a one day

election. OK Bill into in thinking about the regional primary I tend to agree with you on a national primary at this stage of the game when the candidates almost go berserk just trying to cover one state two states three states. I'm very curious what they're going to do when it comes to California because the California primaries the same day as the New Jersey primary and both of those states have pretty good delegates you know they're going to be crisscrossing the country up in the air. It's good for the airline and very good for the airline business. But I think that. In a regional primary would you be willing to say that the regional primary should take place let's say over a six month period I'll tell you why I raise that question. It was very clear that at least the majority of the candidates for Super Tuesday. Those who had taken part in the in the caucuses or the primaries up to that point therefore had not had time to concentrate on the south. So they had to leap into the South covering those that only the 20 states in a very short time you

found really weird situations like I think that the Bush spent 68 minutes in Oklahoma. That was it something on the at the airport. There is no time to do the kind of campaigning and to understand that part of the country in the way that I think the designers of that of that southern primary had really hoped. If it's true that you really that you're supposed to learn something from these campaigns that you're supposed to understand something not only about what unites this country but also about the very substantial differences that there are region to region. Then you can't do it in a minute and a half. You have got to have time to get in there and do your campaigning so maybe the regional system if it could be. You might have a big fight over who is going to go first. I'm rational and I'm sure there are. I think that most of the bills pending before Congress in fact on the original primary do permit that breathing period between the various primary fights themselves

so that you do give the candidate time to become familiar with that particular region and you also in some regions allow a candidate to pick and choose if a candidate doesn't want to compete let's say in the Pacific Northwest. He or she can skip what other bills however would require the Cal counties to be listed on on all ballots. But in terms of the sequencing and timing most of the bills do permit that. You'd almost if you had one week between them all you might as well just go to a national one day primary for the good it would do. OK moving on quickly to our next listener with a question Hi you're on the air. Yeah I was concerned about the fact that I think that there's less than a majority of people of voting age who actually go to the polls to make this decision because this could. At least theoretically cond to question the validity of our whole election process results. But these experts consider the possibility of like a constitutional amendment which would require an election and election equivalent to a quorum where unlike the House and Senate can't

pass anything unless they have a majority of their members present to vote on it. Where in in each election a majority of the people would be necessary. And then in the presidential terms if a majority of those voting age did not cast a vote for the president then it would go to the House of Representatives and only those members in the House of Representatives who had garnered a quorum of the voters within their district would be allowed to vote on that case that would definitely favor Minnesota. All right Jerry what do you think of what we tell you about the United States of America not just Minnesota. You know what we're doing here. I understand what the what the questioner is after. And I think that there have been a lot of us who are very concerned about what it would appear to be a steady decline in the number of people who turned out to vote in November when I'm talking about if I remember correctly Ronald Reagan was elected with less than a

majority of the registered voters just this last time. And that really says something about your people being turned off about the system. It may be a feeling that they can't make any difference. Maybe a tremendous confusion about the process that they have to go through in order to select a presidential candidate. There are some countries. That penalize people fine them if they don't vote. AUSTRALIA and NEW ZEALAND are right in some of the Western European countries at one time did that has now been changed. I don't really think we want to go that far I think that if we if we can strengthen the parties if we can make the issues much more clear to people if we can talk about those things that they regard as important and if we can do this in a way that sort of presents the United States whole and instead of always picking the one little issue that we think might sell in somebody's backyard maybe people will feel more encouraged that yes the system really does work and we

it is incumbent on us to have our say. Bill do you think about that idea of requiring essentially a quorum for an election. I would hate to see us make voting a mandatory act through us through imposing penalties. I agree with Gerry The key is going to be voter education. I'd also add to it however that perhaps we might want to start taking a look at registration processes in many of these states although the Voting Rights Act certainly dealt with many of the more obnoxious ones. There is still some a long way to go in comparison to what the Minnesota Election Day registration system. And clearly political scientists have established anyway that if one eases registration one tends to increase turnout. OK let's take one more question and that's about all we've got time for here we got lists in about a minute and a half to go. Go ahead please you're on the air to make sure I have a comment and a question. My concern is you know response to what was said earlier about how not to

find people not being able to respond to Jesse Jackson in a racist fashion I think that that the two things that should be taken to consideration are that you know the media begins to not dismissing the Jesse Jackson vote and possibly talking about it as if it's only a minority vote. But recognizing that it's a pluralistic vote coming from a broad base of the population then perhaps we'll get to the key of why we've had difficulty in bringing people to the elections in the in the past. Can you state your question and very succinctly because we're almost out of time it's interesting but we want to get your question and my question is how does the electoral process reflect that. Better be political activity that is going on that is not necessarily electoral politics. I'm not really sure I understand the question but I don't either.

Bill I don't gather from the look on your face that you do. I'm afraid that it's it's a very complicated issue and one that we just haven't got time to explore further with the caller because we're out of time I'm sure that she didn't get in a little bit earlier when you said except to say her in the earlier part of her column actually I don't think that it is correct to say that Jesse Jackson has a broad base of support. I mean he clearly has support in the black community and he clearly has support among those people who are pretty much regarded the most on the left in terms of liberalism and on social issues. That's not really a cross-section. The voters of this country. Well folks I'm afraid we didn't really settle any of these issues but it was fun to talk about it anyway. It was certainly entertaining I'm glad you came in. Jerry Joseph who is with the Humphrey Institute at the University of Minnesota former vice chair of the Democratic National Committee and National Committee woman for 12 years at a time when some of the Democratic Party reforms were being adopted. And Bill Morris has been with us president of Decision resources limited a

polling firm. Bill is also a lecturer in political science at Augsburg College and former state I our party chairman. There's been an interesting development on the medical technology front. This is Gary I could invite you to join us for NPR Journal this afternoon when we'll tell you more about it. Briefly though doctors at Methodist Hospital in St. Louis Park have for the first time used lasers to clear the coronary arteries of a patient. The news has touched off a surge in the stock of a local company that's developed the technology. Well I have that story in the rest of the News at 5:00 on FM 5:30 on K SJM 13:30. And that's our midday broadcast for today this is Bob Potter speaking Minneapolis-St. Paul area weather sunny and mild this afternoon high temperature of 50 degrees and continue clear tonight the low 35 tomorrow mostly cloudy 20 percent a chance of a shower in the afternoon. High the moral mid 40s. This is chaos Jan. 13 30 Minneapolis St. Paul it's now 1:00. Hi I'm Paula Schroeder and this is takeout. Today we're going to talk about what the guys do for

fun. No this isn't an assessment of the local bar scene or a rundown of the latest jokes. Rather who will be looking at men's pension for getting together in groups and going hunting and fishing or playing games of one sort or another. We'll see how the love of baseball and literature made a perfect marriage for some local writers. Why men hunt and fish and play organized sports. How man can deepen their friendships with each other and how men and other cultures differ from the American male. That's all coming up in the next hour on takeout.