AMERICANS PROCLAIM: `YES, I'M FOR CHANGE, BUT WITHOUT ANY PAIN'

Commenting on the "lasting impact" of Perotism, one pundit intoned: "The overwhelming message of the Perot bubble is that voters crave hard facts about the country's condition and plain talk about how the next president will try to improve it." Not quite. Lots of Perot voters want to complain loud and long about all of the governmental stupidities and inefficiencies they perceive. But most of them are not anxious to support the tangible sacrifices they will have to make.

Perotism, to be sure, was about change, but change to what? The billionaire's crusade faltered, in part, because he was a thickheaded, pinch-penny amateur lacking in the "vision thing." In addition, and of even greater relevance, the Perot movement broke down because of a vacuity of ideas. Time was running out on the streak of pithy cliches like, "It's as simple as that" or "I'll do it without breaking a sweat" or "Congress and I will waltz like Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire."

Perot advisers had finally submitted to him a belt tightening economic program called "Ouch." The Perot plan would put limits on Social Security and Medicare; impose a $.50 per gallon gasoline tax; limit mortgage interest deductions; and impose other tough measures. As put-up-or-shut-up time drew near, Perot realized that he would cease being a mythical hero and instead be a doctor prescribing the toughest economic medicine the nation has seen since the Great Depression. Painless Perot would become Relentless Ross not so blissful a role to play.

Perot quickly learned that entitlement programs bleed the treasury, but recipients oppose any constraints. Defense workers want change, but not with canceled weapon systems. Farmers want change, but not lower subsidies. The middle class wants change without any increase in their taxes. Auto workers want protection from imports, while airplane manufacturers want help in their exports. Doctors want to be better compensated for their services and less paperwork, while the rest of us want cheaper and broader medical coverage irrespective of paperwork.

Sure there were disagreements in the Perot camp about money and strategy. But the principal reason for Perot's vanishing act was his unwillingness to prescribe a large dose of political arsenic. He couldn't move from the Larry King politics of simplicity to the politics of sacrifice. The fun would be gone.

As Barbara Jordan puts it, "change from what to what?" Perot only focused on the "from what." As he neared the "to what," he realized that a coalition of againsters couldn't be enthusiastically switched to a program of burden-sharing and sacrifice.

The Perot candidacy however failed dramatized the enormous unrest and dissatisfaction that permeates the country. It focused that unrest in a spontaneous and dramatic fashion. It became the symbol of change but avoided answering "to what." If Bill Clinton becomes the symbol of change, he will be the political beneficiary of Perotism. To the extent that Clinton challenges constituent interests in maintaining the status quo, he too will realize that articulating "from what." Americans are more than ready for change if it's painless.