BACKGROUND OF `DAVIDGERGEN' DESERVES CLOSER LOOK

President Clinton's recent appointment of David Gergen to his senior White House staff has been much commented upon, in this space and elsewhere. After I wrote a column on Gergen's appointment, I came across the following revealing item written by nationally syndicated columnist Robert Novak. It is so chock full of insightful information I've seen nowhere else that I felt it would be worth sharing with readers. To understand Gergen, Novak writes, you must understand his particularly shameless brand of professional Washington "courtier."

"It was a magic moment at the Renaissance Weekend in Hilton Head, S.C., last New Year's Eve when more than a thousand rapt listeners heard the earnest speaker, towering at 6-foot-5, perform in soul-searching manner that characterizes these affairs.

"David Gergen talked about turning from the materialistic '80s (when he was a senior Reagan aide) to the caring '90s, and warned against America's fragmentation after the Los Angeles riots. `I thought it was the same old, John Lindsay-type liberal Republican stuff,' a Democrat present told me. `But now that I reflect on it in light of all that has happened, it is clear that Gergen was talking to one person in the audience.' The target was President-elect Bill Clinton.

"That vignette supports the theory that Gergen, not quite a journalist and not quite a politician, is mainly a courtier. That is why he, devoid of philosophical base or political constituency, has emerged at the President's side ...

".... Widespread description of him as a `Reaganite' and architect of `Reaganomics' and the New York Times indictment of him as the popularizer of Reaganism testifies to Washington's inadequate institutional memory.

"During 22 years in the capital, he has been low on both ideological commitment and political loyalty. While he now says he abandoned Republican ties for political independence nine years ago, he voted in the Virginia GOP presidential primary in 1988. ... He rejected his former self to vote for Clinton last year.

"Young Dave Gergen arrived at the White House in 1971 ... to serve as a junior aide ... Awarded this plum thanks to a Yale buddy whose father was a prominent Republican, Gergen let it be known he had voted for Hubert Humphrey in 1968. Positioned today as resident `conservative' in a Democratic White House, he began as resident `liberal' in a Republican White House.

"... He was a Washington `insider' helping George Bush's 1980 bid for President. As Bush languished in the polls, Gergen hesitated to leave his sinecure at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and join the campaign full time. But on the morning after Bush's stunning upset of Reagan in the Iowa caucuses, Gergen was on the phone to say he had been able to conclude his AEI commitment and could now sign on.

"As Bush faded during the later 1980 primaries, so did Gergen's presence exasperating Bush's campaign manager, James A Baker III. Nevertheless, when Baker was tapped by President-elect Reagan as White House chief of staff, he reached out to Gergen as a non-conservative to help form a bulwark against Reaganauts.

"Gergen was true to his posture in the Bush campaign by opposing supply-side tax cuts at the core of Reaganomics. He became a profligate leaker, often undercutting the President. ... After Gergen left in 1984, he joined the Democratic chorus calling for tax increases and arms control concessions opposed by his former chief. ...."

Robert Novak, syndicated columnist

There's more, but you get the drift. Reminds me of all the reasons why, when I worked on Capitol Hill for 15 months (January 1981-March '82), I couldn't wait to get back to Missouri. The town is crawling with the curious sort of eunuch that columnist Paul Greenberg has dubbed "davidgergens", young and old, in the bureaucracy and in Congress, at the media organs and the foundation think tanks.