LETTERS: GOP CANDIDATES KEEP BUMBLING

To the editor:

The events of the past few weeks have led me to wonder: Where have the politicians for the Republican Party gone? It used to be that you could count on whatever candidates who were considered the front-runners to have both the staff and savvy to avoid mistakes like we have seen of late by both Bush and McCain.

First, Mr. Bush speaks at Bob Jones University, which is certainly his right but is not the way to join that Reagan majority of the Christian right and Catholic Democrats. Most political observers consider those two groups to be essential to any chance for a Republican victory. In one fell swoop, he has created a split with those two groups and further alienated any minorities who might be considering his candidacy. As much as Republican apologists would have you believe otherwise, this controversy is not going away. Even someone as smart as David Limbaugh, I suppose in an effort at spin control, categorized Bob Jones University as being "reputedly anti-Catholic." For the record, there is no reputed about that.

Then Mr. McCain attacks the leaders of the Christian right, Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. And the next day he says he was just joking. Longtime Republican loyalists who have bemoaned the Clinton presidency and yearned for the chance to capture the White House must be tearing their hair out at the very real possibility that Al Gore may well capture the presidency.

While we are talking about mistakes by politicians in their campaigning, Senator Ashcroft deserves honorable mention. He certainly has the right to go to Bob Jones University and get an honorary degree, but why would he do it in a campaign year? For him to later profess he did not know that Bob Jones University stood for defies belief. In the words of the eminent jurist Kenny Wangelin, "That dog won't hunt."

The real question is why would such experienced politicians place themselves in such indefensible situations? Perhaps what the Republicans need is a time machine to bring back some of the old polls from the cigar-filled room to teach them the facts of life.

MICHAEL H. MAGUIRE

Cape Girardeau