Word: babbitts
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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With the stock market setting new records, inflation quiescent and unemployment dropping below 6%, pressing economic problems like the deficit and the trade imbalance remain abstract to most voters. Chastened by the experience of Walter Mondale, most Democrats (save for Swim-Against-the-Tide Bruce Babbitt) are reluctant to propose higher taxes. An example of the painless-dentistry approach to the budget is Dukakis' suspect claim that up to $110 billion can be raised by stronger enforcement of existing tax laws...
Faced with the tedium of me-too panel discussions, candidates have created their own exhibition season. No longer does a contender have to wait to be nominated to experience the joys of hurling invective face-to-face at an opponent from the other party. Democrat Bruce Babbitt and Republican Pete du Pont invented the do-it-yourself presidential debate back in May as a way of calling attention to their long-shot candidacies. It may have been a gimmick, but their interparty face-off produced a vibrancy rarely matched in a campaign season devoid of transcendent issues...
...Michael Dukakis tries to overcome a bookish mien by telling a TV audience that he ran a "pretty credible 57th" in the 1951 Boston Marathon and was "always out on the ball fields and playing fields." Albert Gore in most speeches cites his Army service in Viet Nam. Bruce Babbitt, who has pedaled his ten-speed across Iowa and climbed a mountain in New Hampshire, is described in one of his TV commercials as "coming from a frontier family that lives by simple truths...
...tell the unions where to go." Biden has tried to look tough by taking command of the battle against Supreme Court Nominee Robert Bork. But he ends up seeming to cater to liberal groups and surrendering his independent judgment on the biggest issue he faces as Senate Judiciary chairman. Babbitt is more consistent in his willingness to take unpopular stands, as he did last week by proposing a national sales...
Most slavish praise. Babbitt's hosannas to Democratic Patriarch Robert Strauss, who joined Buckley in the questioning. Babbitt twice promised Strauss a Cabinet post in his Administration...