They're Sniping And Squabbling

The sniping among the Republicans picked up speed Friday, while Democrat Bill Bradley kept up a steady drumbeat of criticism, and his target, Al Gore, actually stopped campaigning for a moment to attend a memorial service.

Backers of George W. Bush are feeling a little edgy and concerned about that 19 percent loss in New Hampshire. Sure, Bush dismissed the loss as "a bump in the road," but what if John McCain was right when he said that bump "tore out the transmission" of the Bush effort? With two weeks to go until the next primary test in South Carolona, Bush's supporters want him to change something, to refocus, to take a new tack.

You can guess what that means - attack McCain. Bush is spending less time calling himself a compassionate conservative and more calling his opponent a closet Democrat and a Washington insider. Defending his tax plan, Bush told the press (not the voters), "There were two voices of criticism. One was Senator John McCain and the other was Al Gore - they nearly mirror the same statement."

Bush has decided that he needs to cast himself as the Washington outsider, the honest Texas cowboy out to rid the world of "Washington double-talk." He seized on a Wall Street Journal article Friday that discussed how much money and support McCain has received from lobbyists.

For good measure, Bush went a step further, dwelling on McCain's role as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee. Bush mused to reporters (again, not to voters), "When you are the committee chairman of the Commerce Committee, one is capable of finding people to fly you on airplanes, and very capable of using that position to raise money."

McCain - who won another victory today when a federal judge ruled he must be added to the primary ballot in New York - thinks he knows what this is all about: "I think he's beginning to show a little sign of desperation. I would urge him to get back to the issues."

Last month, McCain fended off questions about businesses that have appeared before his committee and later contributed to his campaign. Bush can't wait to revive those questions. McCain says he's never done anything illegal, and sometimes adds it just goes to show how corrosive the whole darn system is - and that's why he wants to change it.

"I feel like Luke Skywalker trying to get out of the Death Star," he said in a burst of overwrought simile. The political establishment is "scared to death because I'm going to break the iron triangle of lobbyists and money and legislation." Attaboy, Luke!

Bush has also tried to hone in on South Carolina's veterans - considered prime turf for McCain the war hero. A spokesman from a veteran's group appeared at a Bush event Thursday and accused McCain of "forgetting" veterans once he started voting in the Senate. McCain said that was an "inaccurate and unfair characterization."

So should Bush repudiate that statement? cCain said he wouldn't tell Bush what to do, and then added, in a nice sleight of mouth: "He's a big boy. Excuse me, he's a big man."

Bradley is also busy telling you how negative the other guy is. Like Bush, he sought validation in a newspaper article. At an appearance in Maryland, Bradley trotted out a 1991 interview Gore gave to a Tennessee newspaper, where he's quoted as saying, "In order to win an election, you have to rip your opponents' lungs out and then move on." Ouch.

Bradley says Gore is waging a politics of "attack, deny and distort"; a politics where the end justifies the means. And the worst of it, he added, is that Gore knows better. "I believe any politican who knows better should do better."

Gore didn't respond. He spent the day in Washington, attending a memorial service for Bob Squier, a Democratic consultant who once worked for him.

The real dirty little secret of this campaign is that these candidates are tired. They've started stumbling over standard lines from their stump speeches. Bush has taken to repeating phrases twice, repeating phrases twice. Gore's exhaustion sends him rambling through long responses to questions; responses crammed with tangential information and lots of sidebars. So Bradley and Bush are taking Saturday off, while McCain and Gore are scaling back their schedules a bit.

But if you need a political fix over the weekend, don't worry. Purchase (no jokes, please), New York, will become the navel of the self-absorbed political world Sunday, when someone declares her candidacy for the New York Senate.