President Bush, whose political style tends more to the punchy blows of kick-boxing, took a lesson Tuesday with his pal, Chuck Norris, in the more graceful sweeps of karate.
The exercise may come in handy for Bush, considering the competition within the Republican Party and at this convention.
Whether practicing karate or presidential politics, the candidate must seek the same essential element: a sense of balance.
After allowing conservatives to drive away with his party platform, after receiving a new blessing from former President Reagan, and after providing Pat Buchanan with an audience for his fire-eating speech against liberals, homosexuals and feminists, the question for Bush this week is whether he has bowed too deeply to ideological purity.
Under pressure from the right, the president already has indicated he is willing to make some big changes. On Tuesday he said he would launch a major shakeup of his Cabinet if re-elected.
But a larger question remains. As he wraps up his renominating celebration, will the president be able to shape a message for his truer constituency, America`s mainstream Republicans, the party faithful?
They are the Republicans of the North Shore, of Du Page County and of the River Oaks section in Houston to whom Bush is connected both culturally and politically.
In one sense, they are identified within the party as the people who are not evangelical Christians, or zealous in their anti-abortion views. Nor are they so deeply committed to Reaganomics, or to Bush`s vice president, Dan Quayle, that they would not consider abandoning either one for the sake of the party.
Bush has to embrace that wing of the party, however large or small it now is, that includes moderates who in the last two years elected Republican governors who support abortion rights in California, Illinois, Massachusetts and Minnesota.
An abundance of conservative rhetoric has marked this convention so far and Housing Secretary Jack Kemp and Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas added to that Tuesday night.
But Bush, his senior aides and even his wife, Barbara, have been trying to restore some equilibrium. That was behind the first lady`s interviews last week suggesting she has pro-choice leanings on the volatile abortion issue.
”The president himself will have to reach out to a broader group” in his speech Thursday night, said Clayton Yeutter, the president`s domestic policy coordinator, as he acknowledged the convention`s imbalance.
In his suite at the Houstonian Hotel, about nine miles from the Astrodome, Bush has been working on that speech to set out his notion of a second term.
At the same time, Bush began assembling his old team for the last three months of the campaign.
Former Reagan White House political director Mitch Daniels is expected to help the campaign and Sig Rogich, an image consultant who was named last year as ambassador to Iceland, arrived at the convention Tuesday.
After bringing back James A. Baker III as his new White House chief of staff, the campaign is also hiring back Roger Ailes, the television strategist and architect of Bush`s tough ad campaign.
Ailes will help Bush practice his speech delivery; it will be critical for Bush to have the right tone when speaking of his rival, Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton. Said Yeutter: ”It won`t be a kinder and gentler speech.”
It will have to keep a delicate balance among Republicans. Fitzwater, when asked if Buchanan might have alienated Republican moderates by hitting so many hot-button conservative themes, would not disavow the commentator`s speech, even though Buchanan barely mentioned Bush`s name.
”Pat laid out some very hard issues and tried to point out differences between our two parties, and there are differences,” said Fitzwater.
But not everyone in the party is willing to accept such hard-edged, socially conservative rhetoric offered by Buchanan and others in the first two nights of the convention. A national committeeman from New York, Richard Rosenbaum, bared the frustration felt by a number of delegates.
”What`s frightening is the way the extreme right wing in taking over this party,” Rosenbaum told reporters. ”When do the moderates get equal time? They don`t, not around here.”
Some commentators have said this has to be the best speech of Bush`s life if he intends to remain in Washington for a second term.
And the president, while visiting Otto`s, his favorite barbecue restaurant Tuesday, was asked if expectations had become too high.
”Lower them, will ya?” Bush told reporters. ”Lower the high bar a little bit. . . . It`ll be a good speech.”
