Bob Dole, hoping voters will begin to focus on the presidential election with the opening of the Republican convention, urged Americans on Monday to “take a look at us.”
An ebullient Dole, who will accept his party’s nomination Thursday night, spent his second day in the convention city promoting the tax-cut plan that forms the centerpiece of his challenge to President Clinton.
After delivering his pitch to employees of a suburban high-tech firm, the Kansan turned to his real audience–Americans tuning in to media accounts of the convention–and asserted that the GOP is “the party of the future.”
“If you’re not a Republican, if you’re an independent or a Democrat, take a look at us . . .” Dole appealed.
“We’re reaching out. We want to bring more and more people into the Republican Party for the right reasons: because we have the ideas, because we have the agenda and because we know precisely where we’re headed.”
Dole’s remarks came on the day that Republican delegates adopted a conservative platform, one that includes a tougher anti-abortion stance than Dole had advocated.
The convention spotlight would shift by evening, though, to a prime-time speech by retired Gen. Colin Powell, a moderate who favors abortion rights.
The Dole camp has staked his campaign on the staging of a successful convention. Getting voters to take a second look at Dole, 73, the former Senate majority leader, is the crucial first step in the campaign’s come-from-behind strategy.
Dole trailed President Clinton by as much as 20 percentage points in opinion polls entering the convention, and his senior strategists hope a “bounce” from the eventful week can cut the Democrat’s lead by half or more.
“It’s looking good. It’s looking better. I like that, yeah . . .,” Dole said of one overnight poll that showed the race tightening. “We’re going to have a good convention, and I feel good about it.”
When informed that his primary opponent and bitter rival, conservative commentator Pat Buchanan, finally had endorsed him, Dole said: “We’d like to leave here united. . . . I gladly accept the endorsement.”
A relaxed Dole, casually clad in a plaid khaki jacket, taupe slacks and tan penny loafers in lieu of his starchy Washington power suits, appeared to relish the attention he received everywhere he traveled.
He responded eagerly to requests to pose for photographs.
At a lunch with his wife, Elizabeth, vice presidential running mate Jack Kemp and Kemp’s wife, Joanne, at a Mexican restaurant, Dole ate quesadillas while a mariachi band serenaded the couples.
Schmoozing with noon-hour patrons of the Old Town Mexican Cafe, Dole gestured toward some nearby reporters and quipped, “Get the press a margarita; then they’ll write good stories.”
The Doles and Kemps later posed for pictures with former President George Bush, one of Monday evening’s convention speakers, and his wife, Barbara.
Asked if he had any advice for Dole, Bush said, “No advice, just a great deal of enthusiasm.”
Often criticized in the first eight months of the election year as a candidate without a message, Dole honed his tax-cut mantra Monday morning at Solar Technologies, a $1 billion-a-year manufacturer of turbine engines.
“It makes a lot of sense to me, and it ought to make a lot of sense to the American people,” Dole said of his proposed 15 percent across-the-board tax cut and his promise to balance the budget by 2002.
Acknowledging skepticism by some voters of election-year promises, Dole assured his audience that he could cut taxes and balance the budget.
