Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole was interviewed Friday by Tribune staff writer Thomas Hardy in Washington, D.C. The following is an edited transcript of the interview.
Tribune: What have you learned about the country that you didn’t know before since you’ve left the Senate to go out and talk to the voters?
Dole: Well, I have had obviously more time to focus and more time to spend out on the road, more time to visit with–we had meetings with different people. For example, yesterday we met with families, a number of children, talked about our tax credit, talked about opportunities, scholarships, educational scholarships.
So I think you learn pretty much what people are thinking about, and there is some anxiety, obviously. People are concerned about jobs.
Also, I think on the political side, I just feel a great deal of enthusiasm now for the campaign coming out of the convention. That’s about it.
Tribune: What’s your fantasy for the country? Is there a certain time and place in this country’s history that you’d like to see America get back to, and how would you take it there?
Dole: I don’t want to take America backward; I want to take America forward. But I think we do look back at things that have worked, we look back at basic values, as I said in my acceptance speech, we take a look at the present-day problems, whether it’s drugs or crime or courts or defense or whatever.
But I just think we need strong leadership, we need conservative leadership. We can cut taxes, we can balance the budget, we can do both.
Tribune: What’s the voters’ greatest reservation about Bob Dole as they make up their mind about this election?
Dole: I’m not certain I could answer that accurately because one thing we found out in pre-convention surveys, even though people knew I was in politics and in the United States Senate, most people knew, that’s about all they knew. They didn’t know who I was or where I was from or what I was all about, if I had ever done anything for anybody.
A lot of people think people in politics are born in blue suits; we don’t really care about anything but ourselves.
So hopefully, in our acceptance speech and Elizabeth’s speech and my daughter’s speech, they got a better look at Bob Dole. I think those who watched the convention got a little better view of Bob Dole, and we think it’s been very helpful.
Tribune: What do you think this election is a referendum on?
Dole: Trust. Trust the people or trust the government. I want to make it clear every day that we trust the people rather than Clinton to go back and rattle off his laundry list, but every one is going to have a tinge of more government in it, whether it’s family leave or whether it’s something else, higher taxes, more regulations that he fought us on, fought us on the balanced budget amendment, fought us on turning Medicaid to the states, fought us on welfare two times, and everybody knew he’d sign anything the third time.
So, trust. I trust the people. He trusts the government.
Tribune: Do you think that character has become less of an issue in political campaigns and presidential elections?
Dole: I don’t know. I’ve never gotten into the personal things. But for some people, it’s very important. Others separate public life and private life.
Tribune: Your campaign slogan says that you’re the better man. Why are you the better man?
Dole: I think more experienced, as I pointed out in my acceptance speech. Age has its advantages and. . . I think I can be a bridge to generations coming up and present generations. My colleagues on both sides of the aisle will, I think, say without exception that Bob Dole is a man of his word, that he’ll work with us.
I think President Clinton has not worked much at all with Congress. They’re so busy running ads saying we’re extremists that they don’t have time to work with Congress.
Tribune: You said in San Diego that Clinton’s your opponent and not your enemy, yet a lot of people are saying that this is going to be perhaps the nastiest campaign ever. Is there a contradiction there?
Dole: It’s not going to be on my part. We see a lot of evidence coming from the Democratic Party, some of their ads–Jack Kemp is an extremist, Bob Dole is an extremist. I mean, they’re handing out packets on our civil rights record. We both have good civil rights records. So they’re going to use every trick in the book.
Tribune: Your economic plan. You’ve got a little bit of a credibility issue there. You’ve been a deficit hawk for 35 years, now you are embracing a tax cut. Why should people believe you’re not just saying . . .
Dole: I think most every Republican agrees that you can’t just cut taxes, so you are going to have all this feedback and you don’t need to worry about spending.
The balanced budget amendment is going to be No. 1, balancing the budget by the year 2002, and tax cuts are No. 2. And my view is I have some credibility.Bob Dole has been a deficit hawk. Pete Domenici, John Casey, Gary Becker from Chicago, a Nobel Prize winning economist, George Shultz, Chicago roots, all these economists that have signed onto our plan, they’re not political animals. They’ve got the credibility. They wouldn’t be saying this is a good, honest, doable plan. So it is a question of presidential will, as I have been saying in my speeches.
I have it, and I am going to get it done, and it’s going to help the American people, help the economy, create more jobs. It’s not just the tax cut, it’s regulatory reform, litigation reform, stop some of these trial lawyers in their tracks.
Tribune: Is Ross Perot and his criticism of you and your tax plan damaging to your candidacy?
Dole: Well, he has to say something, so I don’t expect him to agree with what we’re doing. It’s a free country. He has a right to criticize.
My view is, it’s good, sound. Has he looked at it? Probably not. Has he had it analyzed by economists? Probably not.
I think if he does, he will find that as the Tax Foundation said just yesterday in their release that it’s basically a good, sound plan.
Tribune: As people watch this Democratic convention in Chicago, what would you like them to keep in mind?
Dole: Keep in mind, you know, they are going to make a lot of promises. As I said, Clinton has tried to be a pretty good Republican lately. He grabs everything that comes up, whether it’s health care, which has been around for 3 1/2 years, much of it my initiative. Welfare, he signed the Dole bill in effect after he vetoed it twice.
He has had more election year conversions than anybody in history.
He set more records for me-tooism, but he will stand up and they all stand up and they will castigate us and say our plan won’t work or we won’t work or whatever and then he’ll go out and promise–he will have a tax cut at the convention.
I want people to remember what they promised in 1992 and what they gave us. They tried to give us nationalized health care, they tried to give–they did give us the biggest tax increase in the history of the world, they’ve fought the balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. They fought regulatory reform that cost the average family $6,000 per year.
My view is that they have not kept their promises.
So there will be a lot of hoopla, and I hope they have a good convention. I’m not like President Clinton. I’ll probably watch some of the convention. I don’t know why he didn’t watch ours.
Tribune: You’ve taken some shots at Hillary Clinton.
Dole: Oh, no, I haven’t taken–
Tribune: Is that out of bounds or is there a reason for–
Dole: No, I’ve said, with all due respect, the only thing I ever said was about the book and mine was positive, it takes a family to raise a child. And I wouldn’t attack Hillary Clinton. I never have. I disagreed with her on health care policy. I may have made some policy statements but nothing personal. That’s not my bag. I don’t do that.
Tribune: What does a Bob Dole presidency mean for people under 45? Why would they vote for you?
Dole: I think because they know I’ve had the experience, and I think they know–at least I hope they know that I’ve had sort of a hardscrabble life from time to time and that I never gave up, never gave up and I worked at it. It’s not just that generation.
I want seniors to know, as I did in Social Security, helped save Social Security, it’s solid, it’s sound. We’re going to do the same with Medicare, we’re going to have a Medicare commission. We’ll fix it short term and have a commission make recommendations for long term.
The surveys show right now with young voters we’re ahead. So it’s all about confidence, about trust.
It’s when you believe–you know, let’s face it. Some people don’t believe politicians. They think they make all these promises and they forget them as soon as election day rolls around.
