Copyright 2000 The Washington Post
The Washington
Post
May 31, 2000, Wednesday, Final Edition
SECTION: A SECTION; Pg. A04; CAMPAIGN 2000
LENGTH: 984 words
HEADLINE:
Bush Lashes Out; Gore Pulls Back; Candidates Appear To Trade Styles on Making
the Point
BYLINE: Howard Kurtz, Washington Post Staff
Writer
DATELINE: MILWAUKEE, May 30
BODY:
Kicking off what aides describe as a
week of positive, more personal messages, Vice President Gore today accepted his
first endorsement from a national environmental group and all but ignored George
W. Bush.
In an appearance here that lost its scenic Lake Michigan
backdrop when thunderstorms forced the event inside, Gore recited a familiar
litany of proposals for cutting industrial pollution, protecting national
forests, combating sprawl, banning new oil and gas drilling off Florida and
California and launching what he called "the Environment Decade."
In a
small break with White House policy, the vice president said he would
immediately oppose timber sales in Alaska's Tongass National Forest, rather than
awaiting the results in 2004 of a five-year review of the ban as the
administration prefers. "I will assure full and permanent protection for the
roadless areas in the Tongass, America's great and temperate
rain forest," Gore said to cheers. Bush, meantime, was in Denver, where he
accused the Clinton administration of leaving the military unprepared, telling a
Veterans of Foreign Wars audience that the Pentagon is in dire need of a sign
that says "Under New Management."
While Gore, departing from his
attack-a-day approach, did not mention Bush in his speech, the League of
Conservation Voters, which backed the vice president today, did that for him. It
is a shift aimed at softening Gore's attack-a-day image by relying instead on
surrogates to attack the Texas governor's record, campaign aides said.
"If the League of Conservation Voters wants to contrast the mess in
Texas with Al Gore's pro-family, pro-environment record, that's their decision,"
Gore spokesman Chris Lehane said of the shift in strategy.
Deb Callahan,
president of the 9 million-member group, declared that "Governor Bush's friends
are the big corporate polluters and lobbyists for the timber, mining and oil
companies." She called Texas "the most polluted state in the nation" and warned
that in a Bush presidency, "America's clean air laws would be crippled."
Callahan even invoked President Ronald Reagan's controversial interior
secretary, saying: "Governor Bush has more in common with James Watt than Teddy
Roosevelt."
Gore, dressed in a blue polo shirt and tan slacks, stood
stiffly on her right during these attacks.
Wisconsin Secretary of State
Douglas J. LaFollette also took a swipe at Bush's environmental credentials,
saying in an interview that the governor would "hide his record behind TV
commercials. We'll see Bush in a canoe, Bush on a mountaintop, and all that is
baloney."
Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer responded that Texas's air and
water have gotten cleaner during the governor's tenure, "as opposed to campaigns
that are not so clean under Al Gore. It appears he's finding new surrogates to
do his attacks for him . . . since his attacks were backfiring. So much for Al
Gore running a positive campaign."
Gore sought to balance his
environmental advocacy with statements touting national prosperity, saying that
the United States can improve its quality of life and the economy at the same
time and can export pollution-fighting equipment around the world.
"We
will no longer accept a situation where asthma is on the rise in the United
States," Gore said. He said he would protect the Great Lakes by cracking down on
power plant emissions.
Personalizing his policy remarks today, Gore
spoke of his family farm in Carthage, Tenn. "My father taught me a lesson about,
well, for example, soil erosion and how to take care of the fields," he said.
Gore added that his mother, Pauline, had introduced him to "Silent Spring,"
Rachel Carson's book on dangerous pesticides, leading him to champion
toxic-waste cleanup in Congress in the late 1970s.
In a day of campaign
role reversals, Bush, who typically allows his surrogates to handle the harshest
criticisms of Gore, lashed out today at the vice president, accusing him and
President Clinton of allowing the country's military readiness to dangerously
erode.
"I want the people of Colorado and America to consider the
results of seven years of the vice president's management and involvement," said
Bush, flanked by a Desert Storm veteran and a retired Air Force general. "U.S.
troops are over-deployed and underpaid and under-trained. Entire Army divisions
are not prepared for war. Military recruiting fell thousands short of its goal,
and six thousand United States soldiers are on food stamps. Al Gore claims that
qualifies him for a promotion. No, the Clinton-Gore record cries out for a new
sign on the Pentagon that says, 'Under New Management.' "
Bush cited
Bosnia and Haiti as examples of how the administration had stretched the
military's forces thin. While he promised to honor America's commitments, he
said as president he would work to convince U.S. allies to play a bigger role in
peacekeeping missions overseas.
Bush, essentially restating proposals he
laid out in a defense policy speech in Charleston last fall, vowed to improve
the pay, treatment and training of troops.
As he campaigns this week,
Bush is also getting back to the business of fundraising. In seven events this
week, he plans to help raise about $ 1.3 million for the Republican National
Committee, $ 200,000 for state parties and about $ 350,000 for his own campaign.
In a news conference after this morning's event, Bush dismissed an offer
from Secretary of Defense William Cohen for a briefing on nuclear security,
saying he found the comment to be "political in nature."
"I think the
briefing I got from [retired general] Colin Powell, [former defense secretary]
Dick Cheney and [former secretary of state] Henry Kissinger was substantial,"
Bush said, referring to his advisers. "These are leaders with a proven track
record."
Staff writer Terry M. Neal in Denver contributed to this
report.
LOAD-DATE: May 31, 2000
