It's About Coalitions Not Purity, Part Twenty-Four

"The 1992 Campaign and Election" Part Two

Bill Clinton, the Democratic governor of Arkansas, won the Democratic presidential nomination and he chose Senator Al Gore of Tennessee as his vice presidential running mate; the two men were both in their mid 40s, which was perhaps a plus to some younger voters. Clinton's reputation for word play began in earnest when he admitted to having tried marijuana, but "I didn't inhale." Then he caused some Republicans to have a stroke when he told voters, "Vote for one, but get two," in reference to his activist wife, Hillary. This brought scrutiny to Hillary's life too, especially her business dealings and legal representations (she was an attorney), something that would continue for years. Questions of Bill Clinton's infidelity became rather common, but he went on national television to deny such. This too was an issue that would continue to haunt Clinton and the country in the coming years.

Meanwhile, the talk of the nation still centered around Ross Perot, who still was riding high in the polls, although a bit less so as spring turned into summer. Perot appeared to be thin skinned as the media checked into his life, and by July, Perot announced he would not run, citing the potential for the election to be so split in the Electoral College, that it would have to be decided by the House of Representatives.* Later Perot said he had dropped out as Republicans had planned dirty tricks to disrupt his daughters wedding. Later, Perot asserted that the CIA was involved in trying to destroy his campaign by tapping into his stock trading program to prevent him from financing his campaign, and there were other unsubstantiated charges of assassination plots, etc. The White House and the Bush campaign leaders called it all nonsense. Perot's poll numbers tumbled and Bill Clinton's rose, putting the Democrat ahead of the field. Later Perot decided to get back into the race. On top of the display of paranoia, Perot had selected retired, highly decorated Vice Admiral James Stockdale as his running mate. During the vice presidential debate, Stockdale, who had had little time to prepare for the debate, looked into the television cameras and asked, "Who am I? Why am I here?" Stockdale's apparent confusion and lack of focus throughout the debate produced a series of one liners from comedians and it further called into question the judgment, if not the very sanity, of Ross Perot. The thing was, Perot's paranoia and conspiracy theories played right into the minds of a number of Americans obsessed with such things, and to whom Republican tricks were assumed to be commonplace, no proof required.   

President Bush struggled throughout the campaign and his poll numbers remained in the upper 30s. The economy weighed on Bush, and his numerous public appearances after the Gulf War may have taken the edge off of having a presidential visit, as some Bush rallies were sparsely attended, and the campaign took to using celebrities, and up and coming conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh to draw people in. By the time election day arrived, the Republican coalition had melted to a great degree, as so called "Reagan Democrats" often returned to the Democratic fold, and even some southern states returned to the Democratic column after a substantial absence.** In the end Bill Clinton won 43% of the vote, but a large margin of 370 electoral votes, while George Bush received only 37 1/2% of the popular vote and 168 electoral votes. While Perot did not carry a single state, he got nearly 19% of the national vote, and he received more than 20% of the vote in some states. The Republicans had controlled the White House for 20 of the past 24 years at that point (only Jimmy Carter's four years broke the chain). The question now was, could Clinton put together a new Democratic coalition to gain 50% or more of the vote?

* Just to be clear, the process of getting Perot onto the ballot in all states was still in the process, although it was becoming pretty much of a certainty. 

** There's no question that having Clinton and Gore, two Southerners, on the Democratic ticket helped in the South, but still the election showed how much the South had changed politically, as Bush carried most southern states, even with the two Southerners running against him.

WORD HISTORY:
Clothe-Like its close relatives covered here recently (cloth, clothes, clout, clod, and clot), this verb, meaning "to put on clothing, to dress, to put clothes on someone," goes back to Indo European "gleuh," which had the notion of "stick together, adhere." This then gave its Old Germanic offspring "klaut," and then "klutaz," which meant "piece of material," and also, "material used to cover something." and the derived variant "klaithan," with the meaning "material used to cover something," thus "clothing, garments." This gave Old Germanic a verb form, presumed by some to be something like "klaithonan," meaning "to clothe, to put on clothing, to dress." This gave Old English "geclathian," meaning "to clothe, put on clothes." This later dropped the prefix and became "clothen," before the modern version. German has "kleiden," Low German Saxon and Dutch have "kleden," West Frisian has "klean" (notice the "d," "t" or "th" sound is gone), Danish has "klaede," Icelandic has "klaetha," Norwegian has "kle" (notice the absence of an ending present in the other Germanic languages), Swedish has "kläda."