Trials of a Campaigner

Ohio's Robert Taft, one of the most durable U.S. political campaigners (more than 40,000 miles and 1,000 speeches in six months), dropped in on a Lions Club dinner meeting in Washington, D.C. one night last week, and admitted to some of the occupational hazards of the junketing candidate. High on the list, said Campaigner Taft, are feet and food.

With feet, it is sheer physical strain. A campaigner is usually on his feet 12 to 14 hours a day, said Taft, and ends the day with a foot bath of warm Epsom salts. With food, it's the monotony. In the old days it was always chicken. At one time, he recalled wistfully, it was cold roast beef--until the price of beef went too high. Today it's ham--cold or hot, baked or boiled--but almost always ham, "frequently with raisin sauce." (Taft, delayed by a television appearance, missed the Lions' menu: filet mignon, crabflake gumbo, asparagus tips polonaise.)

Worst of all is the unending throb of political oratory. Senator Taft confided that he was getting awfully tired of the sound of his own voice, reciting the same speeches day after day. But each time he tries to redraft his principal speech ("The Speech," as accompanying newsmen call it), he finds he has missed or obscured important points, so he reverts to the same old texts. Even so, he said, "I have to change them sometimes, because I can't stand them myself."

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