TART, TOUGH & TELEGENIC

EUGENE McCarthy's tart, tough campaign style got national exposure during a memorable television interview following Robert Kennedy's announcement. CBS Correspondent David Schoumacher conducted the quiz in the Green Bay, Wis., studio of WBAY. Excerpts:

Q. I keep hearing there's sort of a rumbling intimation of a deal at some point in the future. Are you prepared to deal with Bobby Kennedy?

A. I'm not really prepared to deal with anybody so far as my candidacy is concerned. I committed myself to a group of young people and, I thought, a rather idealistic group of adults in American society; I said I would be their candidate, and I intend to run as I committed myself to run. I'll run as hard as I can in every primary and stand as firm as I can at the convention, and then, if I find that I can't win, I will say to my delegates: You're free people, go wherever you want and make the best judgment that you can make.

Q. What if a Kennedy trend becomes apparent before then? Would you consider negotiations?

A. Well, I wouldn't have anything to negotiate with. All I have to run on is my commitment, and what I thought was my integrity as I committed it to people who were prepared to raise this challenge against the Johnson Administration at a time when it seemed to me a lot of other politicians were afraid to come down into the playing field. They were willing to stay up on the mountains and light signal fires and bonfires and dance in the light of the moon. But none of them came down. They weren't even coming in from outside, just throwing a message over the fence.

Q. Senator Kennedy says today that he'll come into Wisconsin.

A. We'll have to wait and see. I could have used help in New Hampshire. I kind of listened and waited. But I did do all right. I think I can win in Wisconsin without help, but I'm certainly not going to turn down help from any of my colleagues in the Senate.

Q. One of the things that he listed in his statement was the qualifications that he had that he seemed to feel would make him a good President. What do you think of his qualifications?

A. Which of us would make the better President, that's rather conjectural. I don't mean to be arrogant or unnecessarily humble, but I make two points. I think I'm as well qualified, or better qualified to run for the presidency now, in this year of 1968, than President John Kennedy was qualified in 1960, when he made the bid. And I think if you take into account the matter of the knowledge one should have of government, and the identification with the people of this country, and look at my record in both cases, on that broad base I think, even after the announcement this morning, that I'm still the best potential President in the field.

Q. Senator, you're speaking in terms of relativity. Let me ask you flatly: do you think that Robert Kennedy would make a good President?

A. I don't say he would not make a good President. He has had experience in the administration, as he said. I'm not sure that that is altogether a compelling argument, since at least two members of this Administration, who have had most to do with sustaining the policy in Viet Nam, were members of the Kennedy Cabinet--the Secretary of State and also, until recently, the Secretary of Defense. I don't see that association with those two members of the Cabinet would particularly prepare one to deal well with the problem of Viet Nam.

Q. Senator, in the morning you had a visitor, Senator Ted Kennedy. What did you two talk about?

A. Well, we didn't talk about anything very important. I don't think people do at three o'clock in the morning. It was kind of a good-will mission--a courtesy call--and I appreciated very much the effort that Ted Kennedy made in coming out. It's a long flight from Washington in the middle of the night, and he flew back again the same night--simply to say that what was announced this morning was going to be announced.

Q. Senator, I notice in a column it says that Senator Kennedy cares more deeply about the war than you.

A. In every society it seems that you have to develop a kind of an institution for making rash judgments, whether it's the soothsayers or the oracles or the high priests. In our society, this seems to have been taken over by columnists. I don't really know how any columnist knows how deeply I feel about the war. I think the record shows, however, that of the members of the Senate, I was the first one really to risk what people refer to as a political career, whatever it may have been worth, to lay it on the line with reference to the war in Viet Nam.

I was the first one who said you can't change the policy unless you change the man and challenge the person. So it seems to me that on the record it would appear that I felt either more deeply about it or at least I sensed the problem earlier than others did.

Q. A lot of people have expected you to fold.

A. Well, I don't know how many have. I don't think the people who know me very well expected me to fold. I expect I'll be discovered as we go along this campaign trail, but I have a reasonably good record of standing up to some pretty tough tests in my own political career. The image that somehow someone picked me up and took me out of the academic halls and put me in Congress and then decided fo run me for the Senate is not quite true. [He then detailed the elections he had won against long odds.] So on the record, there's not much to indicate that I would be likely to fold, either for want of money or for want of courage. J

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.