THE BLOOPER HEARD ROUND THE WORLD

Chopping the air with his right hand, Gerald Ford boldly declared: "There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe, and there never will be under a Ford Administration."

Incredulous, New York Times Associate Editor Max Frankel asked a follow-up question that offered Ford a chance to retreat, but Ford lowered his head and charged into a trap of his own making. By his reckoning, Yugoslavia, Rumania and even Poland were not under the Soviet thumb. "Each of these countries is independent, autonomous; it has its own territorial integrity."

Thus, in his second debate with Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford made what could well be the most damaging statement of his career. For any politician, calling Eastern Europe free would be an amazing gaffe. For a President, especially one who is running partly on a campaign theme of experience in foreign policy, the mistake reawakened many voters' suspicions that Ford is a bumbier. In fact, while Yugoslavia is largely free of Soviet domination and Rumania has achieved a measure of autonomy, Poland and several other countries of Eastern Europe are very much in thrall to the Russians.*

Ford got into the jam in the course of answering Frankel's question about whether the Soviets had the better of the U.S. in the grain sales and the 1975 Helsinki agreement, which confirmed the postwar boundaries of Eastern Europe. The President easily came up with justification for the grain deals but ran into trouble trying to defend the Helsinki pact. He has clearly demonstrated in the past that he understands the realities of Eastern Europe, and he apparently meant to say, as he did several sentences later, that the U.S. "does not concede that those countries are under the domination of the Soviet Union." Ford even had studied lines to this effect in the briefing book. But somehow he truncated and garbled the lines, carried away by rhetoric. Then, instead of retracting his misstatement--and only running the risk of appearing tongue-tied--he bullheadedly stuck to what he had said.

Next day Ford struggled to disentangle himself, telling a large crowd of students at the University of Southern California: "It is our policy to use every peaceful means to assist countries in Eastern Europe in their efforts to become less dependent on the Soviet

Union and to establish closer and closer ties with the West." Shouted an unimpressed student: "Good try, Jerry." Two days later, Ford tried again, telling California businessmen that citizens of Poland "don't believe they are going to be forever dominated--if they are--by the Soviet Union." That only made the situation worse.

The gaffe injured Ford's chances of winning what he must: the crucial northern states of Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. All probably will be decided by the shift of a few percentage points, and in those states live millions of voters of Eastern European--and German--origin. The Eastern Europeans are largely Catholic, urban and blue collar, and they traditionally vote Democratic. Ford had seemed to be wooing them with some success by emphasizing his rigid opposition to abortion and by playing on fears of Carter's born-again Baptist evangelicalism.

Carter largely failed to exploit Ford's slip during the debate. But next day he called Ford's remarks "absolutely ridiculous," and his staff considered preparing a series of radio commercials to be beamed primarily at ethnic communities. Chortled Carter Political Director Landon Butler: "We couldn't have picked a better ethnic coordinator than Ford."

THE "ETHNIC" REACTION

Ford's statement dumbfounded and dismayed "ethnic" groups. So far, at least, only a minority echoed the charitable view of Boleslaw Wierzbianski, of the Polish Daily News in Jersey City, N.J., that the remark was "a lapse of lingua--a slip of the tongue." Added Feliks Gadomski, general secretary of the Assembly of Captive European Nations: "I was shocked by what he said, but you have to judge him on the whole American Government policy."

More common was the view of Aloysius Mazewski, president of the Polish American Congress and the Polish National Alliance: "People can't understand it. They know the President knows better." (After a phone call from Ford, Mazewski said he felt "satisfied" by the President's explanation.) Said Wisconsin State Representative Joseph Czerwinski: "It's something out of Alice in Wonderland. Voters are going to question why the fellow sitting in the Oval Office has such an unclear picture of what's going on in Eastern Europe." Casimir Bielen, director of the Ohio division of the Polish American Congress, said: "He has minimized the hopes of people who want freedom." Said Janet

Branden, president of Polanki, the Polish women's cultural organization in Milwaukee: "I was going to vote for Ford. Now I don't know. I feel I can't vote for either one."

THE EXPERTS' VIEW

The Eastern European blooper aside, Ford gave an adequate performance (see following story). The whole debate was a 90-min. slugfest, in which both candidates threw roundhouse punches--a sharp contrast to the first dreary confrontation. But last week's encounter was more style than substance. Both candidates showed something of a box-score mentality, with Carter ticking off the names of the countries he has visited and Ford listing the names of the foreign leaders he has met. Carter greatly overstated America's weaknesses in the world. Ford's inability to put across his Administration's successes or clearly explain its policies dismayed Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who had spent hours briefing him. Yet Carter had a hard time criticizing those policies, since he agrees basically with most of them, differing largely on style and emphasis.

Many experts gave both candidates low marks. Said Soviet Expert Adam Ulam of Harvard: "Neither one had any feeling for the terribly complex problems we have in dealing with Russia and the Communist countries. Much of the debate was nothing more than posturing." Added Vanderbilt Chancellor Alexander Heard: "Both candidates tended to make debating points in a way that raised doubts about the political-education value of these debates."

Several of the experts were particularly disappointed with Carter. Said Sovietologist Paul Zinner of the University of California at Davis: "He was terribly evasive, terribly moralistic in vague, evangelical terms. His strategy was to go on the offensive against the President, rather than to discuss his own program or to show the real flaws in Ford's approach." Added Berkeley Political Scientist Nelson Polsby of Carter: "When faced with a problem, he offers you a nostrum, waves it over the diseased limb and then goes away." But Carter had his defenders among the professionals. Said Harvard Government Professor Samuel Huntington: "Carter did show spark and spontaneity, and he did a good job stating the general themes [of his approach to foreign policy], which is about all you can do given the debate format."

THE POPULAR VIEW

CBS-TV estimated that 83 million people saw at least part of the debate, v. 85 million for the first encounter. Because of Carter's style--an obviously nimble mind and a more relaxed, spontaneous delivery than Ford's--he was generally judged, even by some Administration insiders, to be a narrow winner over Ford, who usually appeared self-confident but occasionally sounded tense and irritable. At times Ford looked like an angry lineman glaring at a linebacker whom he was about to obliterate, though he never quite succeeded.

An Associated Press poll of 1,071 voters awarded the debate to Carter by 38.2% to 34.6%. A Burns Roper spot check of 300 people put Carter ahead by 40% to 30%--almost the exact reverse of a Roper poll after the first debate. Interviews by TIME correspondents indicated that the second debate, like the first, switched few votes--at least for now--though it did help to firm up some support for each candidate.

James Eggleston, 25, a Saint Louis

University law student, thought that Carter benefited mostly "because of the improvement factor--he was so much better than in the first debate." Marie Doyle, 54, associate superintendent of public schools in Jefferson County, Ky., said: "I feel more positive about Carter now. He seemed more relaxed, more responsive. There was a sparkle in his eyes that wasn't there before." Lawyer Steve Meyers, 33, of Santa Monica, Calif, thought Carter "sounded like a leader; Ford sounded whiny and picky." Steven Carpenter, 27, a supervisor at an Indianapolis medical laboratory, complained, "Ford just rested on his laurels."

On the other side, many voters preferred Ford's more stolid style to Carter's sometimes almost smart-alecky behavior. Said David Porter, 31, an unemployed Pittsburgh schoolteacher: "Foreign policy is not a smiling issue." Said Chicago Management Consultant Randy Adams, 32: "I think Ford answered more directly. I don't agree with everything he said, but he answered the questions."

In the aftermath of the debate, Ford's aides were subdued as they came to realize he had not done well enough in the contest that he was supposed to have won because of his two years' experience as President.

* The Soviet Union maintains 31 divisions in top combat readiness, consisting of 400,000 men and 9,000 tanks, plus a veritable army of secret agents. Eastern Europe's police forces, not to mention its economies, are also under Moscow control.

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