Tip O' Neill on the Ropes

By Robert Ajemian

The failed strategy of an out-of-touch leader

Tip O'Neill is a good friend of mine. He garnered a reputation as one of the strongest Speakers in our history. But now, I regret to say, Tip is reeling on the ropes ... he's in a fog ... he's not part of what is happening, and has no idea of where to go.

--Wisconsin Democrat Les Aspin, in a letter last month to constituents

Great old politicians, like great old prizefighters, are usually too proud to quit. Somehow they just cannot let go, and neither can their loyalists.

In his long, charmed career, House Speaker Thomas Patrick (Tip) O'Neill, 68, has rarely been shoved around. A superb political technician, a man trusted even by House members who do not think his way, he drove the impeachment Congress as majority leader during Watergate. For the past eight of his 28 years in Congress, he has been the Democrat to deal with. But today many of the Speaker's good friends agree with Les Aspin that Tip is on the ropes. Despite a moving personal plea by O'Neill from the well of the House last week, 63 members of his party bolted ranks to vote for the Reagan-approved Gramm-Latta budget resolution. At that moment, it was clear that the nation's most powerful Democrat had been badly, perhaps even fatally, wounded.

It has been tough enough the past few years for the Speaker to stay out in front of his rebellious Democrats. The party's ideological compass had begun to spin too wildly for an incorrigible New Dealer like O'Neill. Once Ronald Reagan hit town, the Speaker's troubles got a lot worse. Conservative Democrats viewed O'Neill as a big spender who was out of step with the new frugal mood. Liberals sniped openly that he had no heart left for the fight against the President.

As the reality of Reagan's deep budget cuts began to hit home, the party's young bulls clamored for O'Neill to lead a counterattack. But the Speaker had decided months ago on a different strategy. It would be ruinous, he figured, for Democrats to attack so popular a President. Instead, he would give Reagan all he wanted, sit back and watch the President fail. It was a precarious, cynical approach, and O'Neill would never admit publicly that his objective was, in effect, to lose now and win later by default. So devoted was O'Neill to his own plan that he impulsively predicted a week before the budget vote that the fight was already lost. His colleagues, unaware of what their leader was up to, were more than ever convinced by that cave-in that Tip was out of touch.

The negative game plan was out of character for O'Neill, whose style has always been more positive. When the President first began courting conservative Democrats by inviting 40 of them to breakfast, O'Neill was stung. The problem of how to deal with the disarming Reagan puzzled and gnawed at him. "I've never been up against a Republican like him," he told friends, pointing out that Dwight Eisenhower was also popular, but not as skillfully partisan as Reagan.

It was not that O'Neill had developed any confidence in Reagan as President -- or as a thinker. To the contrary, the Speaker returned from White House meetings and told aides that he was astonished at the empty conversations. Reagan was a nice guy all right, related Tip, but not one for heavy business. When O'Neill raised certain issues, he reported, the President would invariably deflect them to an aide and resume his easy storytelling. Never, declared the disbelieving Speaker, had he seen a President work in such a detached way.

After Reagan's program triumphed last week, O'Neill tried to hold his ground. He sat in the Speaker's vast office, his huge 260-lb. torso looking like a giant plum pudding, his long white hair falling over his blue eyes. As a television screen in the far corner of the room carried speeches from the House floor, he talked about the rising criticism of his leadership. "It hurts," he said, putting his sinewy hands on his knees. "It hurts a lot." Then he leaned forward in his chair, his massive head thrust out. "Wait till Middle America realizes what's happened with these budget cuts," he said. His deep voice filled the room. "Am I going to get some Republican scalps down the road? You bet I am."

O'Neill is beginning to show an uncharacteristic passivity, as if events are already intimidating him. Last week a political friend called and asked if Tip would grease the way with one of his committee chairmen. In the good old days, the Speaker would have arranged the favor with ease. But O'Neill demurred; he did not want to risk pressing his chairmen too far. Fund raisers for the party seek him out less often; they say they need a more compelling voice to attract new money. O'Neill has other, more private problems. He suffers from a painful prostate condition, and even though his doctors have told him he needs an operation, he refuses to undergo one. Tip is terrified of surgery. Instead, he takes medication constantly, despite the fact that the doctors have warned him to cut back. A couple of months ago, he was in such pain that he had to be rushed by helicopter to the Bethesda Naval Hospital for emergency relief.

The Speaker is fighting to stay in place for another reason, this one deeply familial, as Irish as his roots. His son Tommy is running for Governor of Massachusetts, and Tip is determined to see him in the job. He rushes to every fund raiser for his boy, presses his friends to kick in. "Helping the son is the most important thing in his life," says a close friend. O'Neill wants to stay on the ballot in Massachusetts in 1982 to boost his son's candidacy.

When the Speaker moved back into the House chamber last week for his final plea against Reagan's budget, he passed up his high podium chair for an empty seat on the floor. As he chatted with colleagues who stopped by, O'Neill kept an ear on speakers at the podium. When one of them declared that Reagan's economic program was a disaster for the country, O'Neill clapped his hands quietly. At one point, there was too much noise in the chamber; the Speaker rose and commanded silence. For a moment, he still appeared big and powerful, the man in charge. It was obvious that he still had an emotional hold on the House. But the hold is loosening now, and it looks very much as if the job Tip O'Neill has worked a lifetime for is offering challenges he can not meet.

-- By Robert Ajemian

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