HIS WAY OR NO WAY

By Richard Stengel

THE HISTORY OF THE ADVENTURES OF MR. ROSS PEROT AND HIS CURIOUS QUEST TO BE BOSS

IN TWO VOLUMES VOLUME II, CHAPTER 1. IN WHICH OUR SOMETIMES ERRATIC HERO PLANS A CONVENTION AT WHICH HE WILL BE ANOINTED LEADER OF THE PARTY WHICH HE HIMSELF PAID TO BE FORMED.

It is an observation widely acknowledged that a billionaire knows the price of everything but not always its value. The judicious reader will doubtless recall from Volume I Mr. Ross Perot's 1992 pursuit of the nation's highest office, when he precipitately and mystifyingly withdrew, before once again re-entering in October and garnering 19% of the vote. Volume II begins as our protagonist, after spending months of coy obfuscation and many millions creating his perhaps inaptly named Reform Party, declares his intentions forthrightly to his amiable megaphone, Mr. Larry King, but not before luring one hapless Coloradan by the name of Richard Lamm into the race so as to assure voters that Mr. Perot himself was not averse to competition.

Ross Perot's political maneuverings have enough ups and downs for a comic 18th century novel, but his quest for office this time around seems as serious and cold-blooded as a corporate takeover. Pundits and others have wondered whether Perot learned any lessons from 1992. He did, but not the lessons his would-be handlers might like to hear. Perot's private campaign slogan this time could be "My Way or No Way."

His way, on the face of it, seems both simple and extravagant: spend more than $60 million on two autumn months of straightforward, just-the-facts-ma'am television advertising. Perot has always wondered why American campaigns can't be as short (and sweet) as European ones. Now he will get his chance to see if they can.

The Reform Party Convention, scheduled to begin this Sunday in Long Beach, California (one day before the Republican get-together down the freeway in San Diego), will not be so much a convocation as a coronation. It's likely to be as lively as an Electronic Data Systems sales conference. Forget the balloons and funny hats. Backers of Dick Lamm fear that even placards and signs might be banned. The party's national coordinator, Russell Verney, says the convention will play host to only about 1,500 valid Reform Party delegates and is not for hoopla but for decision making. "The enthusiastic part," he says, will be a week later in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, where the winner of the party's nomination will be formally declared.

Even within the Reform Party, excitement seems to be at a minimum. For the party's nomination referendum, a total of 880,298 ballots were received by signers of Reform Party petitions. Only 4.9% of them responded, with Perot garnering two-thirds of their votes and Lamm getting 28%. In the arcane process Perot has designed, anyone getting more than 10% of the votes was deemed eligible to contest the party's nomination for President. Round 2, in which voters will be able to cast mail, phone or E-mail ballots for one of the two candidates, has already begun. Perot only reluctantly agreed to publicize the details of Round 1, and the Lamm folks implied that he was conducting the electoral equivalent of a three-card-monte game.

At the moment, Perot is not on the mind of many voters, but that will soon change. According to the results of the latest TIME/CNN Election Monitor, a poll that regularly returns to the same large sample of registered voters, in a three-way trial heat for President, Bill Clinton holds a robust 20-point lead over Bob Dole, 53% to 33%, with Perot trailing at 9%. That single-digit following may not seem impressive now, but remember that the plucky Texan has been skirting the spotlight, operating largely out of view, and is yet to spend a single campaign dollar advertising his own candidacy. Perot the Sequel has yet to surface.

This time out, though, Perot must scale a wall of voter disaffection. By nearly 2 to 1 (58% to 29%), voters express an unfavorable impression of the Texas billionaire. Four years ago at this time, 45% of registered voters thought Perot could win the presidency, a cohort that has dwindled to a lonely 7%. Fifty-five percent of voters say he is running primarily for "his own personal reasons." Notes onetime Perot voter Mrs. Pat Koller, 55, of Trenton, New Jersey, a retired accounting clerk who was polled for the Election Monitor: "The man had an idea a few years ago...But I think Perot comes off as somewhat egotistical." People who voted for Perot in 1992 but say they have quit him for Clinton or Dole--a group that amounts to 7% of all current voters, according to the Election Monitor--can't seem to forgive and forget Perot's July 1992 swan dive out of the race (though it didn't prevent them from voting for him last time). Says homemaker Carol Ashworth, 51, of Chesterfield, Missouri: "He lost a lot of credibility by doing that. I don't think he could win anymore."

Perot voters have migrated. This time around, they are poorer, less educated and more rural than those who voted for him in 1992. Four years ago, the South was Perot's worst region; now it's Perot country, with 38% of his voters. But the Texan has kept a lock on the pessimist vote: 67% of Perot voters think the country is in deep trouble.

What Perot has lost, however, is his ability to yoke together his unlikely coalition of four years ago. Then he united both socially conservative, blue-collar, anti-NAFTA voters with fiscally conservative but socially moderate voters. Now those groups are going their separate ways, as shown by the difference between voters who prefer Lamm to Perot. The young Reform Party is already a fractious group, with supporters ready to bolt if they don't get the nominee they like. Only about half (48%) of those in the Election Monitor who say they would vote for Lamm in a three-way race would likewise vote for Perot, while only 26% of Perotistas would vote for Lamm in a similar contest. Lamm's supporters tend to be wealthier, more educated and more urban than Perot voters. They are the libertarianish, L.L. Bean-catalog shoppers who in 1992 found the wonkish Paul Tsongas politically sexy.

But there aren't enough of them for Lamm. In the minds of headline writers, Lamm's first name is Sacrificial, and he doesn't seem to disagree. "The Reform Party," Lamm complained last week, "so far is a wholly owned subsidiary of Ross Perot." Perot's people have told Lamm that the Boss doesn't have time to debate. "I'm trying to walk a line between not being a patsy and not being disruptive," Lamm says gingerly.

Lamm, unlike his rival, has managed to lasso a running mate: former two-term G.O.P. Congressman from Silicon Valley and high-tech executive Ed Zschau. Zschau (rhymes with wow), a Stanford-trained physicist who started his own computer business before entering Congress, has said Lamm's campaign should be "inspired chaos." His scientific analysis is already on target. Lamm has raised only about $100,000 and is not going to entice many new supporters with sound bites like this: "America is like the drunk who's looking for his keys under the streetlight even though he lost them down the block."

The Perot organization is mainly a one-man band. Perot's cabinet isn't big enough to fill a kitchen. Russell Verney is the all-around organizer, spinmeister, and aide-de-camp. A former air-traffic controller who ran for Congress as a Democrat in New Hampshire, he has brought some order to the Perot operation where others have failed. Clay Mulford, Perot's son-in-law, a big-time corporate lawyer, is the resident expert on arcane election and finance issues. Perot has a part-time pollster in Gordon Black, who provides memos on message and tactics but typically gets no feedback from the candidate.

Perot '96 will be pretty much the same model as Perot '92, with roughly the same sticker price. You won't see much flesh pressing; Perot doesn't care for it. His strategy will be to focus on television set-pieces--infomercials long on info, short on entertainment. The star, as before, will be the plainspeaking, chart-wielding, sound-bite-spouting candidate himself telling America what's what. Also, don't expect many press conferences. Perot regards the press as his true rival. When he has something to say and wants to do it for free, he will saddle up with his suspendered sidekick, Larry King. "So, Ross, what's on your mind?" "Well, Larry..."

In '92 Perot was far better at diagnosing problems than recommending prescriptions. This time one of his principal targets--the federal deficit--is no longer an issue he owns. While it's true that 78% of voters describe the deficit as "extremely or very important," they are likely to hear their own President touting the fact that, thanks to him, the deficit is now at its lowest point since the 1970s.

For the problems he does identify, Perot will need to come up with some answers this time around. He has wavered on prospective solutions. He initially derided the balanced-budget amendment as a gimmick and then embraced it. He pressed for a substantial increase in the gas tax, then eased off it. He has sought advice from his circle of friends and advisers, but some are dismayed by the candidate's refusal to evolve, suggesting that he's like a Vegas comedian who uses the same jokes over and over, refusing to freshen up his act.

In selecting a running mate, Perot understands that he cannot repeat his blunder of '92, when he chose the stouthearted but miscast Admiral James Stockdale. Perot would love to have a blue-chip candidate like David Boren, Warren Rudman or Sam Nunn, but so far none of them will give him a tumble. Perot, by most accounts, would be a most happy fella to have Lamm on the ticket, but Lamm has demurred, a stance that doesn't make sense if Lamm wants to build the party and become the heir apparent.

Perot's power this time might be in how he directs his followers in congressional elections, where they could be the swing vote in an election that threatens to rob Republicans of their nascent majority in both houses. Only a handful of Reform Party candidates are running for Congress (mainly in Minnesota, New York and Pennsylvania), and Perot says the party will endorse major-party candidates in many races. Expect to see Republicans and Democrats making hegiras to Houston.

Whatever happens in the fall, a legacy of Perot's race may spark a more durable movement that survives his defeat. Owing to the energy from 1992 and Perot's push this year, Reform parties in various stages of development are gaining traction in half the states. Lamm has said Perot is not the figure to take the Reform Party into the Promised Land of electoral viability. "Pass me the torch," he has implored the Founder. Perot has no intention of doing that just yet, and anyone who comes near it is likely to get burned--if Perot doesn't set himself on fire first.

--Reported by Laurence I. Barrett and Jeffrey H. Birnbaum/Washington

See the TIME-CNN election Website at AllPolitics.com for the latest campaign news

With reporting by LAURENCE I. BARRETT AND JEFFREY H. BIRNBAUM/WASHINGTON