CAMPAIGN NOTEBOOK

ELECTORAL HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL

For all the speeches given, the commercials aired, the mud splattered in any election, a hefty percentage of people decide whom they will vote for only at the last minute. Now, if all the people who decide late were to come out for Bob Dole...?

When did you finally decide whom to vote for in the presedential election?

Only in the last three days 17% In the last week 8% In the last two weeks (after the debates) 18% In early fall (after the conventions) 24% Earlier than that 33%

PROP QUIZ

For a politician a prop is more than a toy; it's a visual mnemonic device to help voters remember who the politician is and what he stands for. Match the politician with the prop that has become indispensable to him on the stump, and win the $500 government-issued hammer Al Gore used to lug around.

PROPS:

1. A doll-size wooden rocking chair that sways from left to right instead of from front to back 2. An ice bucket 3. A copy of the 10th Amendment 4. A white pickup truck

POLS:

a. Newt Gingrich b. Victor Morales, Texas Democratic Senate candidate c. Bob Dole d. Elizabeth Dole

Answers: 1. d.; 2. a.; 3. c.; 4. b.

WHAT BECOMES A LANDSLIDE MOST?

With polls forecasting an election sweep for Bill Clinton, some giddy Democrats are already using the L word: landslide. Not so fast, George Stephanopoulos. Even the most optimistic Democrats are predicting that Bill Clinton will not win more than 52%. But a real landslide ought to be well above that. Since 1824, when reliable popular-voting results became available, only four Presidents have made it into the 60% club. (One of them--F.D.R.--ran against a Kansan.)

60.3% 1920 Warren G. Harding 60.8% 1936 Franklin D. Roosevelt 61.1% 1964 Lyndon B. Johnson 60.7% 1972 Richard M. Nixon

Source: Congressional Quarterly, Inc.