Jim Lehrer Read online

There was absolute silence.

  Not too sweetly, I asked her what the problem was.

  “You’ve got two apples and one orange,” she replied, and quickly explained her opinion.

  I snapped back something about the Secret Service having said it was time to go and hung up.

  Kate was well aware by now of how I moved into a zone-out state as any particular debate approached. I closed down my mind to all outside “things,” with the hope that I could float as if in space to and through the debate. Her apples-oranges point had stopped the zoning.

  In the ride to the debate hall—Wharton Center at Michigan State University—there were two interventions. First, my annoyance with Kate settled down enough for me to realize that she was right. Second, a long freight train halted our two-car moderator/panelist motorcade for several minutes, giving me time to come up with another apple to replace that wayward orange.

  Minutes later at the Wharton Center, I tried to call her from a phone in the small backstage holding area to tell her how grateful I was. There was no answer.

  She told me afterward that her distress over having ruined my zone-out just before the debate had driven her out of the house for a quick, nervous neighborhood walk with Amanda, our youngest daughter.

  With the president, the governor, and the businessman at their podiums and me sitting at a small table facing them, the debate began.

  I started with my apple for Clinton.

  “Governor Clinton, in accordance with the draw, those concerns about you are first: You are promising to create jobs, reduce the deficit, reform the health care system, rebuild the infrastructure, guarantee college education for everyone who is qualified, among other things, all with financial pain only for the very rich. Some people are having trouble apparently believing that is possible.

  “Should they have that concern?”

  Clinton responded that he could do it all, but both Bush and Perot underlined the public’s doubts.

  I went on to my apple for Bush:

  “Mr. President, let’s move to some of the leadership concerns that have been voiced about you. And they relate to something you said in your closing statement in Richmond the other night about the president being the manager of crises. And that relates to an earlier criticism, that you began to focus on the economy, on health care, on racial divisions in this country, only after they became crises.

  “Is that a fair criticism?”

  Bush said he didn’t think it was fair at all. Perot said he had come to talk about issues, not the individuals. But Clinton went back and forth with Bush over the crises issue.

  As I let that two-way play out, I felt Perot storm clouds forming. In his distinctive high-pitched voice, he pushed me:

  “I thought you had forgotten I was here.”

  Perot was smiling—almost—but his body language made it clear I had better call on him soon to say what he had come to say or there was going to be trouble. He would, most likely, publicly charge that I was not treating him fairly.

  But I held up a hand as if to say, “In a minute, Ross”—a kind of respectful use of body language, as I saw it—and kept the Bush-Clinton exchange going another minute or so before saying:

  “I have to let—we have to talk about Ross Perot now, or he’ll get me.”

  And I finally tossed Perot the apple question I had for him. Unfortunately it came out ungrammatical, awkward—and much too long. My face warms to read it even now in cold print.

  “Mr. Perot, on this issue that I raised at the very beginning and we’ve been talking about, which is leadership, as president of the United States, it concerns—my reading of it, at least—my concerns about you, as expressed by folks in the polls and other places, it goes like this: You had a problem with General Motors. You took your seven hundred and fifty million dollars and you left. You had a problem in the spring and summer about some personal hits you took as a potential candidate for president of the United States and you walked out.

  “Does that say anything relevant to how you would function as president of the United States?”

  Perot came back with a punch saying he sold his General Motors stock because the people running it were brain-dead. In another health analogy he said:

  “If you have a heart problem, you don’t wait till a heart attack to address it.”

  The “personal hits” referred to a charge that the Bush campaign was allegedly planning to sabotage the upcoming wedding of Perot’s daughter with some kind of embarrassing photograph. Perot gave that as a reason for suspending his presidential campaign in July while ahead of both Bush and Clinton in the polls.

  The “quitter” charge followed him when he returned to the race three months later.

  Perot finished his answer to my apple this way:

  “Now what happened in July we’ve covered again and again and again. But I think in terms of the American people’s concern about my commitment, I’m here tonight, folks.… And talk about not quitting. I’m spending my money on this campaign; the two parties are spending your money, taxpayer money. I put my wallet on the table for you and your children.”

  Clinton, when I asked for his response, said, after a few preliminaries:

  “I have no criticism of Mr. Perot.”

  Bush ended his answer with:

  “My argument is not with Ross Perot. It is more with Governor Clinton.”

  And the storm passed over me—and all.

  THE ONLY GENERAL comment from Perot on the debates was what he said later on Larry King.

  He did no “debate prep” except go to the barbershop.

  “We were just sitting there in the barbershop, and we talked about what the issues were that concerned people in the barbershop—literally, got my hair cut, got on the airplane, and I was ready for the debate.”

  I have always believed that Ross Perot’s decision not to participate in our Debating Our Destiny interviews was based, at least partly, on what I did to him in The Last Debate, my novel that was published in 1995.

  In that 100 percent piece of fiction, “Perot” is the host of Sunday Morning Ross, which is exactly what the title suggests—a Sunday morning television network talk show, à la the real Face the Nation, Meet the Press, and This Week. There are references to “Perot” and his weekly program throughout the novel.

  But then, as the plot goes, “Perot” is replaced by two young journalists who had become stars for what they did as debate panelists. His firing prompts “Perot” to ignore his promise to go quietly and, instead, on his last broadcast he makes a valedictory “squeaky, fiery speech about the awfulness of the people who run the ABS television network and all of network television.” He talks for twenty-two minutes directly to the camera and then storms off the set.

  Among his parting lines: “I’ve been asked if I might hit back by buying this network. Forget it, friends. I’ve got a lot better things to do with my money—which, by the way, I didn’t get by investing in the dying and the past.…

  “These people aren’t long for this world. I understand a merger with the Disney Channel is in the works. Makes perfect sense. One Mickey Mouse outfit deserves another.”

  Later, at a news conference in the ABS News Washington bureau parking lot, “Perot” adds:

  “These people aren’t qualified to run a toilet concession at a roadside park on the information superhighway.”

  I had known Ross Perot—the real one—for years, going back to my reporting days in Texas. He felt that I had abused that long, friendly relationship by making fun of him in the novel. Direct as ever, he let me have it in an angry phone call right after the book was published. In retrospect, I think he had a right to be annoyed. I should never have used his real name the way I did in a work of fiction.

  I wish I had given him the name of a Dallas Cowboy football player, as I did most of the other characters.

  My path did not cross Perot’s again until October 2009 when we both attended a fund-raising gala for the Dallas Public Libra
ry. There we had a pleasant exchange, almost like old pre-novel times.

  I put in a quick new pitch for an opportunity to talk to him—for this book—about the 1992 debates. I reminded him that they were important to the history of presidential debates, with their innovative town hall and sole moderator formats and first attempts at opening up the rules. He gave me his card with his Dallas phone number.

  Three days later, from my office back in Washington, I followed up and, within minutes, Perot was on the line. I repeated the pitch, adding the names of the former presidents, vice presidents, and other candidates I had already spoken with.

  “I have nothing to say about all of that,” Perot said.

  I made a second pass and he said, again, “I just have nothing to say.”

  I pressed on with a question about what James Stockdale had told me about having had no real conversation with him about the debates, positions, issues, or anything else concerning politics.

  “I don’t have any memory of any of that,” Perot said.

  “Memory of having had a conversation at all or what was said?” I persisted.

  “I really do not want to talk about any of this,” he said one more time.

  And that was—is—that.

  I did do one constructive thing shortly after hanging up. I wrote a note to Perot, thanking him for taking my call and then apologizing for what I had written in The Last Debate fourteen years before.

  I wish I had done it long ago.

  IF I HAD had a full chance to talk to Perot, I would have also asked about his remarkable non-presidential NAFTA debate with Al Gore on November 9, 1993.

  That ninety minutes on CNN was a major event in the history of televised debates as well as in the national controversy about the North American Free Trade Agreement that finally ended with its passage by Congress.

  In the pre-debate chatter, Perot’s folksiness was given the edge over Gore’s stiffness.

  They sat side by side in a Washington television studio across the table from Larry King, the moderator. Gore, then vice president under President Clinton, supported Senate ratification of the treaty; Perot was vehemently opposed.

  King laid out the wide-open rules of the debate at the beginning: no formal statement-and-rebuttal format and no time limits on questions or answers.

  After giving out the telephone numbers for viewers to call in, he said, “We’re going to wing back and forth, and then include your phone calls.”

  Afterward, there was near unanimity from the pundits and polls that Gore got the better of Perot that night. Words like “crushed,” “annihilated,” “destroyed,” and “demolished” were used in stories after the debate, which had a still-standing cable TV record audience of eleven million. Much fun was made of Perot for his constant call to Gore, “Let me finish.”

  King, the moderator, drew criticism for the way he handled the evening. Howard Rosenberg, the Pulitzer Prize–winning TV critic of the Los Angeles Times, landed the toughest hits. They came under the headline:

  REAL LOSER IN AL GORE VS. ROSS PEROT: LARRY KING.

  Rosenberg even jumped King for calling the combatants by their first names, “Ross” and “Al,” but the main complaint was about his passivity—for being what Rosenberg called an “absent” moderator.

  I think Rosenberg’s hits were off the mark—and unfair. King did exactly what a moderator should do—leave it to the combatants and stay out of it as much as possible. Absent is sometimes the best thing to be.

  A persistent Gore charge that frustrated King and brought Perot to his testiest was the money behind the lobbying effort against NAFTA ratification. Gore said Perot had spent more against it than those supporting it.

  PEROT: That is not even close to the truth. It is a matter of record how much Mexico has spent. It is a matter of record how much USA/NAFTA has spent. You take—

  GORE: Why isn’t it a matter of record—

  PEROT: I, I—

  GORE: —how much you all spent? Can that be a matter of public record? Can you release those numbers?

  PEROT: I really would appreciate being able to speak.

  KING: All right, go ahead, it was a question he raised before—

  PEROT: I really would—

  GORE: It’s a fair question, isn’t it?

  PEROT: Excuse me—

  GORE: I raised it earlier.

  PEROT: It was my understanding tonight we’d have a format where you would ask the questions.

  KING: Okay.

  PEROT: I would be able—I am not able to finish.

  KING: But if he makes a statement—I’m just trying to balance so that he answers yours—

  PEROT: Well, excuse me, I would like—I would like to finish a sentence, just once before the program’s over. Now, we are not able to buy time. If you are anti-NAFTA, you cannot buy time on the networks. We have had to go buy local station time. We cannot buy network time because the networks won’t sell it. That’s the covers on how much you’re spending. We didn’t run ten-page supplements in The New York Times, et cetera, et cetera.

  GORE: Okay, now, I’d like to respond to that, okay?

  KING: Let him finish, he’s got one more thing.

  GORE: All right, go ahead. I do want to respond.

  Then a few moments later, Perot tried to move on to NAFTA’s effect on manufacturing, arguing that the United States would not be able to sell goods to Mexican citizens who made low wages. Gore seemed to ignore his assertion.

  GORE: Okay. First of all, you will notice, and the audience will notice, that he does not want to publicly release how much money he’s spending, how much money he’s received from other sources to campaign against NAFTA. I would like to see those public releases that the other side has made. Now, let me come to the point—he talked about accuracy of forecasts and numbers. I watched on this program, right here at this desk, when the war against Iraq was about to take place, and you told Larry King, “This is a terrible mistake because it will lead to the death of forty thousand American troops.” You said you had talked to the person who had “ordered the caskets.” You were wrong about that. You said on Larry King just before the election that after Election Day, there would be one hundred banks that would fail, costing the taxpayers one hundred billion dollars. You were wrong about that. Now, the politics of negativism and fear only go so far.

  KING: All right—

  Then, much later after two commercial breaks, King reminded Perot that he still had not answered Gore’s questions about the financing of the anti-NAFTA campaign.

  PEROT: Okay, fine, I’ll answer it. See, again, he throws up propaganda. He throws up gorilla dust that makes no sense.

  KING: What is it then?

  PEROT: May I finish?

  KING: Yeah.

  PEROT: Okay. Most of the television time I bought during the [1992 Perot-Stockdale presidential] campaign. That is a matter of public record. I have had two television shows since the campaign in the spring. They cost about four hundred thousand dollars apiece. Those were network shows. Then we just did a NAFTA show, but we have to buy the time locally. I don’t have the figures yet on what that cost me or I’d be glad to tell you.

  KING: You’re spending—

  PEROT: I had to buy—no, I buy the television time because I don’t want to take the members’ [of Perot’s anti-NAFTA organization] money for that. They understand that, they approve of that.

  GORE: Can I—it’s not all his money, and we don’t know because they do not—

  PEROT: No, but television time. I just told you.

  GORE: Well, but—see, they do not release the records, but I accept your response because you have said that now—

  PEROT: If it makes you feel better to see the checks and the bills from the network—

  GORE: It’s okay for you to interrupt but not me?

  KING: Okay, all right—

  GORE: Now, hold on. You just said that you would—

  KING: Let’s go back to jobs.

  G
ORE: You just said that you would release the records, and I appreciate that. Now, this—

  PEROT: It has nothing to do with what’s going to happen to our country.

  GORE: Well, we need to know who’s trying to influence it.

  PEROT: I am paying for it, it’s that simple.

  KING: We got the answer.

  Ross Perot made another run for president in 1996 as a candidate of the Reform Party, but his performance against Gore during the NAFTA debate was among the reasons it did not go as far as in 1992. The Commission on Presidential Debates ruled that he was too low in the public opinion polls to qualify for joining the presidential debates between President Clinton and Republican Bob Dole.

  Perot ended up drawing 8 percent of the popular vote in 1996, compared to the 19 percent he had received four years earlier. Many in politics—particularly George H. W. Bush and his supporters—believe Perot’s 19 percent was a major factor in the final outcome of the 1992 election. Clinton won 44 percent to Bush’s 37 percent, but what if there had been no Perot—no third candidate? In a straight two-way race, isn’t it more likely Bush would have won more of those Perot-minded voters than Clinton? And thus Bush would have won reelection and there might never have been a Bill Clinton presidency?

  There has been a marked absence of Ross Perot from politics and view since 1996. Whatever his stylistic quirks, he deserves to be remembered as a man of substance who used his own money and iconoclastic words to spark serious discourse about things that mattered.

  CHAPTER 4

  Personal Differences

  Whatever else, the Perot-less debates of 1996 were a big deal for me, because I moderated all three of them—something that had never happened before.

  I had initially received a simpler telephoned invitation from Janet Brown of the debate commission. She asked if I would do the first debate between President Clinton and his Republican opponent, Senator Bob Dole, in Hartford, Connecticut, on October 6, 1996—barely a week later.

  I hadn’t even gone into high-nerves mode about that when there came a back-channel call a short while later.

  “If asked, would you also do the other presidential and the Gore-Kemp vice presidential one, too?”