MediaWatch: August 1992
Table of Contents:
All for Clinton-Gore
SCHIEFFER SWOONS
CBS anchor and reporter Bob Schieffer is another media fan of the Clinton-Gore campaign. On July 21, the CBS Capitol Hill reporter spoke to a group called Democrats for a New Direction. Schieffer praised Clinton's long convention speech: "It seemed to me that it said the right things for winning an election...I thought that the most important paragraph of the speech was when he said 'I accept the nomination on behalf of the working people, the people who play by the rules, the people who pay the taxes.'" Naturally, he said nothing about Clinton's plan to raise taxes by $150 billion.
He also praised the Clinton-Gore campaign strategy: "Seeing them out there on the campaign trail, they seem young, and vibrant, and full of energy...I think this bus tour that they are on right now is one of the great political innovations of recent years. I mean, finally, a candidate is getting out, and actually talking to real people. You see them out there -- You can tell they are having a lot of fun. I think that it is really creating a lot of energy." Why wasn't the idea of a bus tour through small-town America an "innovation" when Bush did it in 1988?
Schieffer also made a few gratuitous pokes at Vice President Quayle. In talking about the fizzled campaign of Ross Perot, Schieffer digressed: "On the cover of Newsweek with one word -- 'The Quitter', or two words, I should say. Sounds like Dan Quayle." As for the Quayle rumors, Schieffer said: "You couldn't take [Quayle] off. He would have to quit...He'd have to say, he believed he could, you know, work for family values as the Secretary of Education, something, something of that nature. I don't think you could make him Secretary of Education, though, with his spelling."
