There's Something About Tom
Ferguson, Tim W.
T he most interesting U.S. Senate race in the country this year, in terms of contrasting ideas effectively expounded, is not going to be in New York. Rudy Giuliani will not, and perhaps cannot,...
...And he is running against an accomplished politician well-situated to dispense gravy to a vast state...
...Jerusalem...
...The "West Bank" mountain ridges dominate the narrow waist of Israel, in which over 70% of the Jewish population, 80% of its industrial base, and the most important military installations are located...
...Or why not just simply "peace for peace...
...She has courted business with her spin as a pro-business Democrat, and PAC slop (which Campbell is eschewing) will come her way as an incumbent...
...Yet as political realists point out, not only is this a big rock to push up the popularity hill toward a majority in Congress, but even if you got there, you'd still have the 16th Amendment to repeal...
...But he has tried--and sued--to stop Clinton's involvements in the Balkans, including the air war on Yugoslavia...
...It has yielded Gaza and about 400/~ of the "West Bank" to the Palestinians...
...With his bold platform, Campbell risks continuing his estrangement from the party...
...This ad has been published and paid for by Facts and Logic about the Middle East P.O...
...Return of these people to Israel, including J u d e a / Samaria ( t h e "West N e i t h e r I s r a e l nor any P a l e s t i n i a n e n t i t y could absorb them...
...Like the Silicon Valley that he represents, Campbell, 47, is protean and disruptive of established patterns...
...9 Carries the deregulatory spirit that marked his Reagan-era boss at the FTC, James Miller...
...Campbell believes as many libertarians (and some on the left) do, that a president must not arbitrarily--and in the case of May 2 0 0 0 " The American Spectator Clinton mischievously--put American forces into battle...
...After that, you have the dead zone of the Legislature...
...By standing firm and resolute, by not yielding to pressure from any source, domestic or foreign, and by not allowing Israel to be strategically weakened, Mr...
...But again, just raising the issue --as no consultant candidate ever would, because it doesn't have interest-group identity--is healthy for the republic...
...The executive, properly in this view, always has and will use power abroad...
...They enable us to pursue these goals and to pablish these me~sages in national newspaiaea's and magazines...
...he simply seems to be more "in your face" about it...
...In 1923, Greece and Turkey agreed to a r e s e t t l e m e n t of 2 million Greeks and 800,000 Turks...
...For a careful scholar, he is curiously enthusiastic about Roe v. Wade'screatived~ trine...
...No local official who gets TV exposure in a major market is Republican material (the time has passed for L.A.'s Richard Riordan...
...What else is expected of a country that occuoies only a fraction of 1% of the lands occupied by the Arabs...
...He has put himself on auto-pilot to lose...
...9 Opposes global economic manipulations by such entities as the Intemational Monetary Fund, Export/Import Bank, and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation...
...Beyond all that game theory, what does the ~l[i GOP in California have as an alternative...
...Tom Campbell won the Republican nod to face incumbent Dianne Feinstein...
...Nor, for all of the attention that the re-election bids of GOP Sens...
...And he is virtually screaming about the commifxnent of men and money to the drug war (actually, civil war) in Colombia...
...Likewise on Social Security, where Campbell is open to change and Feinstein--the supposedly pragmatic Democrat--is adamantly against it...
...I will not win in the normal way," he muses, "against a sitting member of the Appropriations Committee who has not been indicted...
...What we have seen so far is only a foretaste of what is going to be demanded from Israel in the so-called 'Yinal status negotiations...
...Okay, let's have an election about it with high-minded debate...
...Instead of allowing the Palestinians who left Israel in 1948 (and their descendants) to be integrated into t h e i r societies, they have, for the past fifty years, Kept tUeln ill lulsgli:iDl~ "refugee camps" and have encouraged them to plot vengeance and terrorism...
...TIM W. F~RGr0SON is a Los Angeles-based editor of Forbes...
...Spence Abraham in Michigan and John Ashcroft in Missouri merit, will either man be swinging for the fences in tight races against tough partisan foes...
...Rudy Giuliani will not, and perhaps cannot, take that much issue with Hillary Rodham Clinton's "new Democrat" socialism...
...And for many conservatives, who supported Kosovo and even some of the other forays, Campbell's call rings of old McGovernism...
...The American Spectator _9 May ~ o o o 47 nerships within the measure's 14 words...
...Moveable Katyusha rockets would dominate the area...
...Although opposed to government efforts to control content or restrict encryption, Campbell is showing his customary independence in opposing sales-tax exemption for the Internet -- shrugging off the interest of his constituent industry as well as of one of his party's best political weapons...
...Box 590359 [] San Francisco, CA 94159 FLAME is a tax-exempt, non-profit educational 501(c)(3) organization...
...but at the same time the most eloquent defender of Proposition 2o9, the initiative that ended racial quotas in the California public sector...
...Rather, the most philosophically stimulating battle of 2ooo is coming in Califomia...
...Bush, including ~ ~ Robert Bork...
...Amold Steinberg, a conservative political consultant who was allied with Campbell on the Prop...
...Maybe some ego in business or entertainment can be induced to give up mill i o n s - in a blue moon...
...Nobody uses the 3o-second attack ad as mercilessly as the California Democratic Party...
...S t i l l , and this is Campbell's is an exceptional can- why didacy even if he s not an ideal candidate: He has the intellectual force to get a real idea discussed...
...B ased on his overall rhetoric and voting record, which supports his image as a centrist, it's remarkable that Campbell is such a polarizing figure within the party...
...What are the facts Land for Peace...
...But Campbell, long a lightuing rod for conservative criticism, is staking out in many respects a radically constitutionalist (i.e., limited-government) campaign...
...The unusually personal bitterness of the primary--in one exchange the conservative barked, "Look at met" at his sideswiping young adversary--crescendoed on the night of Campbell's upset loss with intense acrimony between him and prolifers who'd brought him down...
...Why are the presidential candidates not talking about this...
...But in a body that has, under GOP rule, disgraced itself in its handling of the public purse, it is hard to know how much stock to put in floor votes...
...Most of the country--indeed, most Californians--are scarcely aware that such a race is even taking place...
...Whether this was for reasons of personal conviction or longer-term political calculation is, like everything about Campbell, forever subject to dispute...
...Indeed, she may, with her good press in a booming economy in an increasingly one-party state...
...Educating voters on issues is a lot to ask of the candidate, even if he vows an unplugged campaign...
...As to Jewish "settlements" in the "West Bank": Netanyahu has made clear that Jews have the right to live in any part of the land of Israel, all of the land west of the Jordan River...
...T o a great degree...
...Two 101 well-ensconced conservative congressmen with ]l~ potential statewide appeal who won't take the risk (Chris Cox and David Dreier) and another, 1 James Rogan, who wouldn't make this race even in the face ofa longshot re-election bid...
...He is, to cite just one of the paradoxes, an instigator of the 199o Civil Rights Act, now a tool of federal regulators pushing discrimination cases based on numbers and not actions...
...Israel needs to keep strategic control of the "West Bank," without which it would not be defensible...
...Further, Campbell famously came around to a critical vote for President Clinton's impeachment...
...To his critics, this is quintessential Campbell: Olympian and deaf to political tones, namely the best wedge for tax relief in sight...
...The congressman drew underfunded and unknown challengers in the primary, thus escaping much reopening of old wounds...
...But once more, Campbell is complex on foreign policy--hardly an isolationist...
...Please send me your videotape on three important aspects of Israel's strategic situation, fiery speeches by Yasser Arafat, and some memorable moments with Louis Farrakhan...
...Recalling his fallout with then-Speaker Newt Gingrich, he says it wasn't personal ethics problems but Gingrich's forcing in funds for the Lockheed Cq3o transport, in contravention of budget guidelines, that soured the Caucus on its leader...
...One camp of libertarians-- for instance, Ed Crane at the Cato Institute--also advocates this, believing it to be the only way to get rid of the Internal Revenue Service as well as the silver bullet to redress the investmentconsumption imbalance that is aching at the American soul...
...Given the arcana of arms control, the right could use legalistic Campbell's support for abrogating the ABM treaty for missile defense...
...Campbell also is courting trouble with his call to speed up the end of economic aid to Israel--hundreds of millions of dollars a year that is supposed to diminish to zero in the next decade...
...With little fanfare in the state's open March primary-and with only 23 percent ofthe vote-- Rep...
...Here, should he actually get elected, he could have an outsized influence as one senator...
...zo 9 quota repeal and toyed with aiding him this time, finds his voting record "conspicuously hostile to Israel," but also cites other policy affronts...
...Barak will have earned the trust of Isreal and the world and will bring peace with security, shalom batuach, to Israel and to the entire Middle East...
...The tax issues are part of what has set Alden off, and they're another briar patch...
...Box 590359, San Francisco, CA 94159 For this campaign he is touting a ranking from the National Taxpayers Union that shows him to be the biggest foe of spending in Congress...
...He is capable of drawing the finest of lines but wearing the boldest of stripes...
...1 Even as he mends fences, Campbell can't resist conlrariness...
...A disillusioned early supporter, Northern California hotel entrepreneur Ellis Alden, frets that his onetime prince is consumed with the political climb and "wants to be in a position of power to rule on other people's lives...
...It sounds at times like the Old Right,-but in fact Campbell is far from that, a frustratingly complex figure who confounds political expectations...
...The assumption among those who do follow politics is that a popular Feinstein will win in a walk this fall...
...But Jerusalem is the eternal and indivisible capital of the Jewish State...
...There are important Arab cities in the "West Bank", under full control of the Palestinian Authority...
...Even so, in line with the Camp David accord, Israel has yielded the vast Sinai to Egypt...
...It certainly fit his pattern of parsing issues according to his own logic and then coming down emphatically in often unpredictable ways...
...The most exciting (though again, base-fracturing) plank in the Campbell campaign is the foreign-policy constitutionalism...
...He has barely reintroduced himself to the state electorate (after spending millions in 1992), but now has the rest of the campaign to reach 15 million voters at the retail level...
...What follows are some areas in which demands will be made and pressure will be applied...
...Its purpose is the research and publication of the facts regarding developments in the Middle East and exposing false propaganda that might harm the interests of the United States and its allies in that area of the world.Your tax-dcductl%le contribufious are welcome...
...He was the most prominent GOP opponent of the "marriag e protection" initiative (against gay rites) on the March ballot that won by a landslide...
...But to some number of Jews (and other partisans of Israel) this seemingly sensible stance is code...
...Suffice to say Campbell is a soft touch for richer-to-poorer transfers but seems to abhor pork...
...And s h o u l d n ' t land for peace work both ways...
...Before the end of the 1967 Six-Day War, no claims to Jerusalem being a Moslem holy city or the capital of any Arab country were asserted...
...With his fine mind, he lapses into complications," sighs Larry Amn, the head of the Claremont Institute who becomes president of Hillsdale College next month...
...and "What about medical marijuana...
...Milton Friedman famously was so exasperated with his onetime student's decision to back away from Califomia's school voucher initiative in 1993 that he renounced his support of Campbell for the state legislative seat Campbell gained while out of Congress...
...But for over two thousand years, Jews have been living in Jerusalem and they have been the majority population since the 19th century...
...Back then a Herschensohn backer, author and activist David Horowitz today salutes Campbell as a rarity--"an intelligent Republican...
...I include my tax-deductible con~ibution in the amount of $ /62A O My contribution is in the amount of $100 or more...
...There is not enough land and not enough water...
...Hence he's against the fiat tax--he regrettably badgered Herschensohn over this--and favors a big federal sales tax instead...
...He has questioned, as too few politicians did, the suspiciously timed attacks against sites in Sudan and Afghanistan...
...There's also an economic efficiency case made for a tax-free Internet by Gary Becker and others: that it forces states and localities to rationalize and reduce their sales levies...
...9 Identifies liberty--"leaving the individual alone"-- as his "unifying message...
...The Palestinians would not need an army to make life in Israel impossible...
...He has many more ways to fall flat--thus discrediting the "moderates can win" claim of his fragile wing of the party--than to score big...
...The whole concept is absurd...
...And why not...
...She landed one big Republican tech fish, John Chambers of Gisco Systems, but Campbell thinks he can hold the line close to there...
...At the Horowitz function, he said he favors Taiwan's access to sophisticated weaponry such as Aegisclass destroyers...
...Barak will bring peace with security, shalom batuach, to Israel and to the entire Middle East...
...He has nowhere to go in 2oo2 if he --,1r loses respectably, presuming Gray Davis maintains a lock on the governorship of a booming state...
...I must atlract independents with viewpoints that most agree with but are afraid to say...
...She could still be on the senatorial balloL Maybe then Campbell would have an easier time drawing attention from others besides his bitter foes...
...As a Stanford law professor, he first won a House seat--once Pete McCloskey's -- in a 1988 primary against an old-style conservative pol who was a freshman fluke...
...This is heady stuff, and there are more snatches...
...Unrelenting pressure is being applied on Prime Minister Ehud Barak to make ever-more-dangerous concessions to the Palesdnians...
...The promiscuous use of presidential war-making powers is not new to Clinton, though he has pushed the envelope in his perverse way...
...The full range of NTU scores over his interrupted tenure in the House paints him in a less libertarian light, actually a rather middling one by most ratings...
...Why should they give up their capital, their holy city as far back as memory goes--or even any part of it...
...Neither man will discuss the other for publication...
...On Africa, a subject of intense passion for Campbell (he sought out a non-"juice" committee assignment), he has encyclopedic recall of his visits and specific ideas for humanitarian relief not "given to dictators...
...Campbell's pre-primary donation disclosure statement is full of Arabic names, from Silicon Valley and elsewhere in the U.S...
...He is far from the only Republican figure to be at odds with social conservatives...
...But heart-on-the-sleeve Herschensohn has never forgiven Campbell for the roughing up he received, which set the stage for the malicious coup de grace delivered by Barbara Boxer's forces in the fall...
...More than 12 million...
...Understandably, such citizens want a senator more even-handed on the Middle East...
...That is a giant if, and it establishes the first order of the campaign, for Campbell one of the most difficult: He must shore up 46 May 2 o o o _9 The American Spectator his party base and overcome his special problem with the right...
...Almost all of our revenue pays for our educational work, for these clarifying messages, and for related direct mail...
...Consider that he: _9 Honors the Founders' curbs on unilateral military interventions by the president...
...What a waste...
...Four years later,-the palpably ambitious Campbell, not yet 4 o, ran a bruising senatorial campaign against the right's beloved Bruce Herschensohn...
...He does it by saying that responsibility requires a tax base sufficient to meet the expectations ofgovemment, and that he is applying logic and fairness to allocating the burden...
...Israel has recognized this historical necessity...
...May 2o o o _9 The American Spectator You deserve a factual look at...
...Here suspicion creeps up on the right again: This is a test run to establish further identity and credibility for a run at perpetually vulnerable Barbara B~ in 2~176 That's a stretch' given !l P the lead time...
...For himself, constitutionalist Campbell said he detected a legal snag with domestic parto 1The open primary, which Campbell himself used David Packard's i money to bring to California through an earlier initiative, was not in the end decisive in the Senate race...
...Part of the tech community rose up against what it saw as coded intolerance...
...The Moslems have their holy cities, Mecca and Medina, and they have 22 Arab capitals...
...A P a l e s t i n i a n S t a t e . Israel could not survive if Judea/Samaria (the "West Bank") were in unfriendly hands...
...Ward Connerly, a maverick like Campbell who so far would rather dabble in the initiative process c~ la Ron Unz...
...They don't have to fear for their lives and nobody considers them an obstacle to peace...
...The fact is that even his conservative foes should - welcome this run at Feinstein, more than Campbell might himself...
...But with Campbell, no motivation goes unquestioned...
...A couple of minor elected state officials who don't excite the right...
...Campbell, by dint of the money in Silicon Valley, is as well positioned as any Republican to try to keep close to the loaded Feinstein...
...Yes~ i want to help the publication of these ads and in clarifying the situation in the Middle East...
...The drug posilion, which is classically Campbell in its nuance and, like most of his stances, can be impressively explained if he has a lecture hour, is too easily caricatured as one of legalization and scares off the soccer morns...
...into another Vietnam...
...Campbell always has pitted himself against the modern GOP base...
...Another cowering Republican campaign simply trying to hit consultantdriven points and avoid mistakes likely will not beat Dianne Feinstein, so why not raise substantial issues...
...How is it possible that 160,000 Jews living among 1 million Arabs in the "West Bank" should be an obstacle to peace if over 1 million Arabs live within the "green line" of Israel...
...The unorthodoxies surfacing in this campaign, Campbell says, don't amount to a Hail Mary pass, but they can help to establish him as not just another politician...
...It would be as unthinkable as for those 3 million Germans to r e t u r n to Poland and the Czech r e p u b l i c or, for t h a t m a t t e r , for t h e 800,000 Jews who fled or were expelled from the Arab countries to r e t u r n to t h e i r original homes...
...Hopeless...
...Return o f t h e "Refugees...
...Over 90% of the Arab population of the territories is under the control of the Palestinian Authority...
...And, especially in light of the experience since the "handshake," during which time more Israelis were killed by Palestinian terrorists than in any comparable previous period, there can be litfie question of the enduring hostility of the Arabs...
...in 1945, the resettlement of 3 million Germans from Poland and Czechoslovakia "By not yielding to pressure and by not allowing Israel to be strategically weakened, Mr...
...If he can get within 5 points of 67-yearold Feinstein (famous last words of the underdog), he can force her into debates and put his estimable intellect (Chicago economics Ph.D., Harvard Law Review) and energy to advantage...
...In fact, all he's advocating is local authority to set up clinics for users instead of jailing them, an option that probably would accord with communitystandards in urban San Francisco or New-Agey San Luis Obispo...
...When Campbell spoke to Horowitz's Wednesday Morning Club of conservatives broadly affiliated with the entertainment industry, his drag line drew the most kibitizing--but the shouts were "Why not legalize...
...Despite Herschensohn's current affiliation with Claremont, Arnn has i praised Campbell for his eloquence on behalf of the race-preference repeal, which saw him buck not only the Stanford crowd, but also a powerful corporate promoter at nearby Hewlett-Packard...
...But the "Arab Nation", with its enormous wealth and vast under-populated lands, has stubbornly refused to face facts...
...9 Favors junking the income tax...
...Campbell is not doing this to l o s e - or at least lose badly...
...With that backdrop, Campbell has had a break this year...
...He is not a pacifist: He supported the Gulf War...
...But Campbell was the Federalist Society's chapter adviser at Stanford and has I I A '~ found himself able to support all of the controversially conservative Supreme Court " choices of Reagan...
...The American Spectator - May :~ o o o...
...Again, this is Campbell: a big, bold righteous stand, and an apparent political lemon...
...The incumbent is hard-wired to demagogue this issue (as, cheaply, Campbell himself did in 1992 against Herschensohn...
...was arranged...
...Yet at least a few Israel backers say they smell a "McCloskey problem," referring to the old Nixon antiwar foe's drift into outspoken criticism of Israel...
...Eight years has dulled some of the animosity...
...The thought remains that A1 Gore might finally ask the oft-jilted Feinstein to be his running mate...
...Myname is _ Iliveat In State Z i p Mail to : FLAME, P.O...
...But it did apparently contribute to the defeat of a few COP conservatives down the ballot O and continues to rankle party regulars...
...He concludes, "Republicans will vote for him without spirit...
...These are the most important issues that Ehud Barak and his government will have to confront in the final status talks...
...Shouldn't the Arabs give up some l a n d to get peace...
...But Campbell has always been idiosyncratic on taxes, mixing realism (you'll never get rid of real-estate breaks) with populism (the rich should pay more) and a growth orientation (cut capital gains levies...
...In this race, though, we might see a Republican use his wits and not be mn offon the old Third Rail...
...Never in the history of the world has any nation returned lands to those who have attacked it...
...But he has backed expansions of federal power in environmental, employment, and consumer law...
...Population transfers have occurred throughout history...
...9 Says the drug war is failing and could lead the U.S...
...Following the collapse of its North African empire, France accepted close to 1.5 million people...
...The backlash against failed drag criminalization may be more general than is believed, though...
...There is no reason for Democrats to vote for him...
...He has a "balancedbudget" approach to controlling government...
...Likewise on China, to which Feinstein is the "best friend in Congress," Campbell says, while he, an arch-free trader, opposes World Trade Organization admittance because the mainland doesn't meet the rules and Ought not be rewarded for its current belligerency...
...Campbell also favors an end to economic sanctions on Iraq that he says-again, persuasively--are simply punishing innocents and not Saddam Hussein...
...The candidate argues that a country of Western wealth hardly qualifies for this handout and that he is not against the bigger military assistance package...
...Muslims and Hindus were exchanged between India and Pakistan...
...By the next morning, Campbell was his preternaturally chipper self again, offering help to his rival...
...We have virtually no overhead...
...Feinstein's 51 percent of the vote in the open primary wasn't overwhelming, but as yet (except in her challenger' s private polls) there's little evidence that Californians are itching to throw her out...
...In an interview, he even boasts of having been "right to have doubts about [closet liberal David] Souter...
Vol. 33 • May 2000 • No. 4
