Molly Ivins September 26

AUSTIN — Good news! Not earth-shaking, revolutionary good news, but some nice, solid stuff of the sort that makes you perk up and think we might save the republic, after all.

The first comes with an admittedly cynical twist — since it comes from a campaign consultant, we know that idealism is not behind it. Nevertheless, Republican pollster Frank Luntz has delved into the sentiments of the American people and is now advising Republican candidates that the way to get elected is to Make Nice. Mind Your Manners. Speak Very Little Evil.

The reason that this is such good news is it means we are past the Newt Gingrich/GOPAC official nastiness campaign. You may recall that GOPAC used to advise Republican candidates to refer to their Democratic opponents as sick, bizarre, pathetic, twisted and traitors. And, you will recall this had a less-than-happy effect on political discourse in our nation. In fact, so many people were turned off by it that there was some question as to whether democracy could survive at all.

But David Corn of The Nation magazine obtained a copy of a 103-page communications strategy for Republican candidates that completely reverses the earlier edict to use harsh, divisive language. Granted, the motive is as cynical as ever, but let's be grateful for small favors.

"Words are everything," declares Luntz, "and we have found the words and phrases that will move the American people." He recommends "kindlier, gentler language" and says Republicans should not "continue to communicate in harshly partisan tones to a harshly anti-partisan audience."

Republicans are advised to avoid inflammatory rhetoric. "Don't criticize individual government programs, which have constituencies. Instead, focus on 'the government bureaucracy.' The greatest anger is aimed at bureaucrats and waste rather than the specific programs. Therefore, every budget statement by every Republican congressman should include the words 'cutting the bureaucracy.'"

Luntz also advises "streamlining" education rather than "privatizing." As the Church Lady would say, "Well! Isn't that nice?"

Now, here's a gem of cynical manipulation from Luntz: "For example, 'not giving' and 'denying' may have the same ultimate result, but Americans are much more willing to 'not give' something than they are to deny it.

... Only 38 percent would 'deny emergency room care paid for by the government to illegal aliens,' yet a majority (55 percent) would 'not give it.'"

I especially like this distinction. Of course, sick babies will die in either case, but at least we will have "not given" rather than "denied."

In keeping with the new, anti-Gingrich mode, the invaluable Kathleen Hall Jamieson, the scholar of political advertising, says that negative advertising so far (knock on wood) is down by about two-thirds this year.

And from North Carolina comes news that even the media are trying to contribute to a meaningful discussion of public affairs. In an unprecedented act of cooperation, several of North Carolina's major newspapers and television and radio stations are cooperating in presenting information about major issues, whether the candidates are discussing them or not.

According to The New York Times, every Sunday, the newspapers present take-outs on issues that their own polling showed were important to readers, like crime or taxes. They are playing down campaign tactics, strategy, spin and "the horse race." Instead, they are concentrating on what can and should be done about the public schools and health care.

Of course, there are critics of this approach; for one thing, it's a little unnerving to see old rivals like The Raleigh News & Observer and The Charlotte Observer caught in cooperation when we usually think that competition produces better journalism. And because cross-ownership of media has reached such an octopus of monopoly, even concertizing in a good cause raises the scary specter of the media all singing out of the same hymnbook, which they already do to an alarming extent anyway.

Jim Andrews, campaign manager for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Harvey Gantt, put his finger on the weakest part of the effort: It, too, like the campaigns themselves, is poll-driven. It may well be that we need to talk about some issues that don't even show up in the polls because we don't know enough about them or don't have the political vocabulary to talk about them — for example, the presence of PCBs in our rivers or the social consequences of the fact that average real wages for nonsupervisory workers are nearly 13 percent below 1973 levels.

Despite these drawbacks, I think the North Carolina media deserve a laurel for at least getting us further than Dick Morris' playing woof-woof with a prostitute. So, I say good on y'all — and good on the public for bringing enough pressure to bear on pols and campaign consultants to get them to clean up their act a little. Hail and respect to each and every one of you.

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Molly Ivins is a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

COPYRIGHT 1996 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.