Will the Kid Come Back?

During the 1992 election campaign nothing could keep candidate Bill Clinton down. If the evening television news reported he was suffering from bimbo eruptions, dodged drafts or non-inhalation, by the time the morning paper was delivered, he'd recovered.

Now he's reminded on the nightly television news that he hasn't yet filled dozens of top-level staff positions and can't keep the staff he's got. And the next morning's paper only makes it clear he no longer walks on Whitewater.

What turned the campaign's comeback kid into the capital's comedown chief executive? Since character still is at the root of his problems, could the difference be only the way the media reports them?

When he was campaigning, Clinton had pledged to turn off the Bush-Baker pressure that had brought Israel to the peace I table in Madrid and Washington to negotiate a land-for-peace agreement it didn't want to sign.

Now that the Lobby's white hope is in the White House, things have changed. Israel's American friends often are uncomfortable with second-term presidents, even those who sweep the Israeli-Palestinian dispute under the rug so long as they are focusing on re-election. In their second terms they're more likely to think about their place in history-and doing the right thing. So, sometimes, the Lobby and its Media sympathizers turn on those it helped into the White House, as was the case with Jimmy Carter.

What would be the consequences for Israel if Bill Clinton were a one-term president? On the Democratic side, Vice President Al Gore would become the nominee. He proved his loyalty to Israel long before Bill Clinton did.

On the Republican side, the race would be wide open. But the Israel lobby would be just as comfortable with Jack Kemp, William Bennett or Rep. Newt Gingrich, and probably with Sen. Phil Gramm, as it is with Gore. It would be wary of former Secretary of State James Baker and of Sen. Bob Dole but, as the front-runner, Dole will be in the limelight and vulnerable to media savaging for two and a half more years before the 1996 elections. That's plenty of time to hurt him and Baker.

So, if you were a member of Israel's column of columnists, like A.M. Rosenthal, William Safire, Charles Krautharnmer or Jeane Kirkpatrick, or of its talk show claque like Gordon Peterson, Fred Barnes, Morton Zuckerman or Paul Gigot, or of its loyal legions in the newsrooms of the White House, State Department or Pentagon, what would you do?

If you'd been going easy on Bill Clinton for the past two years, you might be tempted to regain a little credibility by saying some of the unkind things you'd repressed. And you could square it with your Israel-oriented conscience just so long as you also remembered always to go easy on Al Gore and Jack Kemp, and give Bob Dole and James Baker no quarter.

It's all hypothetical. But if it's correct, the kid may not come back.

Probing the PACs

Through 1988, it was easy to predict where the big pro-Israel campaign donations would be going each election cycle.

The network of national Jewish weeklies printed columns by Washington insiders that said so. In the 1990 election cycle, however, the principal syndicated Washington columnists for the Jewish weeklies, James Besser and Douglas Bloomfield, clammed up.

But that year there still were one or two reports in major Jewish weeklies that listed what they called the congressional FOIs (friends of Israel) who were facing strong challenges in the primaries or in the general election. Readers who could afford to make campaign donations and wanted "to help Israel" thus got their marching orders.

Now those articles have largely vanished from the Jewish weeklies. What happened? One thing that happened was this magazine. It reported where the pro-Israel money was going, just in case someone wanted to help the other candidate. Another was the growth of Arab-American and Muslim-American organizations. They still are small, but they enroll dedicated one-issue voters on Middle East questions.

Most important, however, is the overall change in American public opinion. Back in the 1960s, Time magazine humorously described an anonymous participant in the "Jewish vote" as vehemently denying that she was an "ethnic voter" because of the way she chose her candidate. "Ethnic schmethnic, I don't care," she said. "Just so long as he's Jewish."

In the 1970s and 1980s the pro-Israel vote became more focused and sophisticated. Reward any incumbent who's voted according to AIPAC instructions, its PACs told their members, even if the incumbent is not Jewish and the challenger is. It was that kind of instruction that went out through the Jewish weekly newspapers. By then, however, there no longer were references to the "Jewish vote. " That was partly because it was no longer politically correct (PC) and partly because an increasing percentage of Jewish Americans no longer cast their votes largely in terms of "What's good for the Jews," which by then had become, "What's good for Israel. "

The most important change, however, is that special interest lobbies themselves no longer are PC. The tobacco lobby used to be one of the most important lobbies on the Hill. Now, for most politicians, to get caught taking its money would be tantamount to political suicide. The National Rifle Association may be headed for the same fate.

That leaves AIPAC and its scores of deceptively named pro-Israel political action committees in a class by themselves. Most Americans by now are acutely aware that AIPAC's cause is injurious to U.S. taxpayer health. Voters also are increasingly suspicious that AIPAC recommendations are anti-peace, anti-justice and antihuman rights.

In fact, it was no-strings U.S. aid that made Israeli extremism inevitable. And it was George Bush's attempt to tie loan guarantees and aid to Israel to performance at the peace table that resulted in the replacement of Israel's Likud extremists by the relatively moderate Labor Party.

With such increases in the level of American public understanding of the Middle East problem, and increased suspicion of special interest lobbies like the tobacco lobby, the gun lobby, and the Israel lobby, it's no wonder the Jewish weeklies that anyone can buy on a newsstand no longer give public marching orders to the pro-Israel faithful. To be identified as a recipient of pro-Israel PAC money may soon be just as injurious to a candidate's political health as taking a tobacco PAC's dollar.

One way to get an idea of what the insider pro-Israel PAC newsletters are telling their members, however, is to take a look at who's getting the big PAC money in the current 1994 election cycle. The boxes that follow of the top 15 Senate and top 5 House recipients in 1993 are only the tip of the iceberg.

A lot more of the story is contained in the accompanying state-by-state charts of all candidates who had received pro-Israel PAC money as of Dec. 31, 1993. However, they don't tell the whole story.

Some candidates take no PAC money. Pro-Israel candidates among them may get their payoffs in private donations that don't show in the chart. This is particularly true in the states where most pro-Israel PACs raise their money.

Pro-Israel candidates in places with large and well-heeled Jewish populations like Los Angeles or Manhattan may not need to take PAC money at all. Former Los Angeles Rep. Mel Levine had his own personal pro-Israel PAC through which he raised money to give to other pro-Israel candidates in states where it was difficult to collect such funds.

Nevertheless, the boxes on this page and the charts that follow may help readers evaluate the senatorial and House candidates in their states, and even some in other states who could use help. If a candidate is receiving huge pro-Israel PAC donations this year, it means he or she is being hard pressed by an opponent who has a good chance of winning. Some readers may want to learn more about who those opponents are. It's just possible that by now there are more Americans who will vote against the candidates of the pro-Israel PACs than for them.

—RHC