The Telegraph
Mother Nature forced three of the best-financed hopefuls to appear at the 
G.O.P. fundraiser by phone hook-up
By KEVIN LANDRIGAN, Telegraph Staff,01/08/96

	MANCHESTER: The ferocious winter noreaster that whacked the East 
Coast on Sunday left a more lasting impression on a speech-a-thon by Republican presidential hopefuls than the sometimes ferocious words from the candidates. 
  Mother Nature forced three of the best-financed hopefuls to 
"appear" at the GOP fund-raiser by phone hook-up.
  The stranding of Sens. Bob Dole and Phil Gramm in Washington, D.C., and 
millionaire publisher Steve Forbes in New Jersey took some, but not all, 
of a harsh edge off the evening.
  Media commentator Pat Buchanan had a laugh on all three, referring among 
other things to Gramm's refusal to honor New Hampshire's first primary 
window and campaign in Delaware.
  "I guess my good friend, Bob Dole, got stuck in the deep freeze and ice 
in Washington. So what else is new?" Buchanan cracked.
  "I understand Phil Gramm can't get out of Delaware tonight."
  "And it's a very tough time. ... Steve Forbes is up at the 
estate I've heard, a couple of the polo ponies took sick again."
  Gramm was reduced to telling his tale of woe by phone to the overflow 
crowd of nearly 1,000 at the Center of New Hampshire event. 
  "I was going to take a subway to a train, a train to New Jersey and New 
York and then a plane to New Hampshire and maybe make a movie about it", 
Gramm joked.
  Dole battled a crackling sound system at the close of the four-hour 
meeting to pledge there will be no budget sellout deals with President Clinton.[EP]
  "This was not an autumn of compromise and it will not be a winter of 
concessons", Dole said. 
  "I am not afraid to make this election a referendum on our vision for 
America against Bill Clinton's."
  Dole, the frontrunner in pre-election polls, acted as if none of his GOP 
challengers were in Manchester, narrowing his sights on Clinton while his 
rivals came after him.
  Former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander said Dole misses the point that 
the budget battle sums up how to win back the White House. 
  "I predict Bob Dole won't be our nominee when the votes are finally 
counted because the message of the campaign will not be the budget fight 
with Bill Clinton", Alexander said.
  Borrowing liberally from a speech last week, Alexander said the GOP must 
show it can be compassionate as it calls on the federal government to do less and individuals to do more. 
  "If all we talk about is goverment instead of citizenship and budgets 
instead of schools and numbers instead of neighborhoods, Bill Clinton 
will be re-elected and the U.S. House will be run by (Democrat) Dick 
Gephardt", Alexander said.
  Gramm claimed Clinton has already won due to Dole deal-making that has 
permitted the incumbent to offer four different budgets, all unacceptable to the GOP.
  "We wanted a budget, he (Clinton) wanted a new credit card and he won. 
Now does anybody believe we are in a stronger position with Bill Clinton 
than we were when we started this process in October?" Gramm asked. 
  Forbes rested most on his familiar theme of a 17 percent flat tax that 
presumes a radical surgery on the current tax code. 
  "There is only one thing to do with it, scrap it, kill it, bury it and 
hope it never rises again", Forbes said to strong applause. 
  "The power to tax is the power to destroy. Let's take that power away 
and restore it to the people." 
  "There is one new program I will be proposing as president and that is 
job retraining for the IRS."
  U.S. Sen. Dick Lugar, R-Ind., said keeping any income tax will not 
produce the growth needed to make life better for the next generation and he pressed for adoption of his national sales tax. 
  "The Social Security system won't go broke with 3.5 percent growth but 
it will with only 1.5 percent or zero growth", Lugar warned.
  And Iowa industrialist attacked the Forbes plan for dumping any tax on 
inherited wealth while keeping taxes on working families above their bigger, proposed deductions. 
  "The Forbes tax plan ... it's plain un-American. That's my 
opinion", Taylor said.
  "I sold $15 million of stock to get into this race. Under the Forbes 
plan, I would have paid zero taxes ... but yet an employee I paid $50,000 
would pay 17 percent. That's not right. 
  "Maybe Mr. Forbes believes if you inherit money, then you should not have 
to pay a tax."
  Maryland talk show host Alan Keyes was critical of several candidates 
for not speaking frankly about policies to protect the traditional American family. 
  "It's a message of priorities, not a laundry list of applause 
lines", Keyes said.
  U.S. Rep. Bob Dornan, R-Calif., the final invited candidates, canceled 
his appearance before the storm had hit; Since announcing his candidacy last summer, he has run a moribund campaign in the first-primary state.

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