The Political Interest

By Michael Kramer

What happened to Bill Bradley and Mario Cuomo? Two weeks ago they were giants, demigods, future Presidents. Today they are mere mortals; not crippled, certainly, but diminished.

In New Jersey, it is said that Bradley was punished by voters upset with Governor Jim Florio's $2.8 billion tax increase. That was part of it, but the main reason Bradley almost lost is that he threw away his ace. For 12 years Bradley was that rarest of breeds, a politician of decency, candor and intellect. "He looked at issues one at a time, voted as he thought right and never ducked," says G.O.P. consultant Roger Stone. Until this year. All of a sudden, the architect of the 1986 federal Tax Reform Act avoided taking a position on Florio's taxes. A "state matter," said the Senator.

Bradley could be a straight shooter again -- it is in him somewhere -- and he insists that he gets the message implicit in his close call: "I hear what the voters are saying; they don't think politicians have a lot to offer." But does he really get it? Bradley still won't say where he stands on New Jersey's new tax scheme, and he maintains that if he had it to do all over, he would do nothing differently. Bradley's boosters have long agonized about him as a presidential candidate because he is so often boring. They must now also consider his arrogance and the possibility that he has lost touch with the honesty that made him special.

- While Bradley suffered a Florio problem, Cuomo's meager showing represented a vote against Cuomo himself -- against his aloofness and his governance. "We must learn to do more with less," Cuomo said during his first term. But state spending has soared, New York's overall tax burden is in the stratosphere, the state's budget deficit is close to $1 billion, and Cuomo's massive spending programs are perceived as having had little if any impact on crime and poverty.

Cuomo could still win a presidential nomination, but could he unite his party? Some of the Democratic Governors elected last Tuesday favor limited government. Cuomo too will bow to reality and cut New York's budget. "They'll wake up," he says of his constituents. "They rail about spending but they will complain even more when it's cut, when their libraries close and other services decline."

At least rhetorically, Cuomo is keeping faith with his belief in activist government. Yet activism costs, and the electorate is clearly skeptical of government's ability to spend wisely. What is more, Cuomo's liberalism (he calls it "pragmatism") is a luxury voters may only be willing to countenance when times are good. When the economy heads south, as it now has, the kind of government that spends lavishly to protect the environment and help the less fortunate may be seen as threatening the self-interest of the middle class. If, in fact, that is where the majority is at in 1992, Cuomo will be left without a winning national message and the country will be left with George Bush's inane points of light.