The pol and the pool

A pool reporter tracks several one-on-one sessions between presidential candidate Al Gore and members of the media as Gore's campaign bus speeds across Michigan.

By Compiled by MIKE WILSON

© St. Petersburg Times, published November 5, 2000

From a pool report filed from Vice President Al Gore's campaign bus on Oct. 29 by New York Post reporter Vince Morris. When the setting for campaign activity is too small to accommodate the entire press corps, a reporter is designated to stay near the candidate and write a report for the rest of the media.

This report was forwarded from the campaign trail by Times staff writer Bill Adair.

-- MIKE WILSON, Floridian editor

Okay, so The Man's bus pulls out of (the) center of East Lansing about 25 minutes after he finishes speaking. He shakes hands with the crowd, etc. Jon Bon Jovi walks off to get on his own bus, so he can get to Muskegon and entertain the crowd, which is predicted to be mighty p--- off since it will be kept waiting by the behind-schedule candidate.

Bon Jovi and The Man pass like two ships.

Crowds line the street as we leave.

We pass fraternity row (Michigan State University is nearby) and many of the college types are Bush backers. In front of TKE many fine young men wave the bird at The Man. They also boo. They are clearly not studying today.

A few houses down, a half dozen sweet, blond coeds are standing quietly in front of their house. Sipping from mugs and wearing big puffy sweaters. Sadly, we drive on past them.

There are four camera crews on the bus, plus poolie, and Julia (Payne, a deputy press secretary to Gore). The bus is decorated with recliners and benches upholstered with green imitation leather. There is a Sony TV and a microwave, and the Gores remain in a private room in the rear until the TV crews set up.

A few minutes later we hit the highway and interviews begin.

The Man is sitting on one of those dandy green recliners, sipping coffee, and he's got Tip perched carefully on the left arm of the chair. She's sipping tea and her butt must hurt from balancing on the arm, but like a trouper she remains on that damn chair's arm for the first interview and three more like it. Your poolie developed a whole new world of admiration for the Tip.

First up, Kelcey Carlson with local CBS station sits down and opens up the discussion.

Kelcey leads with her strongest question first:

Question: "What do you do to stay in shape?"

Answer: "I have a treadmill or a Stairmaster in the room where I stay, and I try to get some exercise in each day."

Question: "Will Clinton come here with you in Michigan?"

Answer: "I'm going to campaign on my own. I think it's important to present my own vision for the future and I'm campaigning as my own man. I think that's awfully important. He's going to help get out the base and get out the vote, and I appreciate that. But I'm going to be campaigning on my own."

Question: "Our small town Kalamazoo newspaper" -- sorry I could not get name of paper -- "is a local paper and not thought of as a conservative paper, but it endorsed Gov. Bush this morning. One of the reasons they said they could not endorse you is because of the exaggeration factor." (The Man gives a big time sigh here. Shades of Boston.)

Answer: "The Republican ticket has engaged in a yearlong series of personal attacks. And they use a lot of money to try to make people believe that. But the attacks themselves have been exaggerated. I don't know what to say." The Man seems annoyed to get asked this question and his voice gets more strident as he goes on.

"One of their examples is that I took a trip to Texas to see the fires with the assistant director of FEMA instead of the director. I took 16 or 17 trips with the director, James Lee Witt, two years ago. I'd forgotten that I went with the assistant director on that trip. If they want to spend a lot of money claiming that's a character flaw, I'm sure that some people will believe that. But it's not. When he makes a similar mistake I don't attack him personally on that basis. . . . This is not about me. This is about the people," etc.

Question: "What do you say to undecided voters?"

Answer: "I want to fight for the people," etc. Never been afraid to take on special interests, etc. (Look, I'm not going to give you the boilerplate. If you want it all please move to Grand Rapids and tune in to WWMT.)

Question: "Are we going to see you back here before the election?"

Answer: "I hope so. I hope so. It's sort of on a day-by-day basis in the final week."

The Man clearly, as he likes to say, does not want to promise he'll come back this way, despite the broad, unique appeal of central Michigan.

Here, all of a sudden, while that last answer is still hanging in the air, The Man leans up and gives Tip a nice big, mushy kiss.

Next up is Garson Fischer with another CBS affiliate.

Question: "Every stop matters because race is so tight. How does it feel?"

Answer: "It's great. It keeps you focused. No time to waste."

(The next question started out well, especially when the talent mentioned the word "curse," but it did not live up to expectations.)

Question: "My Jewish mother would say I'm cursing you here but what about if you win big states but lost other ones. Would that affect your ability to govern?"

(This poor guy was trying to ask about the popular/electoral issue and The Man fortunately did not make him restate the question.)

Answer: "Well I try to resist hypothetical questions that are unlikely to come up." . . .

Question: "Remember what you wrote in Earth in the Balance? They say your presidency would be bad for the auto industry."

Answer: "Of course, the auto industry is supporting me. CEOs of the auto industry have made statements that go beyond mine in their commitment to make a new generation of cars and trucks with more efficient engines, fuel cells, hybrids."

Etc.

(The Man at this point shows a flash of yuppie upbringing. "Can you can get me a cup of real coffee?" he snarls at a steward on the bus. The guy comes back about 3 minutes later with fresh coffee.)

The next guy, Rick Albin of NBC, comes forward and gets a happy "hello" of recognition from The Man.

(Before getting down to business, Albin asks The Man to sign a photo of himself and the Veep. This takes much longer than it should because guy hands The Man a ball point and Tipper immediately notes "that won't come out" on film. So a small hunt for a Sharpie ensues, with Gore's photographer saving the day.)

Question: "It's Jan. 24, 2009. We've just spent eight years of Al Gore as president. . . ."

Answer: "I like this question."

(Appreciative laughter)

Question: "What are things like?"

Answer: "Our schools are the best in the world. Our people are employed. We have a smarter, smaller federal government. . . ."

(This goes on for seemingly 20 minutes, with The Man getting more and more excited as he goes on.)

"For something that you've never thought about that was a pretty good answer," replies Albin. (Har har har, all around.)

"A good question deserves a good answer," The Man says.

Question: "Tipper, let me ask you this question even though I know you're biased. Why, beyond policy, should Americans vote for Al?"

Answer: "Well because we have been married for 30 years and we've known one another even longer. We have four children, and we have a grandson. I think it speaks to his character that he has been there for us. This is a man of courage, of character, of passion."

"And exciting?" asks Al, looking lovingly up at Tip.

A pause here, as if she really had to chew on this one, before she can give a response: "Yes! And exciting."

Question: "I want one more campaign promise. After election can I have an interview? I'll go wherever you are. I just want 15 minutes."

Answer: "You got it. You got it. Julia, write that down."

Julia: "I got it. I got it." (Julia scribbles madly on a stack of paper. One more promise to a voter by The Man.)

Finally, the round-robin ends with Gretchen Wirtz, of the Fox affiliate. . . .

Question: "What question do you get asked the most?"

Answer: " "Will you kiss your wife again?' " says The Man, after thinking on this one longer than any other question posed to him during this bus ride.

. . . Then Gretchen, so shy and maybe aware that she's not really supposed to do this kind of thing, asks The Man if he will sign her press pass, which she removes from her head with effort after the string holding it gets snagged on her earring.

Aiming to please, The Man says: "How do you want me to make it out?" . . . He signs the cameraman's press pass also.

As everybody gathers stuff up to get kicked off bus, The Man makes conversation with Gretchen about her career. She volunteers that her career got its start in Cedar Rapids, S.D. She looks back at The Man and says, "Is that where you got your start?"

Here the Tip chimes in and says, "He got his start in Vietnam."

The Man thinks about that for a second and gets the thousand-yard stare of men who have seen blood spilled in battle: "I started out at Khe San," says The Man -- all serious here. Poolie waited for him to laugh but he did not. Then he asks Gretchen, in a big brother type of encouraging way:

"So New York is your next market?"

"Oh yeah," responds Gretchen.

And so with that, Sam grabs poolie by jacket and pulls him off bus.

-- Word for Word is an occasional feature excerpting passages of interest from books, magazines, Web sites and other sources.

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