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Sound bitten

Republican slate reflects overall poor choices

As the balloons and banners, sound bites and blue suits indicate, the primary season has arrived. Republicans poured millions of dollars into Iowa last week -- an airwaves blitzkrieg -- with a mere 17 percent. Was the impersonal media campaigning responsible for the record low turnout, or is it the abundance of charismatic vision among the candidates? Both seem to have played a part, along with the role of money within the primary process -- a system that is now in dire need of reform.

Steve Forbes raised the stakes by spending his millions on the airwaves and diminishing the impact of handshakes and town meetings. But his use of television's and radio's encompassing scope to introduce, reinforce and virtually drown the field backfired. Forbes reaped only 10 percent of the vote. Calls for a spending cap that first arose with Ross Perot's campaign resurfaced with Forbes. Yet no amount of money will win a race if the ideas are poor. Negativism and the impersonal nature of the sound bite cast the superficial glow of television upon the candidate. Money, as Phil Gramm has discovered, will not win an election; it will only keep the candidate in the race.

The meager offerings, the courtship of the elusive moderate vote and the need for a cohesive Republican vision threaten to splinter the party and its ability to select an electable -- much less formidable -- opponent to the Democrats. President Clinton, in comparison, appears powerfully presidential. The ensemble presented thus far seems empty. Trying flannel practicality, didactic statesmanship or isolationist conservatism, candidates have failed to tantalize or invigorate the electorate. Though it is early, voters are searching for the candidate of movie lore, the assured calm hero -- the role Colin Powell declined. Politics has become prohibitively expensive and bitterly distasteful despite its lack of substance. The mix has effectively screened out countless qualified candidates before they had the chance to run.

The mercurial moderate voter seems to be searching to make an informed and confident vote. Americans need real discussion of issues, not meaningless media phrases, to cast educated votes.

Access to equal, untainted television time blocks for all registered candidates might provide each presidential contender a forum to fully air ideas. Media spin would be somewhat circumvented. The sound bite would no longer dominate voter decision. Contenders would be evaluated not by their ability to group funds but for their ability to articulate vision.

The perennial desire to vote "none of the above" has lingered too long. Candidate selection deserves a more careful process. Until an open and complete debate in each state is implemented, voter disenchantment -- and apathy -- will continue.