The Candidates at Work

> Barry Goldwater had his finest hour in California. He won endorsement from the California Republican Assembly despite a Rockefeller attempt to block it. Actually the C.R.A. is a dwindling power in state politics, and its boost gave Goldwater little more than a psychological victory. But Barry made the most of it. After a surprise visit to the winter retreat of Dwight Eisenhower in Palm Desert. Barry reported that Ike said "he does not think it wise for Republicans to fight Republicans," and implied that this was a criticism of Nelson Rockefeller. At a fund-raising dinner in Los Angeles, Goldwater fired a volume of metaphors at President Johnson and the Bobby Baker scandal. Said he: "If a Republican President found a Bobby Baker in his closet, he would open the door and air it out, not slam the door and try to hide it . . . I don't care if there is a Baker's dozen of sacred cows involved in this scandal--they should be herded out in a roundup of honesty." Cheers and applause were thunderous. Even better: the $100-a-plate dinner netted nearly $400,000 for the Goldwater campaign treasury. > Governor Rockefeller returned to New York from his California swing--and probably wished that he had stayed away longer. The state assembly in Albany turned down a pet Rockefeller plan to provide $165 million in new state funds for public housing. What made the defeat even more chilling was the fact that Rocky's own Republican majority in the assembly ganged up to vote 63-16 against him. > Governor William Scranton rammed through the state assembly his much-beleaguered plan to reform Pennsylvania's rickety unemployment compensation laws (TIME, Feb. 21). So intense was Democratic feeling against the bill that the assembly nearly broke into a riot. Characteristically, Scranton said he was interested only in what the bill "is going to do for Pennsylvania." But no one could deny that the victory would add another feather to his national cap. Scranton, who once showed even less interest in the vice-presidential nomination than in the No. 1 job, told newsmen he would accept a vice-presidential draft. Of course, he added, he does not think a vice-presidential nominee is drafted, but he might consider the job just the same.

> Richard Nixon conceded that "it is obvious that I will attend the Republican Convention and have some influence on the decision." For the next three weeks. Nixon will be working his way through the Far East on behalf of the Pepsi-Cola Co., a client of his New York law firm. On the itinerary for a two-day stopover: Saigon, South Viet Nam, temporary home of noncandidate Henry Cabot Lodge. On the agenda for discussion: politics--or Pepsi?

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.