"The Curious Crew"

Republican Goldwater decided some time ago that his most effective issue was national "immorality" under Democratic Administrations. Thus, although the Jenkins case underlined the issue, it did not change Barry's tone. The only difference was that when he spoke--as he had been speaking for weeks--about the "curious crew" in the White House, he got a greater audience response.

Bobby Baker's name remained the one that Barry mentioned most often and most scornfully. Early in the week, while he was addressing some 15,000 people in downtown Des Moines, Iowa's Republican Senator Bourke Hickenlooper handed him a slip of paper. Written on it was news of an announcement that a Democratic-controlled Senate committee, assigned to continue the investigation of the Baker case, had decided that it would hold no more hearings until after Election Day. Barry's face purpled.

"Now this is the kind of thing I'm talking about, folks!" he cried. "This is the kind of thing that bothers me. When the President of the U.S. has swept so much dirt under the rug that you have to walk uphill to get to the Democratic platform; and when he can, by twisting the arm of any U.S. Senator or Congressman, call off an investigation that I am now convinced leads to the White House, then it is time for a change. This is a question of morals, it is a question of honesty or dishonesty, it is a question involving the White House--and that dark cloud has gotten darker. The American people don't like this!"

In Kansas City, Goldwater declared: "The man who now occupies the White House could stand on the side of truth. Instead, he is standing firmly and coldly on the side of deceit and cover-up . . . The White House remains silent in the face of scandal, grave suspicion, and a sense of national doubt unequaled in our time!" In Harlingen, Texas, he said: "The people have looked at the White House and have found it dark with scandal. The people have looked at the man who now occupies the White House and have found him shadowed by suspicions which no amount of handshaking and hurrah can chase away."

Goldwater's decision not to mention Jenkins, however temporary, was not shared by some other Republicans. G.O.P. Campaigner Dick Nixon raised the question of how it happened that Johnson's "two closest associates" should be "bad apples." Beyond that, Republicans are working up a TV film documentary showing stripteasers and wild teen-age parties, interlaced with shots of Bobby Baker and his pretty friend, Carole Tyler. Also on tap: G.O.P. sponsorship of an organization to be called "Mothers for a Moral America."

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