Somebody for Everybody

Not mesmerized by Mondale? No yen for Glenn? No heart for Hart? New Hampshire voters will still have plenty of options at the polls next week. A record 22 candidates have paid a $1,000 filing fee to be on the state's Democratic ballot.

There is Martin Beckman, 54, "Montana's Fighting Redhead," who is campaigning on the novel notion that "everyone should pay a fair share of taxes." Hugh Bagley, 52, of Keyes, Calif., has called for the annexation of Mexico as the 51st state. To rein force the point, he has printed up some real-looking $51 bills.

Wealthy Timber Baron Gerald Willis, 44, is running for both the presidency and the vice presidency. So fervent is Willis' admiration for President Andrew Jackson that he combs his hair in an exaggerated pompadour reminiscent of Old Hickory. His Piedmont, Ala., home is a replica of Jackson's Hermitage in Nashville. Boasts Assistant Campaign Manager Jim Yarbrough: "He is the only nationally recognized political unknown."

David Kelley, 59, who lives in a campground near Pigeon Forge, Tenn., and bills himself as "the last Confederate soldier," is one of four Republicans challenging Reagan in the New Hampshire primary. Of course, there is also Harold Stassen, 76, the "boy wonder" of the 1940s, who with his eighth stab at the Oval Office has transformed himself into, well, the Harold Stassen of the 1980s.

But the New Hampshire crowd is only a fraction of the 163 aspirants on file with the Federal Election Commission in Washington. They include Bob Brewster, 53, of Orlando, Fla., the candidate of the Christian (NonLawyer) Committee; and Elijah the Prophet, 40, of New York City, who sent the FEC a bonus along with his registration papers: a copy of his book, The Time of the End. But surely the wave of the future is a beeping Baltimore independent, Rebecca Robot, who pledges "high-tech jobs for people." A nation governed by a robot? She, or rather it, would certainly be the ultimate machine politician.