Dallas On The Line

By DAVID ELLIS

Ross Perot is fond of condemning Washington as "a town filled with sound bites, shell games, handlers and media stunt men." His disdain for politics- as-usual propels his anti-campaign. Yet Perot has turned over management of his crusade to a bipartisan corps of political pros who exemplify everything Perot says he opposes. Their efforts to transform Perot's volunteer army into a more traditional campaign brigade have sown widespread resentment and anger among his early enlistees.

In a sense, Perot was only fulfilling his promise to provide his supporters with "a world-class campaign" when he recruited Republican Ed Rollins and Democrat Hamilton Jordan to guide his effort. They, in turn, have signed experienced operatives from both parties to lend the crusade an air of professionalism. In conjunction with several of Perot's former business associates, the team will determine campaign strategy, look for a running mate and help shape the candidate's stands on at least a few major issues. But the , transition from grass-roots petition drives to a high-tech political offensive has run into some bumps. Some of the revved-up volunteers who have placed him on 20 state ballots so far are complaining about being edged out of the process by handlers dispatched from the tightly organized Perot headquarters in Dallas.

Many grass-roots supporters fear that the brain trust will turn Perot's maverick run into a mainstream bid for the White House. They are convinced that the candidate is in danger of being packaged by a group of slick operators more interested in returning to power than in revolutionizing government. That argument is reminiscent of the "Let Reagan be Reagan" true believers who accused Washington insiders of badly serving the former President's interests whenever he veered away from the conservative creed.

"People are calling me from all over the country; there's a lot of disenchantment," says Jack Gargan, an early Perot backer from Florida who has begun to feel shut out. "They're trying to put a saddle on him." Gargan, a term-limit proponent and founder of THRO (Throw the Hypocritical Rascals Out!), invited Perot to give the keynote speech next week at a Texas convention advocating the defeat of congressional incumbents. Rollins and others in the campaign reportedly advised Perot against attending the convocation, lest he alienate influential senior members of Congress who will survive the November election. But Perot overruled the staff and called Gargan personally to confirm that he would show up.

Even among Perot insiders, there is disagreement on strategy, and the high command has still not identified which voters to target. Press spokesman Jim Squires points to polls indicating a low number of undecided voters to back up his assertion that Perot must chip away at the supporters of both Clinton and Bush to win. "The task left now is to take the other guys' votes," he says. But Morton Meyerson, the chief executive of Perot's computer company, who is serving as a senior adviser to the campaign, advocates a broader appeal. "We're not going after anybody," claims Meyerson. "We'll offer up a program and invite people who find it attractive to come in and help us."

Disagreement also arises over how to publicize the Perot message. San Francisco adman Hal Riney, who helped create Reagan's effective "It's Morning Again in America" television campaign in 1984, has signed on to devise the Texan's television ads. Rollins and Jordan want to launch a full-scale media effort almost immediately, but other aides favor more of the unadorned, direct appeals that have proved so effective in building support. Several key assistants were ecstatic over Perot's performance on an abc town meeting last week. Although the candidate was typically discursive and vague when responding to questions, the ratings were impressive, an indication that his appeal is still strong. At the moment, the team plans to roll out a modest, paid media effort by the end of the month.

Although the exact message to voters is still being fashioned, an organized effort to build support is taking shape. Republican advanceman Joe Canzeri has been making sure that crowds at Perot rallies have been plentiful and telegenic. Tim Kraft, who handled Jimmy Carter's field forces in 1976, will deploy 30 operatives across the country. Each coordinator will be charged with setting up offices in three or four states and zeroing in on voters within each congressional district. Most of the $4 million raised by the campaign so far ($3.2 million of it from Perot's pocket) has been spent on establishing this structure. Under orders from Dallas, volunteers seeking donations and handing out campaign buttons are strictly prohibited from accepting anything larger than $5, Perot's stated limit for personal contributions. There is a fear that a "supporter" who hands over a $10 bill and says "Keep the change" just might be a reporter or opposition mole trying to test whether the cap is truly being heeded.

The insiders advising Perot have decided that they must wrest management responsibility away from the volunteers, who are considered less reliable and certainly less pliable. "If you've got paid people working for you, you can come out with a plan and expect that it will be followed. If you have volunteers, you must meet with their approval, or they won't do it," says Meyerson.

So far, however, the volunteers have performed remarkably well. In New York part-timers have established two separate structures: one to overcome the state's byzantine electoral laws and assure Perot a spot on the ballot, and another to cultivate grass-roots activities through November. One petition- drive worker in New York City who attended an orientation meeting received four follow-up phone calls confirming that she would actually hit the streets with a clipboard. Other statewide groups have been equally effective in marshaling support and finding their way through the legal thicket. Perot's California organization, which collected more than 1 million signatures to place him on the ballot, has drawn up a 26-page strategy manual on how to deploy volunteers and sent a copy to the main office urging its adoption nationwide. Some Perot partisans contend that paid political consultants contracted by the main office are simply moving in and completing a process the volunteers started months ago on their own time.

The frictions are most acute in Oklahoma, Colorado and Illinois, where hotshot pros have shoved aside older volunteers who have labored for months to get their man on the ballot. In some instances the acrimony has led to legal battles. In Tulsa organizer Pat Clancy says a Dallas-based team took over his group's bank account when they consolidated operations in Oklahoma City. When Clancy balked at being shut out, the World War II veteran was told he was a "security risk." According to Cliff Arnebeck, a Perot volunteer in Ohio, the Dallas-based advisers "squelch and humiliate" grass-roots workers. If a local organizer is at the center of a controversy over tactics or long-range strategy, the professionals "put out the fire by jettisoning those under attack."

In some cases the professionals are attempting to channel the energies of the petition workers elsewhere. In many regions Perot's paid staff members are trying to set up in 100 days the kind of support network that has been in place for the major parties for years. One idea: enlist volunteers in an adopt-a-voter program, in which each draws up a list of 25 other potential Perot supporters, ensures that they are registered and monitors the level of their enthusiasm right up to Election Day. Although Perot has criticized both parties for kowtowing to special interests, his campaign has a "coalitions" section that will craft specific appeals to blacks, Hispanics and veterans. More than 100 Perot youth clubs have sprung up, and strategists want to attract a major portion of the 26.4 million Americans in the 18-to-24-year-old age group worried about finding their first jobs in the troubled economy.

Perot seems content to let the pros run the campaign. He never attends the daily 8 a.m. tactical sessions and rarely involves himself in the debate over how to set up and maintain operations in each state. Perot has also kept hands off in the research-and-development area of the campaign. Issues chief John White, a Deputy Budget Director in the Carter Administration, is developing positions for Perot on the economy, crime prevention and foreign affairs. White has hired 12 young policy analysts to interview experts on various subjects, some of whom have been flown to the Dallas headquarters for skull sessions at the candidate's expense. "It's an enormous task," admits White. "We could be here a year and not get the job finished. Unlike a conventional campaign, we can't call up a staffer on the House Budget Committee and say, 'Give us all your stuff.' "

That hands-off attitude is an apparent change from Perot's behavior in the business world. Former aides note that when Perot headed Electronic Data Systems, he exercised tight control over major policy decisions and had a penchant for cutting top aides out of the loop and playing one man against another. While he has allowed the political experts to plan among themselves, some in the campaign are worried that Perot might blow his stack if things begin to go wrong. In April he dressed down campaign chairman Tom Luce for not providing adequate briefing data during the taping of an interview. "Ross can only hold himself so long," predicts an ex-employee. "He'll nail someone on national television, and the public will be aghast."

Some of the campaign's top lieutenants believe that no matter how much they plan, simple destiny -- tied to a broad willingness to accept a third-party candidacy -- will dictate whether Perot makes it through to November. "This is either a unique time in American history or it is not," declares Luce. "If it is, Ross Perot is going to be elected President." If a Perot Administration comes to pass, there will be no shortage of people claiming credit for the coup.

With reporting by Sally B. Donnelly/Los Angeles and Richard Woodbury/Dallas