Newsweek: Gore-Clinton Ties Strained After Clinton Attacks Bush Without Warning Veep of Comments
Clinton Aides Say It Was a 'Mistake,' 'Wouldn't Happen Again;' President to Lay Low for Rest of Campaign
NEW YORK, Oct. 22 /PRNewswire/ -- Vice President Al Gore was furious last
week at President Bill Clinton for launching a headline-grabbing attack on
Texas Gov. George W. Bush in a speech to Democrats on Capitol Hill that stole
the thunder from Gore's own successful campaign stops in New York, Newsweek
has learned. Gore hadn't been warned of what the president would say and he
thought he had made it clear -- in public and private -- that Clinton should
not interfere with his campaign.
(Photo: newscom.com
newscom.com )
Gore aides burned up the wires to the White House to find out what
happened and were told that Clinton had departed from the prepared text after
concern over seeing Gore as unable to make his own case, writes Chief
Political Correspondent Howard Fineman in the October 30 issue of Newsweek (on
newsstands Monday, October 23). "They said it was a 'mistake,' and that it
wouldn't happen again," one insider tells Newsweek. The aides agreed that
Clinton would remain far below the radar for the most part, appearing only at
private fund-raisers, recording messages for phone banks, and doing radio
spots.
"We'll see if the guy can follow the script he's given," said one aide
about Clinton, who is only expected to make one high-profile trip for the
entire ticket: California. But Fineman reports that Bush is raising the
stakes as well. He'll be campaigning in California next week too -- perhaps
simultaneously with Clinton.
With only a few weeks to the election, both adversaries are fine-tuning
their final messages, and Fineman writes that Clinton is in one way or another
the force behind both of them: "Gore isn't just distancing himself from
Clinton. He's abandoned Clinton's run-to-the-middle strategy and is focusing
on firing up his own rank and file. It's Bush, a New South governor like
Clinton, who has the savvy -- or the luck -- to follow Clinton's theory that
victory lies in blurring partisan lines."
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