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                                                                                COVER STORIES, Page 28

PRESIDENT BUSH

Rot On The Right


G.O.P. conservatives win a rhetorical victory, but deprived
of Reagan's leadership and the Soviet enemy, their fractious
movement is in disarray. Some look beyond Bush for a new champion.

By LAURENCE I. BARRETT/HOUSTON


    Judging by the doctrinaire platform going before the
Republican Convention this week, the conservative coalition that
Ronald Reagan constructed 12 years ago seems as robust as ever.
Just below the surface, however, the right wing suffers a
mid-life crisis that threatens its future -- as well as the
party's. The movement lacks an inspirational leader, a unifying
cause and an external enemy big enough to outweigh its internal
divisions.

    A symptom of the malady: Pat Buchanan, who assaulted Bush
from the right in the early primaries, is searching for a new
label to replace "conservative." His sister and campaign
manager, Bay Buchanan, explains, "We need something broader and
more relevant. The movement was defined by what no longer
exists, the cold war, and still uses a vocabulary now out of
date." The fact that Bush gets diminishing credit for the U.S.
victory in the cold war during his watch is a larger sign of rot
on the right. "There's an amazing disconnect," says one of
Bush's top campaign advisers, "between the President and
conservative leaders. They can't forget that he didn't come out
of their movement the way Reagan did." Nor does Bush get much
respect for his vigorous pandering to right-wing concerns.

    Reagan's great trick in 1980 was to unite the three main
sects of "wingers": the better-dead-than-Red faction, whose main
concern was fighting communism; the religious right, interested
in moral issues such as abortion; and fiscal rebels for whom the
great demons were high taxes and government regulation. Bush's
cold-warrior credentials served as a visa when he crossed from
the Establishment faction into Reagan country in 1980, but the
fall of the Soviet Union has shattered the right's consensus on
foreign policy. Bush admires pragmatic power-balance diplomacy
of the Kissinger school. Others favor more crusading zeal, while
still others want to curtail overseas involvement.

    Buchanan's brand of neo-isolationism appealed to only a
minority of voters during the primaries. Still, those who
supported Buchanan's message managed to get his "America First"
motto into the platform's final draft. Though proposals to phase
out foreign aid and to castigate the Administration for granting
China most-favored-nation status were voted down, the Buchanan
camp did win a provision favoring tougher measures against
illegal immigration from Mexico. The new plank supported placing
"structures" along the border, a variation of Buchanan's idea
of building frontier fences. "That's wacko," remarked
Congressman Vin Weber of Minnesota, a conservative whose main
concern is fiscal policy.

    Weber belongs to the faction that has been pressing Bush
to promote a bolder economic-growth program. After fencing over
nuances with White House agents supervising the platform, the
Weber group won a few concessions. One called for the
"ultimate" repeal of the tax increases imposed in the 1990
deficit-reduction deal between Bush and Capitol Hill. That Bush
went along with the compromise still rankles many conservatives,
though others feel that the deficit would be even worse without
it. Weber, who is quitting Congress, mourns the loss of fervor
for Reaganomics. "It's discouraging," he says, "how little
supply-side sentiment is left among elected Republicans."

    Even more discouraging to Republicans of varying hues is
Bush's surrender to the religious right on issues such as
abortion, gay rights and pornography. Pro-choice advocates
seeking even token concessions came away empty-handed. But they
did get some support from yesteryear's conservative icon Barry
Goldwater. The former Senator sent a letter from Arizona warning
that the "convention will go down in shambles, as will the
election," if the party clings to its adamant stand against
abortion. Because Bush's most solid constituency now is the
religious right, he cannot risk alienating it. Yet one of Bush's
advisers concedes privately that "the social issues really
aren't at the top of the President's agenda. What they do is let
us provide contrast with Clinton."

    Abortion is too narrow a cause to rally the old Reagan
coalition. "It stands out now," says conservative analyst Burton
Pines, "because there is so little else to galvanize the right.
But it's really marginal." Pines is one of many ideologues who
are cool to Bush -- "We'll vote for him holding our noses," he
says -- and wonder where the next Reagan will come from. One
subject of covert conversation in Houston is whether the
conservative cause would be better served by a Bush victory or
defeat this year. Another is which personality has the best
chance of uniting the sects for the next election.

    Dan Quayle appeals strongly to the social-agenda crowd,
but has such heavy liabilities elsewhere that he could survive
only if a second Bush term proved highly successful. Housing
and Urban Development Secretary Jack Kemp, the optimistic
supply-side advocate, draws the economic boomers and is
politically correct on social issues. Texas Senator Phil Gramm
has a strong regional base and conservative fiscal credentials
but may suffer from the perception that he has cuddled up too
snugly with the party establishment. James Baker is even more
alien to the wingers than Bush. Baker would have a shot at the
1996 nomination only if parts of the right wing got so disgusted
with the G.O.P. that they bolted to form a new party. Given the
fractious mood, and the strong appeal of Ross Perot's aborted
candidacy, that old idea could become reality after 1992.