Political Aides

Ross Perot dropped out of the presidential race because he abhorred the intense press scrutiny, was unwilling to spend the money required to win and lacked the temperament either to run a successful race or to govern, according to Edward J. Rollins, his former campaign co-chairman.

Thirteen years ago, Terry Tamminen was a Malibu pool cleaner and part-time actor with a gift for charming influential people and a resume that chronicled more rambling than a Jack Kerouac novel. Tamminen had sold condos in Florida, managed a sheep ranch in the Midwest, helped start a bottle recycling program in Nigeria, dabbled in Shakespearean acting and measured chlorine levels for such celebrities as Madonna and Johnny Carson.

If he were a basketball star instead of a statehouse staffer, he'd be Kobe Bryant or Magic Johnson -- a veteran playmaker, feared by foes, his best moves unleashed just before the buzzer. But like so many Sacramento insiders, Kip Lipper plays out of the limelight, in the back corridors of the Capitol, unknown to the public whose air and water and ecological ethos he has made his specialty over the last three decades. As the environmental expert for the state Senate's ruling Democrats, Lipper has helped craft many of California's groundbreaking laws in that realm -- and become a foil for Republicans irked by what they view as regulatory excess, and by the economic fallout.

A criminal investigation by the Justice Department has concluded that the chief spokesman for the attorney general and a former FBI official played roles in confirming a politically damaging CBS report about Rep. William H. Gray III of Pennsylvania, one of the top Democratic leaders in the House. The investigation failed to establish the original source of the information, but said the individual probably was outside the Justice Department, sources close to the investigation said Thursday.

A political insider tapped by Barack Obama to vet potential running mates resigned Wednesday, saying he wanted to prevent a controversy over his personal finances from hurting the Democratic presidential candidate's campaign. The unpaid advisor, Jim Johnson, was chosen by Obama last month to serve on a three-member team screening prospective nominees for vice president.

A judge on Thursday set a Dec. 16 trial date for two GOP political aides accused of campaign wrongdoing stemming from last year's 67th Assembly District special election. Rhonda Carmony is charged with three felonies for allegedly helping orchestrate the illegal circulation of petitions on behalf of a decoy Democratic candidate in the election. Maureen Werft faces two felonies for her alleged role in the November 1995 election.

The people running Bill Clinton's campaign for President would prefer you didn't know about Mort Engelberg. Engelberg, 54, is a nice fellow--smart, articulate and passionately devoted to the candidate he has served since last fall. But Engelberg is a Clinton advance man. And in the world of modern politics, advance men are somewhat like secret agents--people whose very existence is best concealed for the sake of the mission. Consider the risks of exposure.

Labor union officials and some liberal activists were seething Tuesday over Barack Obama's choice of centrist economist Jason Furman as the top economic advisor for the campaign. The critics say Furman, who was appointed to the post Monday, has overstated the potential benefits of globalization, Social Security private accounts and the low prices offered by Wal-Mart -- considered a corporate pariah by the labor movement.

Matthew Dowd knows sorrow and loss. He has been divorced twice. A daughter died two months after she was born. And then there is the added heartbreak -- a word he uses -- of his split with President Bush. Dowd, 46, is one of the nation's leading political strategists, a onetime Democrat who switched sides to help put Bush in the White House, then win a second term. He spent years shaping and promoting Bush's policies -- policies that Dowd now views with a mixture of anguish and contempt.

The long pale hands fumble a bit as the elderly German unchains the iron gate. But he still moves with military correctness as he leads the way through a frontyard enclosed by a high hedge and into his home. He sinks into an aged armchair in a dim living room filled with books and an air of solitude. At 88, he is courtly, wary, nostalgic. His blue eyes glow when he recalls the day Joseph Goebbels introduced him to Adolf Hitler.