Presidential Elections 1992 California

Striding into the heartland of Republican politics, Democratic presidential contender Bill Clinton urged an Orange County crowd estimated at more than 18,000 to tell their neighbors to "hold their noses this one time and vote for a Democrat, because they'll like what they get." During a 20-minute speech from the stage of the jampacked Pacific Amphitheatre, Clinton lashed out at President Bush and bluntly predicted that the Republican Administration would be bumped from office on Election Day.

Undaunted after an 0-for-4 drubbing on Election Day, Gov. Pete Wilson on Wednesday blamed the worst economy since the Great Depression for a Democratic "tidal wave" and hinted that he now may be more conciliatory toward his legislative adversaries. "Although there are differences in philosophies, people can work together for the perceived common good of the state," said the man many consider to be one of the most combative California governors of modern times.

Democrat Bill Clinton claimed his party's nomination Tuesday night and sought to reclaim the mantle of change that his campaign lost during four bruising months of primary elections. "The election for America's future begins tomorrow," he told a large and enthusiastic group of supporters crowded into a ballroom in the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles.

Democratic presidential nominee Bill Clinton is still running comfortably ahead of President Bush in California, with Ross Perot having little effect on the race, the Los Angeles Times Poll has found. A statewide survey conducted after the final presidential debate and completed Friday night showed Clinton with a 19-point lead over Bush among registered voters. Perot was third, having picked up little ground since a similar poll in mid-September.

Trying to prove his commitment to an all-out state effort despite trailing Bill Clinton by landslide poll numbers, President Bush's political strategists have begun a blitz of TV commercials and campaign mailings in Southern California. The TV ad and mailed flyers also are designed to help Bush build a substantial "bump" in state polls coming out of next week's Republican Convention in Houston.

Today's presidential primaries in six states--including California--offer a huge cache of convention delegates but will do little more than confirm the obvious. Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton needs fewer than 100 of the 700 Democratic delegates up for grabs to clinch his party's nomination. President Bush wrapped up the Republican nomination last month; his share of the the 427 GOP delegates at stake will simply add to his winning margin.

Ignoring his last remaining rival and seeking to consolidate a still-divided party, Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton wound up eight months of campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination Monday by criticizing President Bush and calling for unity. "Most politicians in America today try to find ways of dividing us," Clinton told a rally in Oakland. "I will never, never divide this country.

PRESIDENTIAL 100% Precincts Reporting: Votes (%) -- Democratic Bill Clinton: 67,643 (46%) Edmund G. Brown Jr.: 57,872 (39%) Paul Tsongas: 12,154 (8%) Larry Agran: 3,583 (2%) Eugene J. McCarthy: 351413 (2%) Bob Kerrey: 2,045 (1%) Lyndon H. LaRouche Jr.: 1,306 (1%) -- Republican George Bush*: 162,560 (72%) Pat Buchanan: 62,381 (28%) American Independent Howard Phillips: 852 (100%) -- Libertarian Andre Marrou: 1,297 (100%) -- Peace & Freedom Ron Daniels: 135 (39%) Lenora B. Fulani: 132 (38%) R.

Months of arduous and aggressive political struggle ended Tuesday when Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton clinched the Democratic presidential nomination with primary victories in California and five other states. In California, Clinton rushed to an early lead over his last lingering competitor for the nomination, former Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., and he held on to it as ballots were counted throughout the night. With 85% of the vote counted, Clinton led Brown 47.7% to 40%.

Loaded in buses and vans, they choked nearby freeways and local streets, overflowing the parking lot at the Pacific Amphitheatre and lining up hundreds deep to get through the gates to see the Democratic candidate for President. Swept up by the size and enthusiasm of the crowd that turned out Thursday night at a rally for Gov. Bill Clinton, Orange County Democratic Chairman Howard Adler couldn't help but engage in a bit of hyperbole as he commandeered the microphone.

The schedule could hardly be more unusual: Just a little less than two weeks before the election, a Democratic presidential nominee appeared Thursday night in the Republican bastion of Orange County. But that is the way Campaign '92 has gone for Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton. "It's tough to be a Democrat here, but no more," Orange County Democratic Chairman Howard Adler said Thursday night as he surveyed the crowd of more than 18,000 who crowded into the Pacific Amphitheatre to cheer Clinton on.

Here is the Alamo, the Maginot Line and the Ft. Knox of the Republican Party. For half a century and more, Democratic presidential candidates--if they were ill-advised enough to venture into Orange County at all--moved in timidly and left tracelessly, like low tide at Laguna, like the water lapping faintly at the pilings of the Huntington Beach pier. The Republicans of Orange County, legion and loyal, withstood them all. No one since F.D.R.

Striding into the heartland of Republican politics, Democratic presidential contender Bill Clinton urged an Orange County crowd estimated at more than 18,000 to tell their neighbors to "hold their noses this one time and vote for a Democrat, because they'll like what they get." During a 20-minute speech from the stage of the jampacked Pacific Amphitheatre, Clinton lashed out at President Bush and bluntly predicted that the Republican Administration would be bumped from office on Election Day.

"In politics, as on the sickbed, people toss from one side to the other, thinking they will be more comfortable." --Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 18th-Century poet Truck driver Don Anderson of Norwalk is President Bush's nightmare--and Bill Clinton's dream come true. He is a "Reagan Democrat," a member of the most chronicled and celebrated "swing voter" group of the 1980 and '84 presidential elections. He also is a Bush Democrat, having crossed party lines to vote Republican again in 1988.

Like war, political campaigns are fought in the air and on the ground. The air war, television advertising, gets vastly more money and attention. The ground war is waged by thousands of unsung staffers, paid and unpaid--the grass roots. They measure their victories one voter at a time. The headquarters for the state Democratic Party's northern forays is a converted home where organizer Larry Tramutola recently lectured a few of his paid staffers about their assignments.

PARTY POOPERS: Good news for Democrats and Republicans in Tuesday's primary: Both parties have more registered voters than last election. Bad news is they control a smaller portion of the Orange County electorate. . . . That's because the number of independent and third-party voters has increased by about 10,000 since 1990 to 11.4%. . . . "It's very clear--most people are disgusted with politics . . .

President Bush sought to boost his standing in Southern California Friday by offering help for the beleaguered defense industry, but he also received a harsh dose of political reality from state Republican strategists. Bush, who campaigned Thursday in Northern California and will speak today in Universal City before leaving the state, met privately for about 60 minutes Friday afternoon with more than 100 Republican leaders.

Vice President Dan Quayle hit hard at Democrat Bill Clinton in campaign stops in Tacoma, Wash., Palo Alto and San Francisco Monday before arriving in Los Angeles, where he will campaign today. "Gov. Clinton wants to travel the road of more taxes and more regulation," Quayle told lumber mill workers in Tacoma. "President Bush wants to lower taxes, to have less regulation and to get the government off your back."

Given the Republican Party's close ties to the business community, Bob Massey is the kind of voter who should be leading the parade for President Bush. Massey, president of the San Gabriel Chamber of Commerce and vice president of San Gabriel Valley Lincoln Mercury/SAAB, shares many of the conservative values long espoused by the GOP. But even before this year's primary, he began having doubts. He changed his registration from Republican to independent.