The Future Begins on Nov. 4

By Ed Magnuson

Carter and Reagan offer the voters a difference that really matters

Amid the whirlwind of emotions over the late-late TV showdown debate and the American hostages, U.S. voters will go to the polls on Nov. 4 to make an irrevocable choice with which they will have to live for at least four years. Despite the confusion caused by the shifting positions of the presidential candidates and the hyperbole and innuendo of a disappointing campaign, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan offer, in many ways, clear-cut and contrasting choices. Whatever other complaints the 1980 American voter may have (and there are many), he cannot complain that he has been confronted with Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

The conservative California Republican and the centrist Georgia Democrat are locked in a dead-even struggle that could affect the role of the Federal Government in domestic affairs, create a clean split in political philosophy between the two major parties, profoundly affect the nation's economy and energy directions, and deeply influence the role America plays on the global stage, thus raising the prospect of increased international tension.

There are striking similarities between the campaign Carter ran in 1976 and the one Reagan is conducting this year. Then Carter was opposing Big Government, just as Reagan is today. The former Georgia Governor wound up settling for some civil service reforms and deregulation of the airline and trucking industries. But these were modest improvements in making the Government work rather than any real dismantling of the existing power structure.

Reagan would try harder--a good deal harder. He sincerely believes that "the permanent structure" of Washington bureaucracy stifles free enterprise and individual initiative. He is deeply--and instinctively--committed to "getting the Government off the backs of the people." When Reagan vows to reduce the regulatory role of Government, eliminate such recent bureaucratic creations as the departments of Education and Energy, and wipe out countless petty federal forms that businessmen must fill out, he can be counted on to fight hard to do just that.

Despite talk of a new "pragmatism" in Reagan's thinking, he has not really abandoned any of the fundamental beliefs he has held for many years. For purely political purposes, he has made some token shifts, such as favoring federal aid for both New York City and the Chrysler Corp., but both are questions that have already been firmly resolved. Reagan really is not a moderate on any major domestic issue, although, as his record as Governor shows, circumstances can force him to change his policies.

Reagan and Carter differ sharply in their views of the role of the Federal Government in solving the nation's social problems. Because of fiscal restraints, Carter has not pushed hard for new programs, but he has no philosophical quarrel with the long-held tenet of the Democratic Party that it is the Government's responsibility to help uplift the lowly, keep a watch on the powerful and legislate equal opportunity. In contrast, Reagan is deeply suspicious of Washington's trying to cure the ills of American society. He is much more inclined to let the job be done on a state or local basis, and, wherever possible, by private enterprise rather than by Government. For example, he would try to get the Federal Government out of the welfare business; Carter believes it should take on even more welfare responsibilities.

There is another fascinating contrast between Carter and Reagan in their views of the proper role of the Federal Government. Reagan sees no contradiction with his basic philosophy when he urges federal action to support the so-called traditional values. For example, he endorses constitutional amendments to limit abortion and to permit prayers in the classrooms. Carter, on the other hand, feels that the Government should stay out of such matters.

While their philosophies of government contrast sharply, Reagan and Carter are surprisingly close together on some specific domestic issues:

The Economy. Reagan has assailed the Carter economic record time and again, citing its huge budget deficits and its high rates of both inflation and unemployment. Yet the Governor has failed to make the economy the dominant issue of the campaign because he has been unable to convince a vast majority of voters that his approach, centering largely on tax cuts, would be much more successful than Carter's various plans. At the same time, the difference in economic proposals between the two candidates has narrowed, though their fundamental difference of attitude about the economy has not.

Both now advocate income tax cuts.

Reagan's would include a 10% reduction in individual tax rates in each of his first three years in office. The first-year savings for businesses and individual taxpayers would total about $36 billion. Part would come from an accelerated depreciation schedule for business investments to encourage expansion. Reagan has abandoned his "supplyside" economic theory claim that such tax cuts would stimulate so much economic growth that swelling tax revenues would permit him to increase defense spending and balance the budget at the same time. His advisers now estimate that his plan would mean a total cut in taxes of $192 billion by 1985, while only $39 billion would be raised in revenues from economic growth. Yet Reagan promises to balance the budget by 1983, closing the gap by reducing Government spending. Beyond calling for the elimination of "waste and fraud," he has not been specific about what he would do or the programs that he would curtail to reach his goal.

Under the pressure of the campaign, Carter, with some reluctance, has also proposed a tax cut for next year. It would provide $27.6 billion in relief to taxpayers and a faster write-off for business depreciation. Surprisingly, for a Democratic plan, a larger share of the savings would go to business than under Reagan's proposal. Carter would give individuals just $11.9 billion in cuts; business would get $15.7 billion. But there is one key difference: Carter's plan for individual reductions would be used to offset the scheduled 1981 increase in Social Security taxes. This would reduce taxes for everyone with incomes up to $29,700 a year (next year's cutoff point for Social Security payroll taxes), but have no effect on the marginal rates for workers who make more. This, say conservative economists, would limit the tax cut's effect on providing individual incentives for increased productivity and willingness to seek work.

Defense. Reagan has long demanded an increase in spending to strengthen both strategic and conventional military forces. Carter, who had come into office with a promise to reduce the military budget, now proposes to increase it next year by $24 billion. Both advocate higher salaries to make the all-volunteer armed forces more attractive, particularly to needed specialists who are leaving the services in alarming numbers.

On specific weapons, Reagan has criticized Carter's decision to delay production of the neutron bomb and cancel the B-l bomber. Carter contends that the cruise missile has made the B-l obsolete but he has, with some campaign fanfare, suggested that a bomber employing "stealth" radar-baffling technology may be built instead. Both candidates support the new MX missile, although they differ about how the land-based weapon should be deployed.

There is one defense issue on which Reagan's position is more dangerous than Carter's: how to reach an effective strategic arms agreement with the Soviet Union. The Reagan proposal to scrap SALT II and renegotiate an entirely new treaty is simply not plausible, as Carter discovered to his chagrin when he tried the same thing with Moscow in 1977 (see box). There is no doubt that Reagan's stance runs the higher risk of a new, costly and counterproductive arms race, although he has modified an earlier position that the U.S. be militarily superior to the Soviets to an insistence that the U.S. have a "margin of safety" over the Soviets.

The Environment. Reagan made novel statements about what most threatens clean air; he has cited both trees and Mount St. Helens as wreaking more havoc than auto exhausts, leading to a joke in the Reagan press corps about "the attack of the killer trees." Such nonsense has reduced his credibility in this field. Still, as Governor, he earned respect in California by upholding rigid water-pollution and smog-control laws and by protecting an additional 145,000 acres of park lands from private commercial use. In any clash between energy development and the environment, however, Reagan would be expected to give priority to energy. Carter's priorities seem the reverse, although he, too, is a supporter of nuclear power expansion. He has been a strong backer of the Environmental Protection Agency and has supported the Clean Air Act despite complaints from coal producers that it hinders production. He has also backed a strong congressional bill protecting Alaska lands. In a clash between economic growth and environmental protection, he would likely come down on the side of conservation.

Foreign Policy. As the campaign evolved, Carter skillfully managed to reduce the discussions on the foreign policy issues to a single dominant theme: as the President put it, unfairly, the election involves "a choice between war and peace." Carter, of course, never accused Reagan of wanting a war. But he has exploited a more responsible and highly relevant question: Would Reagan's policies run a higher risk of war?

The success of the Carter strategists in putting Reagan on the defensive on this question is based on two undeniable facts: 1) Despite a series of hot spots around the world during the Carter presidency, no U.S. soldiers have been involved in combat (though they were prepared to fight in the aborted hostage rescue raid into Iran), and 2) Reagan has in recent years repeatedly recommended the use of American military force in various foreign situations. For example, he suggested a U.S. naval blockade of Cuba in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and said that U.S. soldiers could have been used to ensure an orderly transition to black majority rule in Rhodesia in 1976.

Reagan firmly believes not only that the Soviet Union seeks world domination but that every time the Carter Administration has failed to respond with a show of force, the Kremlin has been encouraged to push on. Ignoring the irrationality of Iran's leadership, Reagan suggests that no American hostages would have been seized if the U.S. had been seen as more powerful. It is certainly true that the Carter Administration has conveyed a sense of meekness and vacillation in its failure to project power abroad. Reagan in the White House would undoubtedly try to be more consistent in foreign policy and more given to international power politics (which should not be a dirty word). He would reduce Carter's moralistic emphasis on human rights, using that cause as propaganda against Communist countries, but not employ it to belabor U.S. allies, even if their regimes are dictatorial.

The potential risk of a Reagan foreign policy probably is not so much outright belligerence as his tendency to divide the world into good guys and bad guys. He seems to underestimate the complexity of Third World countries, where not all revolutionary movements are necessarily pro-Soviet or permanently anti-American. Evenhandedness in delicate trouble spots--of the sort that enabled Carter to bring about the Camp David accords--does not seem much in Reagan's character. His one-sided defense of the Israeli position, to the extent that it is more than campaign rhetoric, leaves him little credibility in the Arab world.

Voters weighing the risks to peace in a Reagan presidency will need to consider two related questions. Will a candidate who has sounded so belligerent actually act that way when he faces the real, rather than the hypothetical powers of the presidency? There is no way to be sure. Lyndon Johnson campaigned as a relative dove--and wound up vastly escalating U.S. involvement in Viet Nam. On the other hand, Dwight Eisenhower, a war leader, was extremely cautious as President about the use of military power and even warned about the insidious influence of a "militaryindustrial complex," which Reagan now considers no danger at all. But Reagan's own policies as Governor of California certainly turned out to be far more moderate than his campaign for the office had suggested.

Second, would Reagan as President surround himself with a range of advisers who would temper his hawkish tendencies? The evidence is otherwise. His task forces drawing up foreign policy options include such hawkish advisers as William Van Cleave, a defense expert from the University of Southern California; Edward Luttwak, a leading theoretician of the right; and Richard Pipes, a Harvard history professor who is strongly anti-Soviet. Of late, he has been advised by more experienced and moderate voices as well, Henry Kissinger being a noteworthy example. But there is little doubt that Reagan would use U.S. military power abroad more aggressively than Carter. On balance, Reagan's greatest appeal in the foreign policy field lies in the fact that, despite the risks represented by inexperience and simplicity of approach, he would bring a fresh start after Carter's failures and confusions.

For a time, the widespread fear of Reagan's views and the disappointment with Carter's performance left an opening for a third choice, and Independent John Anderson tried to fill the gap. He established a number of courageously different and unpopular stands on a variety of highly specific issues. Anderson rejected tax cuts on the ground that they fuel inflation, insisted that energy independence without mandatory and painful conservation by Americans was "an illusion," and argued that the U.S. needed far stronger conventional forces more than it needed the MX missile. But Anderson's "new realism" failed to stake out any contrasting central philosophy that would make many voters want to abandon the major parties. At most, Anderson now offers a chance for voters to protest against the system by which the two other candidates were chosen. The dilemma of having to decide between Carter and Reagan as cynically posed by New York magazine writer Michael Kramer: "We can either stick with the mediocrity we already know, or we can follow Mae West's advice that as between two evils we should always choose the one we haven't tried."

The underlying campaign issue between the known Carter and the still relatively unknown Reagan is the matter of competence and the ability to lead the nation. Carter has demonstrated repeatedly that he cannot inspire a commanding national majority, much less a divided Democratic Congress, to follow him on those infrequent occasions when he has tried to lead boldly. Carter was probably as eloquent and as persuasive as he can be in his early plea for waging a war on the energy problem, but nothing much happened until after three more years of U.S. dependence on foreign oil. Perhaps it is the soft delivery, often smothering strong lines. Perhaps there is a subconscious lingering national prejudice against Carter's Southern style. Whatever the handicap, Carter's words carry no command, even when the need to follow seems clear.

As his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention showed again, Reagan can stir emotions. While much of his earlier reputation for rousing performances was built as he dazzled conservative audiences with those zinging one-liners they loved to hear, he at least offers greater hope that, when the nation needed to be aroused, there would be a President who could do it.

Carter has different skills. He is more nimble, mentally and verbally, than Reagan when confronted with an unexpected question or when his memory of governmental detail is suddenly tested. His impromptu replies may be the clearest and most carefully couched of any recent President's--a comforting quality in an office where offhand remarks can rattle the world. But Carter's mental agility does not necessarily mean he is the wiser man. His mind readily grasps detail, orders the options and focuses down on a solution to a given problem. But it often fails to place that problem, or its solution, in a broader context.

Reagan, on the other hand, seems often to rely more on intuition than thought.

Rather than getting bogged down with detail, he has advisers examine a problem, then present courses of action for him to consider. More by instinct than analysis, Reagan then is likely to make a quick decision. The decision for voters may rest on whether they trust Reagan's instincts and particular vision more than they do Carter's more rational, but narrow, thinking.

Once they have made a decision, both Carter and Reagan tend to consider the matter solved. Rather than wheel, deal and fight to put their solutions into effect, each likes to move on to the next problem. Washington does not work that way. Carter shows signs of having learned this lesson; Reagan would have to change his one-step-at-a-time habits to be effective in the Oval Office.

B oth candidates also have a similar dislike for commotion around them, hate to discipline errant aides or, in fact, to deal with touchy personnel problems. Yet the White House is no place in which to seek serenity or avoid the inevitable friction of strong personalities grasping for power. Carter has depended too heavily on his Georgia cronies, failing to cut some of his ties with, say, Bert Lance or Andrew Young as early as he should have. He pledged, as all new Presidents do, to reach out for strong men to direct Cabinet departments -- and then, in effect, fired several (including Joseph Califano at Health, Education and Welfare and W. Michael Blumenthal at Treasury) when they became cantankerously independent, upsetting the harmony he values and the sense of loyalty he demands.

But there is a significant personality difference between the two men. Reagan's ego seems to get much less entangled with his policies than does Carter's. Despite his ability to convey feeling, Reagan rarely loses his temper or carries a personal grudge. He is not emotional or vindictive. Those qualities could prove valuable in the rough give-and-take of official Washington.

Last week, speaking to an exuberant crowd gathered around the steps of the federal courthouse in Texarkana, Texas, Jimmy Carter declared, "There is a great difference between myself and Governor Reagan. There is a great difference between the Republicans and the Democrats. But what we're talking about in this election, as the last days draw to a close, is the difference in the futures we will have."

Perhaps the greatest failing of Carter and Reagan during this drawn-out campaign is that they have not been able to persuade Americans of their competence to occupy the presidency. In addition, they have been unable to describe the differences between themselves with enough clarity so that Americans would choose their future on Nov. 4 with enthusiasm and a confidence that they knew what lay ahead .

Reported by Laurence I. Barrett with Reagan and Christopher Ogden with Carter

With reporting by Laurence I. Barrett, Christopher Ogden

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