While Democratic governors met in Portland, Maine, last week to see what they could get out of Feds, most political reporters were there to test standing of Democratic presidential hopefuls. David Broder, Washington Post’s ace political reporter, found marked interest in John Glenn, particularly among governors from South, Midwest, and West. Said Gov. Bruce Babbitt (Ariz.): “[We are] searching to see if a centrist candidate emerges who can be a credible alternative to Mondale.” George Wallace (Ala.) took the up-and-coming line among Democratic pros about Glenn: “He has the same kind of image as Eisenhower did.” (Tip O’Neill, a fortnight earlier: “Make no mistake about it: Glenn is our Ike.”) . . . Evans & Novak found governors critical of Mondale pitch to every special interest in the land (barring big business); they particularly resent his veiled threat that if elected he would use his presidential powers to coerce states that don’t go ERA. . . . The guvs, say E&N, are plenty scared of Ronald Reagan. For instance, Gov. James Blanchard (Mich.) said that blue-collar workers, including Detroit auto workers, “tend to like Reagan for a strange reason. Reagan has made government the scapegoat and that’s being accepted.” . . . On which note an interesting Gallup poll shows 51 per cent of the people think big government is the greatest threat to the nation, as against 19 per cent who fear big business most, and 18 per cent who fear big labor most. (Before Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, only 14 per cent feared big government most.) . . . For the record, all four Democratic presidential candidates in the Senate—Glenn, Cranston, Hart, and Hollings—voted against MX funding; Hollings and Glenn voted for resumption of nerve-gas production; the other two did not.
“But, General, if we do let the world’s banking system collapse, bang goes everything we’ve managed to salt away abroad.”
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