No one’s sure any more that the Democrats will take over the Senate in 1986 (see also “Cato”). If they don’t pull it off that year, says Democratic pollster Peter Hart, “they’ve definitely lost control for a decade [1980 to 1990]—and possibly for 15 years.” He feels the GOP Class of 1980, swept in with Reagan, is stronger than its critics say. . . . The seven Republicans Lane Kirkland’s AFL-CIO has targeted for extinction are: Jeremiah Denton (Ala.), John East (N.C.), Charles Grassley (Iowa), Mack Mattingly (Ga.), Don Nickles (Okla.), Dan Quayle (Ind.), and Steve Symms (Idaho). . . . Among those mentioned as possible opponents to Denton, incidentally, is George Wallace Jr. . . . Paul Kirk, newly appointed head of Democratic National Committee, says he plans to build a “lean political strike force” and will fire thirty of eighty DNC staff members as a starter. . . . For what it’s worth, Kevin Phillips’s early line of starters in 1988 Democratic presidential stakes includes: Edward Kennedy, Mario Cuomo, Geraldine Ferraro, Gary Hart, Bill Bradley, Richard Gephardt (of the Bradley-Gephardt flat-tax bill), Sen. Paul Simon (he replaced Charles Percy), Gov. Bruce Babbitt (who hopes to win Barry Goldwater’s Arizona Senate seat when Goldwater retires). . . . According to Evans & Novak, Mario Cuomo is telling his friends that “a third straight Republican landslide will be ensured if Kennedy is nominated in 1988.” . . . David Garth reports Cuomo is less than 12 points behind Kennedy in early-bird polls, even though two-thirds of voters don’t know who he is. Question: Doesn’t that tell us more about Kennedy than about Cuomo? … In the White House, says Christian Science Monitor columnist John Hughes, Ronald Reagan is having fun with his critics. “Unemployment is down, inflation is down, interest rates are down, production is up, the stock market is up. How come they don’t call it Reaganomics any more?” he asks.
While Big Labor was busy choosing new DNC chairman, out Idaho way the boys were passing the first right- to-work law in nine years—over the veto of Gov. John Evans. Campaign was tough despite Department of Labor figures that show the twenty (before Idaho) right-to-work states ranking higher in employment and earnings than non-right-to-work states. . . .
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