the '92 democratic primary

[Giant Saguaro]

Went back into the nostalgia folder for this one...

Tsongas was from MA; he argued for "tough choices," a hike in the gas tax, and a cut in overall spending. He had a thing, "No more Santa Claus." Kinda like "We can't have everything," which Clark or Kerry or somebody argued in this primary. Tsongas was the first to enter the race, that I remember. Spring or early summer 1991.

Brown was the former gov of Cali and was kind of an anti-establishment guy and was for a "flat tax." I think he wanted it to replace the income tax.

Clinton ran on the "new Democrat" idea; he was neither conservative nor liberal, but both and neither. Generalizations. Smooth talk, he said stuff that sounded good. I think he went after some of them for being "old liberals" or something like that. He was for the death penalty, and I remember him signing the death warrant of someone that either had mental problems or had some issues, obviously to prove he supported it. He spent a lot of time even in the primaries addressing problems and issues like his extra marital affairs, corruption, and of course, the draft. The don't question my patriotism became a rally theme for him here too. But his big thing was his personality and youthfulness that coincided with the onset of "the '90s." He offered up a definition of the party that had not yet been put forth and did a lot to put forth the idea that if you're having problems, it's someone else's fault. This won him over to people, IMO.

By the time Super Tuesday rolled around, Clinton had won one state, if memory serves. He was always up there, though, and whether Tsongas, Harkin, or whoever was winning early states, Clinton was always there. A distant second, close third, and then he came out big on Super Tuesday, which had a lot of states in the south up. Clinton won most all of them and Tsongas won a handful, maybe two.

There were others in the race - L. Douglas Wilder of VA and Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, but they were never formidable. Harkin was for just a brief moment, winning Iowa right off the bat, but after that it was a Clinton/Tsongas show.