Rendezvous with Destiny: Ronald Reagan and the Campaign that Changed America Read Online Free PDF Page B

event for the Washington Post . 22 Reagan's body language and his refusal to address the president directly, much less talk up his chances against Carter, were lost on no one. “I can remember saying … to my editors, this is not much of an endorsement,” said Cannon. “The words do not begin to convey how distant he was. I've never seen Reagan like that in my entire life.” 23 The Ford children and the Reagan children stood at opposite sides of the room and simply glared at eachother. 24 Cheney had previously gone to California on a “peace mission” to smooth the relationship between Ford and Reagan, but he met with little success; when he reached Mike Deaver on the phone, “he got a distinctly cool reception.” 25

    Ford loathed Reagan, but he needed him. Reagan loathed Ford, but he needed to keep up appearances for the sake of any political future.

     
    C ARTER BEGAN TO DECLINE in the polls but it was not because the voters had discovered that they had fallen in love all of a sudden with the wallflower Republicans. Far from it. Doubts were being raised about Carter. Even the old crook Willie Sutton said, “I've never seen a bigger confidence man in my life, and I've been around some of the best in the business.” Sutton knew his psychobabble. When a psychiatrist once tried to plumb his depths, asking why he robbed banks, Sutton famously replied, “Because that's where the money is.” 26
    By Election Day 1976, Gerald Ford had battled back from a 30-point midsummer deficit in the polls, thanks in part to his so-called Rose Garden strategy, which amounted to staying in the White House and acting presidential. But in the end, Carter successfully ran out the clock on Ford. He won narrowly in the Electoral College, 297–240, and even more closely in the popular vote, defeating Ford by a hairsbreadth, 50–48 percent.

    So it was that America ended up with this improbable president, James Earl Carter, the peanut farmer and former one-term Georgia governor. Carter, like Reagan, had grown up in an atmosphere of populism; also like Reagan, he had campaigned against the Washington buddy system. The beliefs of Carter and Reagan were based on cultural, religious, and moral values, though Carter was a distinctly more left-wing populist. But the media and the American people had a hard time figuring the Democrat out. “I was a conservative southern governor who believed in human rights … and a balanced budget,” Carter recalled. “It was kind of a strange mixture.” 27

    Some of Reagan's aides were delighted at the outcome of the election, because to them it proved that a conservative majority existed in America, outside the limited boundaries of a clannish, elitist GOP, which excluded Democrats and independents, but not outside the reach of Reagan, the conservative populist. They were convinced that had Reagan been the nominee, he would have made inroads into the South and won the election. They were also convinced that Reagan would have made mincemeat out of Carter in the debates, unlike Ford, who had made a hash of them.

    Reagan himself remained publicly undecided about whether to take another shot at the GOP nomination and the White House. When a UPI reporter caughtup with him on Election Day and asked him about his plans for the future, Reagan said frankly that he “‘wouldn't rule out and wouldn't rule in’ another try … in four years.” 28

     
    P OSTELECTION , P RESIDENT F ORD SUMMONED Vice President Nelson Rockefeller, former Texas governor John Connally, and Reagan to discuss the future of the GOP. The time for the meeting was changed at the last minute and Reagan had to scramble to make it. He later confided in a letter to an old friend, former senator George Murphy of California, “Do you suppose they were hoping I wouldn't come?” 29
    One of the key issues involved the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee (RNC). Ford and Rockefeller were quietly supporting James A. Baker III, Ford's