During last week's presidential debate, Al Gore said that he couldn't promise he would "never get another detail wrong," but that he would "try not to, and hard." THE SCRAPBOOK has found something the vice president would be well-advised to try even harder to do -- suppress old campaign memoranda. As we reported last week, courtesy of Matt Drudge, two campaign aides during Gore's 1988 presidential run sent lengthy internal missives to the serial embroiderer, trying to find a polite way to tell their boss to cut it out.
Of Gore's boasts that he was a farmer, then campaign press secretary Arlie Schardt wrote, "Your main pitfall is exaggeration. Be careful not to over-state your accomplishments . . . " In an even more entertaining passage, then deputy press secretary Mike Kopp wrote, "Jim O'Hara and Bruce Dobie ( Nashville Banner and Tennessean reporters) asked me why you felt compelled to switch ribbons on the cattle for a photo opportunity at the Iowa State Fair."
This last charge piqued THE SCRAPBOOK's curiosity. Like most Americans, we assumed the bulk of Gore's brushes with Angus beef occurred when he ordered it with a baked potato and sprightly garnish. But, it turns out, in 1987, during a debate appearance at the Iowa State Fair, cattle from the Gore family's Tennessee farm were entered into competition. Gore even took to the ring in his dress shoes and tie, blue ribbon in hand, to show off the presumably award-winning 2,340 lb. Angus bull Ankony Gore Dyno.
As reported by Strobe Talbott (now deputy secretary of state, then Time magazine reporter), it was Gore's custom at the time to introduce himself as "the only farmer in the race." Never mind that Gore's congressional disclosure forms never showed any farm income other than the $ 4,800 his father paid him to lease some pasture. Still, we were stumped about the ribbon-switching allegation, so we called Mike Kopp, the memo's author, who had no recollection of the details. Likewise, Jim O'Hara (then an inquiring reporter for the Tennessean, now married to former Gore press secretary Marla Romash) drew a blank.
Fortunately, Bruce Dobie (then a reporter with the Nashville Banner, now editor of the Nashville Scene) had his memory jogged by the Kopp memo. "I'm certain there was hanky panky," says Dobie, whose paper recently endorsed Gore for president. "I'm absolutely certain that there was a first place ribbon that was not his that was put on that cow." As Dobie remembers it, during a photo op, Gore snatched the ribbon from "some poor, usurped Iowa farmer" in order to trot his own bull around the ring "to make it look as if he's got this winning cow." Dobie has no recollection of recounting the episode in print. "At the time," he says, "we thought it was inconsequential."
THE SCRAPBOOK called the Gore campaign to find out if their candidate was a ribbon-switcher. A tentative spokesman said they'd check into it, though he wasn't certain "we want to put anything out on that." Several hours later, however, they did, faxing us a news article with the highlighted information that Gore Farms did in fact win first place in the heifer class and "best of five" competition. Coincidentally, these details came from the Nashville Banner article written long ago by Bruce Dobie. Though Dobie had no recollection of committing the ribbon-switching to print, his story in fact states: "No matter that the bull Gore trotted around the arena . . . did not really win the blue ribbon being held out to photographers." (The Gore spokesman neglected to highlight this last bit.) Iowa State Fair records obtained by THE SCRAPBOOK show this particular bull in fact won fourth place.
In the same article, Gore is quoted as telling the crowd, "Sometimes, in presidential politics, the question is asked, 'Where is the beef?' Well in this campaign, we know right where it is." Suggestion for the Gore campaign: Replace "beef" with another bovine product and you've got yourself a handy new Gore 2000 slogan.