Dole sees Bush as a loser

Press, 9 March 1988, Page 10

Dole sees Bush as a loser

NZPA-Reuter Washington Robert Dole, apparently on the verge of a crushing defeat by the Republican front-runner, George Bush, in the biggest oneday collection of Presidential primary elections, called the Vice-President a loser.

"We ought to nominate a winner, not a loser,” Mr Dole said yesterday in final campaigning for “Super Tuesday” (today, N.Z. time) as polls showed Mr Bush with a three-to-one lead over his main rival.

Asked if he expected the Republican nominee to win the Presidential election in November, the Senate Republican leader from Kansas told reporters: "Not if it’s George Bush.” Several opinion polls

saw Mr Bush headed for a near-sweep of 17 states choosing Republican national nominating delegates yesterday, and the Vice-President shrugged off Mr Dole’s remarks. Among the Democrats, who are competing in 20 states and American Samoa, Jesse Jackson and the Massachusetts Governor, Michael Dukakis, appeared to lead a fourman race.

Republicans were selecting 753 of their 2277 convention delegates, about 66 per cent of the total needed to win the nomination at the New Orleans convention in August.

Democrats were picking 1307 of their 4162 convention delegates yesterday, about 63 per cent of the number needed to

be nominated in Atlanta in July. The A.B.C. television network said its poll of the 12 southern states dominating the contest showed Mr Bush leading the Kansas senator by 60 per cent to 20 per cent.

The former television evangelist, Pat Robertson, a southerner who had high hopes of challenging Mr Bush in what he called "my backyard,” took 12 per cent of those polled. The New York congressman, Jack Kemp, was preferred by 4 per cent.

In the Democratic race, A.B.C. said Mr Jackson led Mr Dukakis 29 to 25 per cent across the South. But Mr Dukakis had a bigger lead in Texas and Florida, which account for one-fourth of the delegates chosen on Tuesday.