Iowa Electronic Market, 7/18/96
	Vote Share			Winner-Takes-All
	Dole	Clinton		Dole	Clinton
Open	44.8%	55.0%		33.9%	63.9%
Close	44.6%	53.0%		33.9%	65.0%
Pundits' Index
Clinton: 84%, up 2 points from last week Dole: 15%, down 3 points from last week Perot: 1%, first week in pundits' index

The Quayle Syndrome: In 1988, Dan Quayle's early idiocies led fellow Republicans and pundits to view him as an idiot, which in turn led them to view everything he did thereafter as idiotic. Dole is fast earning a similarly self-reinforcing reputation as an aimless bumbler. Even conservative scribes construe his every move, fairly or unfairly, as a gaffe. When Dole skips the NAACP convention, pundits conclude that he's confused rather than decisive. When Dole offers platform language to resolve the GOP's abortion debate, Paul Gigot scoffs, "This is about the third time he's resolved it." When Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu seduces Washington, the Wall Street Journal asks, "Why Isn't Bob More Like Bibi?"

The Anonymous Back-stabbing Syndrome: Pundits don't like to kick a candidate when he's down. Instead, they invite the candidate's "friends" to kick him. Now that Dole is in trouble, the chat shows are abuzz with gossip about Republicans scorning him: "Even his closest friends have told me. ..." "His staff tells me. ..." "The campaign handlers are tearing their hair out. ..." "The despair in Congress among Republicans is unbelievable."

The Joke Syndrome: Once a candidate has been sufficiently caricatured and disowned, he becomes an object of sport rather than serious discussion. Right-leaning pundits are now comparing Dole openly to Michael Dukakis, Walter Mondale, and even Hurricane Bertha.

The "Dark Side" Syndrome: Long before the pundits decided Dole was a bumbler, they decided he was mean. So now, every time he tangles with a public figure (Katie Couric, C. Everett Koop), reporters snicker that he's on the rag. This week's exhibit: Dole's casual speculation that former Democratic Rep. Kweise Mfume "was trying to set me up" by inviting him to address the left-leaning NAACP. Dole's remark was treated as an outrage in Friday's papers and replayed as such on all the weekend chat and quiz shows (though it could well be true).

Dole's best hope lies in an outside force that might shake up these deadly market dynamics. As though on cue, three candidates leapt into the race this week: Libertarian nominee Harry Browne and Reform Party hopefuls Ross Perot and Dick Lamm. After launching his candidacy July 9, Lamm was upstaged by Perot July 10, written off by Al Hunt (kindly) and Maureen Dowd (unkindly) July 11, and gang-banished by TV's talking heads over the next three days. The prevailing theory is that Perot owns the loyalty of most of the Reform troops, and, with money and control of the ballot-counting process, can seize the rest.

The early line on Perot is that he'll draw fewer votes than in 1992, because 1) we know him better now and love him less; 2) there's no longer a glaring, unaddressed national crisis from which he can promise to save us; and 3) he's entering the race with 13 percent of the vote and, like previous third candidates (e.g. John Anderson), will lose much of his support in the election's final days as voters decide to back one of the top two candidates in order to defeat the other. The pundits think Perot might help Dole by attacking Clinton in the fall TV debates, but otherwise will hurt Dole by stealing anti-incumbent votes, tilting Midwestern states to Clinton, and focusing on issues at the expense of the character questions on which Dole hopes to run.

--William Saletan

William Saletan co-founded and edited The Hotline, a daily digest of political news, and is the author of a forthcoming book on the politics of abortion.