Washington

By TOM LITTLEWOOD

Some speculations on the return of Rumsfeld and Shriver

DON RUMSFELD and Sarge Shriver are two products of Illinois who achieved distinction in a variety of challenging political activities in Washington, and yet continue to be plagued by a feeling of unfulfillment because they have not been able to find the way to the very top of the mountain. Rumsfeld is 43 years old and chief assistant to the President, sharing in the copious power of that office. Shriver was the Democratic candidate for Vice President in 1972. Each is an attractive public figure who handled difficult administrative assignments in political campaigns and in experimental government agencies. Shriver, the brother-in- law of John F. Kennedy, was the first director of the Office of Economic Opportunity, the now defunct federal antipoverty agency. Rumsfeld gave up a secure seat in Congress to throttle down the same operation for the Nixon administration. Not the least of the similarities in the two careers is the politically ambitious, hard-driving wife: Eunice Shriver is a typically aggressive member of the Kennedy clan. Joyce Rumsteld is said to be the one who spurs her super-cautious partner onward and upward.

The Illinois governorship
By coincidence, the governorship of Illinois either was. or soon will be of crucial importance to both careers. Despite his dreams, Shriver will almost certainly never be in a position to run for President, all else notwithstanding, because he was never able to convince Mayor Daley that he was trustworthy enough to be endorsed for governor. For all the Kennedy mystique, Shriver made the decision in the early 1960's to hook his fortunes to Daley's organization. Later he turned to Lyndon Johnson as a potential patron (for which his in-laws never forgave him); and made an uncertain stab still later for the governorship of Maryland.

While the book may be closed on Shriver, it is still being written in "Rummy." He has served two Republican Presidents in a staff capacity. But White House staff jobs are notoriously rickety as stairways to elective office—and if Rumsfeld expects to acquire power in his own right he will have to return to Illinois and hack it in the rough-and-tumble competition, either next year or before the 1978 gubernatorial election. His biggest drawback is his unfamiliarity with downstate. Congressmen who are interested in state politics have the same problem. While he was in the House, for instance, Rumsfeld could hardly make many speeches in Peoria without causing Bob Michel to wonder what he was up to. Since then it has not been easy to build a statewide network of Republican contacts from an office in Washington.

Not that Rumsfeld isn't trying. He has always understood the importance of the Republican corporate-financial establishment. In recent months, from his vantage point close to the Oval Office, he has been methodically preparing for his own future back in Illinois. Federal patronage (both honorific and otherwise) and other enticements —such as invitations to formal dinners at the White House—have been be- stowed upon wealthy contributors and prominent Republicans from Illinois, many of them from downstate counties where he is relatively unknown.

Doing it right
At first Rumsfeld installed his former Cook County campaign associate, William N. Walker, as patronage director in the White House. Then it was arranged for Walker to be nominated as the nation's on-the-scenes negotiator at the trade talks in Geneva. Nothing is more vital to corporations that sell abroad or compete with foreign products than the terms of the upcoming foreign trade agreement. Many interests were anxious to be represented on the U.S. negotiating team. But Rumsfeld didn't preside over the Nixon wage and price controls, or serve as envoy in Brussels, without learning the relationship between corporate and political power. He is athletically active, buttoned-down efficient, and likes to consider himself tough-minded without the Haldemann scowl. In his dealings with reporters, Rumsfeld is cordial but uncommunicative. He never imparted any information that didn't advance the interests of himself or his superior, be it Nixon or Ford.

Restyled images
Shriver and Rumsfeld are both "cool" politicians, public relations artisans who have demonstrated their administrative competence and would probably make good governors. Both have restyled their images, Rumsfeld with mod aviator shades, Shriver with flowing hair.

Competence may not be enough anymore though. As political scientist Michael Robinson* documented recently, the evening network news has become a third party, an opposition party that feeds on the distrust of politicians. The Inadvertent Audience looks passively, swayed by the hostile images, growing more confused and cynical. We are headed toward a scene in which the candidate who can make it will be the one who acts "odd," who behaves most unlike a politician, who can think up new and more bizarre gimmicks to divert attention from all the seemingly insoluable public problems.

* Michael J Robinson, "American Political Legitimacy in an Era of Electronic Journalism: Reflections on the Evening News" in Television as a Social Force: New Approaches to TV Criticism, edited by Richard Adler (New York: Praeger, 1975).

August 1975/Illinois Issues/ 255