What It Takes

by Richard Ben Cramer

  It wasn’t that they didn’t talk. There was time now to talk about personal things, things they’d just let slide for the last ten years. With Gary it was never easy. But at some point you had to talk. And she told him, this was the stupidest thing he’d ever done. But she knew, even as she said it ... she didn’t have to. That’s why she had to laugh about those stories—Cosmopolitan, or some magazine like that, made such a big deal about things she wouldn’t even ask! Well, after nearly thirty years, there’s so much you don’t have to ask.

  And Sally Quinn—the feminists—were pathetic! You work hard at a marriage for twenty-eight years, and then when somebody makes a mistake, you throw it over? ... And in this case, when you really got down to the facts, it wasn’t such a horrible mistake. Just stupid.

  She never would understand how he could be so stupid. “But,” she said, “those things happen.”

  She said she never shed one tear.

  People would call—they were so blue without the campaign—and Gary would end up consoling them: life would go on, there would be other challenges, other ways to carry on the mission.

  Him? ... He was fine. He’d remind them: he got out of the race on Friday and was at the law firm, 9:00 A.M., Monday morning.

  Which was true, but it didn’t say anything about him ... except he wasn’t going to sit home. If anyone tried to ask about his work for the firm, he’d roll his eyes to show: he wasn’t really a part of that—he was just a rainmaker, a money-raker, supposed to put the firm into the middle of deals. It seemed so empty to him.

  He had to do it.

  He had engaged himself to do it, for one thing ... and the partners had tried to be good to him. And he had two kids in college, and never took the time before to make money. And his option on the land around the cabin—137 acres, his one personal place in the world—would come due in July ’87, two months after he quit the race. (And the campaign contributor who was going to loan Gary money to buy the land suddenly withdrew the offer. Life changes when you’re a loser.)

  Hart had to make money in a hurry. (In the end, he had to ask Warren Beatty ... who gladly lent him the money.)

  So this wasn’t therapy, or Hart settling into a new life. There were demands, as ever. Gary put his face to the phone. ... But that wasn’t what his life was about.

  He’d defined himself for so long by his public purpose, there was no way to do without it. You couldn’t fly around for six years in a race to change the country before its future be squandered or scarred ... and then, after a ten-minute concession speech, walk away with a shrug, a smile. He could not.

  He was religious, in his way—and one of the great sins was to fail to make use of your talents and abilities. He never meant to suggest he was selected by God—nothing like that—terrible presumption. But he had something to offer ... that had carried him for fourteen years, if you went back to the Senate campaigns.

  There had to be a way.

  A friend would call and Hart would bring up an idea: someone had suggested he might write semi-regularly for The New York Times, op-ed—you know, opinion, foreign policy, defense ...

  “Sounds great.”

  “You think so?” Hart would say. “May come to nothing ...” He’d mention the L.A. Times Syndicate—a column ... or he thought he might give his remaining economics speech at a college. He’d been talking with a professor who thought it might be good to do a series of lectures.

  There were always possibilities. Next week, they were still possibilities. Nothing happened. But he had another idea: PBS might want to do a series of interviews—if he could get Gorbachev ...

  The fact was, he didn’t want to commit to anything real and large enough to hold him. He wouldn’t take a step in any direction if that would pull down the pillars of his life ... not when there was a chance he could build anew.

  He wouldn’t bring it up. People called him! ... Had he seen that poll about the press? (Two-to-one, people thought the press went overboard on Hart.) Had he seen that southern-states poll from Atlanta? (When Hart’s name was added, he was still the Democratic front-runner.)

  “Really!” Hart would say. (Like he hadn’t talked about that poll thirty times.) He’d tell them about the letters—hundreds of letters, came to his house, to the law firm ... hundreds he couldn’t even get to yet that came to the campaign address.

  People were writing to tell him he never should have quit—the cause and the country required him. There were letters that offered theories on who’d set Gary up; letters from lifelong Republicans who said they’d vote for Hart; there were senior citizens who sent five dollars from their pensions—all they could afford. There was a hundred dollars from one couple who’d just birthed a baby girl. They had this money to buy a new crib, but they decided it was more important to do something for their baby’s country.

  Of course, there were letters on the other side. But they were few, or from obvious sickos, or people who didn’t ... well, Gary said they weren’t worth mentioning.

  Dear Mr. heart sorry your bLue. Evrybody thinks your sLezzy. But I don’t!

  sincereLy,

  Rand Olson

  P.S.

  Your a nice Guy.

  here is my

  picther

  Hart never mentioned, anymore, anyone who wanted him gone for good. If he heard any bad news about his standing, it didn’t register. Or it only proved to him that the politics-as-usual hacks were afraid of him, ganging up. That’s how the real Hart people knew. Friends or staff who’d gone through the wars with Gary could tell: Jesus, he was serious! ... He was getting ready to be a majority of one again.

  The Hart people would call one another, like consulting physicians. Billy Shore would dial Sue Casey and say: “I saw him today.” He didn’t have to say who.

  “Yeah,” she’d say, like she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear.

  “He’s doing it again.”

  “Like, how bad is he doing it?”

  “Well,” Shore would say, “he asked me three times, ‘Do you really think any of the others really get it?’ ...”

  Occasionally, one of the physicians would hump up Hippocratically and try to talk to Gary. Casey was still in Denver. She’d call his law office, get him out to lunch.

  “Look,” she’d say. “There’s life, and there’s running for President. And there’s just things you’ve got to resolve in life first.”

  “There you go again,” Hart would say. “Pass the bread.”

  “No, really! What do you want? What’s really going to make you happy?”

  “It’s good bread ...”

  Sometimes, Casey would resort to bitter memory-dose: “Think what you’re going to put people through! Your family. Yourself! All these stories ... it’s gonna be, like, slap me again! ... Have you forgotten? ... What it’s going to be like?”

  Hart would insist, his family was ready. “The kids—you don’t understand.”

  Casey did understand. Andrea had given her an earful—she was furious at Sue for opposing a new campaign. It was betrayal, like Sue was siding with the assholes! ... How come you’re not part of the family anymore?

  But even Casey couldn’t understand what happened in Gary Hart when he looked into his daughter’s eyes and saw doubt ... about him. If he’d done nothing wrong, why did he quit the race? Why didn’t he get back in? The truth will always prevail—he was the one who’d taught her that!

  If he believed what he’d always said, he had no choice!

  Ideas had to make a difference in life.

  How could he duck the battle now?

  The worst was when she wouldn’t talk. Hart would be up late, reading in his chair in the main room of the cabin. Andrea would walk in and, with one glance, fill the room with the question.

  “Andrea ...” he’d say. “If people as smart as Billy and Sue don’t think it’s possible, you have to think ...”

  But she’d just keep going to her room. He already knew what she thought.

  In
some ways, John was harder. He’d never wanted this before—to be a part of a campaign. But now he wanted it so much. It was like bitter fate was trying to insure that Gary and his son always passed each other, going opposite ways.

  “Dad, you gotta do it!”

  “John, you cannot imagine what it’d be like.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “I don’t mean just for me. I mean, for your mother ... for you, and Andrea.”

  “We can take it. The family’s strong.”

  They were strong, Gary thought. And he would not sacrifice that. He wasn’t confused about the arguments that Casey made—she was right, of course. Billy was right. If Hart raised his head out of the ditch, there’d be a thousand people trying to kick it. They’d hit him with everything they could grab.

  He knew that. But how much would he pay for the respect of his son?

  That’s why he asked John to meet him in Ireland. Hart had business in Europe that August—John could meet him for a week, before returning to school. They both loved Ireland. Gary would get the time with his son. John would have the chance to make his case.

  That’s when it happened, when Gary and John were in Ireland: Bill Dixon, the former Campaign Manager, told The Washington Post that Gary would reenter the race within a few weeks, to run a low-budget guerrilla campaign ... because supporters and family were urging him back. “His wife and children want him in.”

  Then all hell broke loose. Everybody had to get Hart, but Hart was in Ireland—where, precisely, no one would say. Irish Radio finally tracked him down, but Hart went cute—wouldn’t confirm or deny. “I’m not going to get into a debate here in Ireland.” (In fact, the resumption of the hunt caught Hart flat-footed; he wasn’t even sure what Dixon had said.)

  There were hundreds of press calls to the white boys, who were back in D.C. now, or in their home states, in new jobs, new lives. ... If some Hart people tried to knock down the story, all they could say was, they’d heard nothing. Then, they were presumed to be out of the loop. Dixon must have the inside track! He hadda be talking to Hart, right?

  Lee Hart was besieged anew, and she was furious ... at Gary! He had to be talking to Dixon, right? Bill wouldn’t just say such a thing—how she wanted Gary back in the race? ... She and Gary hadn’t even talked about it! But she couldn’t say that ... what was she supposed to say?

  It was a national fever.

  The papers were already moving on to the tactics of reentry. Dixon said Hart would have to apologize, of course, for the conduct that drove him out of the race ... he’d use the free debates to make up for his lack of ads ... and put together a bare-bones national staff—three people instead of three hundred ... he’d pick his states, to maximize his impact, and ...

  Whadda story! The sonofabitch was gonna rise from the dead! ... Now the papers were digging out that Gallup Poll, where they left Hart’s name in the mix: the guy was still ahead of Jackson, two-to-one, and everybody else at least four-to-one.

  Did he think he could turn those numbers into votes? ...

  Did he think they’d let him get away with that? ...

  Did he think all the stories went away in four months? ...

  What got into the guy? Why would he do this to himself? ...

  Why? Why? ... Why?

  On the first day, the Post offered a piece of speculation that was just chewy enough for perfect political cud: Hart was still in debt—$1.4 million, from his ’84 campaign. If he got back in, his ’88 contributions would qualify for matching funds from the federal treasury: that would be a million dollars, right there.

  Aha! ... The official and well-known secret reason!

  After that, it did not matter that Billy Shore got hold of Hart and retailed, at last, a Hart denial. (In fact. Shore offered a Hart quote: “Oh, no, no, no.”)

  It did not matter that Hart could not (without a legal fight) apply any ’88 funds to clear off his ’84 debt.

  It certainly did not matter that Hart was apparently not running for anything; was running away, in fact, from the fond attentions of the press in the green and voteless countryside of the Republic of Ireland.

  Nobody believed that pose!

  Hart was gonna have to come back and say something. Hart was gonna have to answer questions—answer to them. It was just a matter of when, a matter of how. ... Nightline was calling—how ’bout it?

  Hart did Nightline on September 8—but not without a struggle. He insisted, for one thing, that ABC break its format and put him in the studio with Ted Koppel. He had to be face-to-face, on equal footing with the host. He had to avoid that frog-on-a-lab-table look that guests get when they cannot see Koppel but only the needle of a camera lens poked at their brains.

  The show went on for more than an hour, but as Koppel conceded in his opening tease, there were only two questions everyone wanted to ask: Was Gary Hart running for President? ... And if so (or even if not—what the hell!) ... did he have an affair with Donna Rice?

  Koppel asked the second question twenty minutes into the show. Hart nodded, squared himself on his seat, and fiddled with the ring finger of his right hand.

  “Mr. Koppel,” Hart said (even now he could not presume to “Ted”), “I was asked a question last spring, which I refused to answer—and your clips showed that. The articles to which you’ve referred have commented not only on Miss Rice, but, I must say, an outrageous number of people with whom I have been linked—a large number of whom I have never met, let alone been involved with. It has also been suggested that I don’t tell the truth because I would not reveal all about my personal life. And I’ve tried to figure out the best way to answer these questions—not only for my sake but for other elected officials’ sake, in the future, other candidates for national office. And so, it seems to me, I have no choice but to answer the question that was asked me last spring, and I will do that. If the question is, in the twenty-nine years of my marriage, including two public separations, have I been absolutely and totally faithful to my wife, I regret to say, the answer is no. But I also am never going to answer any specific questions about any individual. ... It isn’t anyone else’s business.”

  At last. Hart’s line was drawn. And despite a half-hour of intelligent follow-up (Tom Shales, the TV critic, remarked that Koppel looked like a splendid candidate), Hart held to that line.

  He dodged the question about the Post’s “other woman.” (It wasn’t just the Post’s threat that drove him from the race. It was the fact that any—every—other paper would now hound him with other women.)

  Hart explained (sort of) the National Enquirer photo of him holding Donna Rice on his lap. (“... this attractive lady, whom I had only recently been introduced to, uh ... dropped into my lap, I was embarrassed, I chose not to, ah ... dump her off, and the picture was taken. I shouldn’t have been in that situation.”)

  He even responded with patience to the theory (propounded by the Chief Majorette) that Gary Hart didn’t really want to be President. His unstable chemistry made him act out in a tacit plea to the Karacter Kops: Stop me, oh, stop me PLEASE ... before I win.

  No, Hart said. He wanted to be President.

  So, how ’bout it, Koppel asked, at last: Are you back in the race?

  “Mr. Koppel, I am not a candidate for President, and I’m not making any plans to become one. ... I am frankly in a kind of a perplexing situation. We have been talking about sin here, this evening, I guess—that’s what it gets down to, not crime, sin ...”

  “And bad judgment,” Koppel offered.

  “And bad judgment. Uh ... but the Bible that says that being unfaithful is a sin also says we’re all sinners, and that only those who are without sin can cast the first stone. And it says, further, that one of the greatest sins is to waste God-given talent. I’ve been given some talents, and what I’ve realized in the last three months is that I can’t waste those talents. And I’ve got to figure out a way to contribute. ...

  “I’m not going to create a campaign organizat
ion. I’m not going to raise money. I’m not going to hire a pollster or a media expert. But I am going to give speeches, and I am going to try to have an impact.”

  It was perplexing, indeed.

  Hart didn’t reveal any definite scenario for his future, save that he would not go back to hiding in Troublesome Gulch. ... He did reveal the reason, obliquely. He asked Koppel for a clean shot at the last thirty seconds of the broadcast.

  “Mr. Koppel,” he said, full face to the camera, “I appreciate the chance to be on this program. I just want to say ... to one very special young woman, and young man—how sorry I am for letting them down ... for many others like them.

  “Have courage.

  “We are not defeated. And we will not be.

  “I will find some way—I promise you—to continue on.”

  Of course, it was instantly well known to those in-the-know: Hart was talking to his own kids. On national TV.

  C’monn ... talk about weird!

  The big-feet lost interest in Hart’s new speaking tour, after the first speech. The news was that Hart had crawled out of his hole. After that, it was a yawn. They never did write much about what he said—New Ideas, and such. The problem was, you couldn’t count on members of the public to ask the right questions, to make him squirm about Donna Rice—they didn’t even try!

  Even Hart was surprised by the questions. Maybe people at the campuses, the community halls, were just too nice to ask whom he’d slept with. Or maybe he’d been right from the start—they didn’t care! They asked about the candidates who were running. They asked about Gorbachev, arms control, Iran-contra ... they asked about the deficit, taxes, education.

  The halls were packed, most of the time. Sometimes, they had to move Hart’s speech to a larger room, or the gym. There were a couple of stops where nobody showed—Gary was crestfallen, of course. But he found out (would not rest until he found out) that the posters never got printed, or the organizers never put them up ... there was always a reason.

  Billy Shore would travel with him, and in most cities, there was some old supporter who’d pick them up at the airport, who’d put together a bunch of people to attend the speech. These weren’t organized like campaign events, but someone was always calling Billy—anything they could do?