THE 1992 DEBATES : COMMENTARY : Perot Pitches, Bush Swings . . . Oops, That’s CBS

As theater, Ross Perot was a howl, Bill Clinton seamless and sentimental. And President Bush? Gotta tell ya. Not good. Goin’ nowhere. Shoulda stayed home. Don’t even wanna think about it.

Not that you would have known if you were watching CBS, which had intended to join NBC, ABC, Fox, CNN and C-SPAN in providing live television coverage of Sunday’s presidential debate in St. Louis.

But baseball intervened.

CBS had planned to sandwich the debate between its live telecasts of Sunday’s American League and National League championship games. Because the American League contest turned out to be a marathon, however, CBS missed the entire presidential event. The 90-minute debate, which began at 4 p.m. PDT, and the game--Toronto’s 7-6 victory over Oakland in 11 innings--wound up concluding almost simultaneously.

The event was readily available to viewers on other networks. Yet the CBS debate gap was still a blow to the prestige of its news division, once the most vaunted news organization in all of television. In 1987, the network’s coverage of the U.S. Open tennis tournament delayed the start of “The CBS Evening News” by two minutes, so enraging anchorman Dan Rather, who was in Florida covering Pope John Paul II’s visit there, that he stormed off the set. An embarrassing six-minute blackout resulted when he wasn’t back in his anchor seat for the start of the newscast.

If Rather blew his top then over two minutes, one can only imagine his reaction to what happened Sunday.

Nor was CBS the only network choosing sports over Bush, Clinton and Perot. NBC did not begin its own coverage of the debate until 4:21 on the West Coast, opting to wait until the completion of the National Football League game between Houston and Cincinnati that it was feeding to this region. It made that decision even though the game had only marginal appeal here and Cincinnati was 14 points behind late in the fourth quarter when the debate started.

Thus, NBC viewers missed not only a portion of the debate dealing with domestic issues, but also some of Perot’s zingiest zingers. Responding to Bush’s and Clinton’s boasts of having the right experience for the White House, Perot cracked: “They have a point. I don’t have any experience in running up a $4-trillion deficit.” As for the Bush Administration, he said: “The party’s over, and it’s time for the cleanup crew.” And many one-liners later, he threatened to ship the government’s do-nothings off to the Smithsonian Institution.

Perot also scored high on pulling-together platitudes. “We oughta get along together,” he said. “United teams win and divided teams lose.” It sounded like a plan you could take to the inner city.

Concerning the nation’s racial divisions, moreover, Bush, Clinton and Perot each declared that they hate hate. But even here Perot was unsurpassed, boldly declaring: “If you hate people, I don’t want your vote.” Just how many defections that will cost him was uncertain, but you had to salute his boldness.

Meanwhile, Bush was friendly toward Perot, calling him “Ross,” and cool toward his Democratic opponent, addressing him as “Gov. Clinton.” If Perot was pesky and energetic, though, Bush seemed passive and nervous, sometimes even stammering.

It was Clinton who delivered the most homilies and folksiest anecdotes. And while Perot and Bush mostly directed their remarks to moderator Jim Lehrer of PBS and a panel of journalists, Clinton frequently spoke directly to the camera, establishing eye contact with the nation. So you see the utter sincerity in his eyes when, during his statement on family values, he wished his wife, Hillary, a happy 17th anniversary.

Inevitably, the networks weighed in. ABC’s post-debate “Pulse Poll” had Clinton losing a little bit of support, Bush losing more and the scrappy Perot gaining significantly.

Even more incisive was CNN’s living graph, a goofy polling device that measured the responses of Bush, Clinton and uncommitted voters to the debaters, point by point, as they spoke. And if you thought Perot was sidesplitting, then you should have caught CNN commentator William Schneider trying to explain what it all meant.

“See that pink line is the swing voters. It’s moving. . . . That was clearly not a successful comment by Gov. Clinton.”

Thus, the debate made things pretty clear. If you want a veteran President, vote for Bush. If you want a funny guy in the White House, vote for Perot. If you want someone who remembers his anniversary, vote for Clinton.

Meanwhile, the party was over. Time for the cleanup crew.