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Interchangeable Parts. His stumping style, however, leaves something to be desired. Reciting a prepared text, Agnew's flat voice falls—like that of Nelson Rockefeller in similar circumstances —into leaden, soporific cadences. Two weeks ago, for example, Agnew delivered a well-reasoned and progressive speech to the American Political Science Association at the Washington Hilton. The applause was scattered, and several younger members of the audience even drifted to the room next door, where Draft Director Lewis Hershey was holding forth.
In his first weeks of campaigning, Agnew stuck almost exclusively to what an aide dubbed his "TFX" speech-named for the U.S. fighter-bomber that has been tailored for both Air Force and Navy use. The speech was a collection of interchangeable parts to be used or dropped according to the audience. But when recited in Agnew's Baltimore accent, with its semi-glottal ts and distinctively rounded os, the TFX seldom got far off the ground.
Joe America. Agnew has switched from reading texts to the more congenial medium of off-the-cuff speaking, which has the disadvantage of encouraging him to be impulsive. He began his "soft on Communism" outburst defensively, in reply to reporters' questions. Later he explained that he simply had been angry because Humphrey had attacked Nixon as a hard-lining "cold warrior." "I guess by nature I'm a counterpuncher," he explained. "You can't hit my team in the groin and expect me to stand here and smile about it." He has yet to learn to temper his "counterpuncher's" reflexes with the politician's self-restraint.
Nonetheless, Nixon and his aides insist that they have no intention of muzzling Agnew. Said Press Aide Herb Klein: "We haven't tried to dictate to him in any way. You have to allow a man of this stature to speak out on his own. We've never had a monolithic line." Agnew himself emphasized: "Mr. Nixon hasn't put any gag on me." Nor, if the Nixon camp's judgment of Agnew's appeal is correct, would there be any reason to do so. "This guy is made for 1968," said a Nixon agent. "He's Joe America. Follows the Colts. Drinks beer. Comes across honest."
After the unguarded jab at Humphrey, Agnew made certain that he also came across cautious. Reverting to the middle ground during a shopping center appearance in Erie, Pa., he made no mention of Communism. "Law and order" was judiciously counterweighed with a call for equal opportunities. But then an incident occurred that illuminated both Agnew's character and his campaign style. Agnew had just completed his customary pitch that there can be no U.S. withdrawal from Viet Nam without an "honorable settlement." The audience was responding well. Agnew made a rhetorical reach and asked: "Are we going to stop the bombing?"
To his astonishment, a handful of pro-McCarthy collegians in the crowd cried back: "Yes, yes, yes!" The heckling, the first that he had encountered in the campaign, continued through his next several sentences. Agnew was badly shaken. His voice lowered with emotion, his face reddened. Quickly ending the speech, the candidate departed for the airport ahead of schedule.