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Buchanan insists that raising the living standard of working Americans is the key to "relieving some of the social tensions and social divisions." But as a speechwriter, columnist and candidate, he has rarely missed a chance to open those wounds and pour salt in them. In 1992 he talked publicly about the problems a million immigrant "Zulus" might have assimilating in Virginia, compared with a million "Englishmen." He has expressed some doubts about the Holocaust and has said of the AIDS epidemic that "promiscuous homosexuals appear literally hell-bent on Satanism and suicide." His past attacks on gays, Jews and minorities make him a scary prospect, particularly as his rhetoric becomes more nuanced and his codes more subtle this time around.
This is why Buchanan can be running a strong second and can still seem to analysts more an irritant than a threat. The emotions he stirs are intense, both for him and against him. His negative ratings have consistently been roughly double the percentage of people who support him. Even some political operatives are wary of the risks. Sal Russo, a respected G.O.P. consultant in Sacramento, California, says he advised Pete Wilson to beware the fearmongering. "When you take that negative, finger-pointing path, you polarize your potential support. That means you can get to 50%, but it's hard to get much higher," Russo argues. "I believe it's much easier to get people revved up with a shining city on a hill." The whole tenor of Buchanan's campaign, particularly as it reverberates across the Republican field, may also take a larger toll. At a time when popular faith in public institutions is reaching an all-time low, presidential candidates pile on at their own risk. "It creates a circular problem," observes Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the University of Pennsylvania. "The more politicians complain about the government they would be part of, the harder it is for them to govern."
For all his evangelical fervor, when Buchanan talks about reclaiming the presidency as a bully pulpit, the operative word is more "bully" than "pulpit." He pulls no punches, whether he is attacking the weak or the powerful. And simply by standing up and preaching with such apparent conviction, speaking the unspeakable and crossing the lines of polite political discourse, Buchanan distinguishes himself from every candidate who ever waffled or wavered or hinted or hedged. As the '96 race stands, that distinction promises to carry him a long way.
--With reporting by Nina Burleigh/Washington