- Coming up on IGI, we remember an honor, Bob Dole, a war hero, Republican nominee for President, and giant of the United States Senate.

Stay with us.

(light melodic music) (bright upbeat music) - [Announcer] KNEA, empowering educators so that educators can empower Kansas students.

- [Announcer] This program is brought to you with support from a Lewis H. Humphreys Charitable Trust, and from The Friends of KTWU.

(bright upbeat music continues) - Hello and welcome to IGI.

Kansas recently lost one of its own.

Loved as a man of the people, Bob Dole was known as the face and the voice for the greatest generation.

From his humble beginnings in Kansas, he became a war hero, a nominee for president, and worked tirelessly on behalf of the American people in his role as United States Senator.

Today, I am honored to be part of this IGI special to remember a true leader in American politics, Senator Robert J Dole.

Joining me now are Dr. Amber Dickinson, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Washburn University, Dr. Michael Smith, Professor of Political Science at Emporia State University, and Steve Kraske, host of KCUR's Up To Date via Zoom.

Thank you all for joining me today on IGI.

We're going to start with Bob Dole's pre political background because I believe that is an important element in understanding his career.

And rather than let me explain it, let's hear about Bob Dole's early trials and challenges from him, from a 1974 film his campaign produced when he ran for the US Senate.

- [Narrator] We want you to take a long hard look at Senator Bob Dole.

We'll start with what comes naturally to the average politician, shaking hands.

To most men in public office, it's a way of life.

To Bob Dole, it doesn't come easy, not since the day he lost the use of his right hand.

It hasn't always been that way.

Bob Dole not only shook hands when he was a kid, but won numerous sports letters and awards.

He fought his first battles in the fields of Russell High, moved down to the University of Kansas, where as a pre-med student, he won his letters in basketball and football.

(dramatic music) But then in the war broke out.

Bob Dole signed up, he was 20.

At Camp Breckinridge he weighed in at a trim 192 pounds.

But then one cold morning as he was leading his platoon against a German machine gun in placement, he left his shell hole to save a wounded radio man.

The machine gun and fragment wounds he received cost him 39 months in army hospitals.

They gave him the bronze star with cluster, but they couldn't give him back the use of his right hand.

With med school under the question, Bob Dole turned to law and eventually to public life.

In 1960, he was elected to the House.

And as the son of a grain elevator operator, he asked to be on the prestigious AG Committee.

Next year, he'll be the number one Republican on that committee.

That's why Gerald Ford asked him to speak for the farm states at the Summit Conference on Inflation.

- And like Americans, generally farmers are paying more for everything, everything they buy.

You can't run a farm as Senator Bellman knows on my left being a bonafide farmer by the seat of your pants anymore.

Inflation compounded by serious shortages of things he needs to do the job is a farmer's biggest problem.

A problem government did the most to create, we feel is a problem government must do the most to solve.

- Lets start with Dr. Michael Smith.

When you look at Bob Dole's background, it's absolutely incredible what he went through.

And he was going to become a doctor, he wanted to be an athlete of course, and star at KU in multiple sports.

And his entire life not only is nearly ended, but it changes.

How do you think that influenced his later career?

- Well, in a variety of different ways, of course, as you saw from the video, he and his team were not shy about using that for his campaign.

It's part of his story, it's part of who he is, they wanted voters to know that.

I think you're absolutely right, he identified with his generation so much.

But it also was one of his passions in the Senate, and of course, one of the things he's most known for is his work to pass the Americans with Disabilities Act.

This was deeply personal for him.

And I think that in a day and age, when, once again we've seen a backlash against politicians that seem canned, or scripted, or shaped by pollsters or consultants, Bob Dole was very much what you see is what you get.

- Steve Kraske, thanks for joining us, so- - Hey bob.

- How much do you think Bob Dole's background had to do with his eventual political career?

- I think it had everything to do with it, Bob.

I think the war injuries shaped him immeasurably, really made him the man and the politician that he became.

Just think about this for a moment, Bob, his biggest fear in life, following that war injury, was that he was destined to become a pencil salesman in downtown Russell, Kansas.

That's what his worry was, what his fear was coming out of that long rehabilitation here.

And you just have to begin to imagine the drive and the determination that he had to pull himself out of that very difficult hospitalization to make himself whole physically or at least enough a whole physically to present himself on the campaign trail and become the candidate that he became to win so many offices, so many elections, one after another that he did.

I think the war wounds were instrumental in giving us the Bob Dole that we all came to know.

- Yeah, I mean, he grew up in Russell and his parents were hard workers.

He told the story of his mother having a saying, and his mother's saying was, quote, "Can't never could do anything."

So his parents were influential.

But to your point, Bob Dole said that his doctor said to him, at one point in the recovery, he had multiple surgeries.

His doctor told him, "It's up to you to make the most of what you have, there will be no miracles."

And so, I think that led him to work incredibly hard, and he sort of had to sacrifice a personal life and maybe his first marriage because of that.

But it also reminded of that movie "Saving Private Ryan," if anybody's ever seen it.

Near the end of the movie, one of the characters survives and he's told, earn this, all the sacrifice that went on to save that one soldier.

And then he asked, "Did I earn it?"

And everyone tells him, "Yes, you did."

I get the sense that Bob Dole, when he finally came out of the years after World War II and he survived, that part of them thought I have to spend my life just earning all the sacrifices that people went through to save me.

Dr. Dickinson.

- Yeah, I definitely think that you can see these lessons that he'd learned coming out of this, in particular these war injuries.

So for example his community of Russell really had to pass the hat to help him and pay for his treatment, and I think that this sense of community and this idea that you have to come together to help people make financial ends meet when they're in a really challenging situation, I think certainly echoes in the things that he did later on in life, looking at some of the policy that he was really driving and really pushing for I think that idea that his community really had to come together and support him when he couldn't financially support himself clearly echoed later on in his political career.

- Right.

Let's move on to Bob Dole as a legislator.

A lot of terms are being talked about, one that comes up is giant or titan of the Senate.

So when he ran again in 1974, he himself emphasized how influential he was in the Senate.

Let's take a look at an ad he runs in 74.

- [Bob] It may appear to be- - [Narrator] You are listening to the number one Republican on the Agriculture Committee, a senior Senator in the Budget Committee on Inflation, one of the most respected and influential voices in congress.

If you stop that voice, consider the alternative.

Would an unknown voice carry nearly as much weight for Kansas?

Re-elect Senator Bob Dole because when he speaks, Washington listens to Kansas.

- And of course that's not always in vogue right now, a lot of voters like outsiders and people that don't have experience, but clearly he was emphasizing that.

Bob Dole told former Congress, Kansas Congressman Jim Slattery, that he was most proud of the Social Security Act of 1983, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and also Feeding the Hunger.

Dr. Dickinson, tell us a bit about a couple of those programs.

- So when we look at in particular Food Assistance programs that Senator Dole really championed, I think that this probably comes due to the fact that he grown up during the great depression, and he knew firsthand what it was like to watch communities be food insufficient.

And so, when you look at this idea of Food Assistance programs, I think that one of the things that he was really good at was making this bipartisan appeal to people and saying, "I'm not just coming at this from this one particular viewpoint that's really aligned with my party," but that he knew he was smart enough to know that he needed to win over some members of his party.

And so, when you look at things that he was doing like, we've got to eliminate this part of the policy that says you have to pay to play, essentially, you've got to pay money to get Food Stamps.

Well, this is really not achievable for some members of the American public at the time in particular.

And so, he wanted to get rid of that, and then, but he also wanted to sort of quell these concerns that people had that, "You're gonna see rampant abuse in the system."

And so, there were these aspects of this Food Assistance program that was saying things like, "If you're the head of household, you can't just up and quit your job and then turn around and file for food stamps."

And that really, I think, went a long way with people and gaining their trust in that program in particular.

- Yeah, Steve you've covered a lot of senators and congresspeople.

Bob Dole starts out as a Congressman in the US House, and he's pretty doctrinaire in terms of very conservative Republican.

And then he still is very partisan, but he ends up working with Democrats in a number of issues.

What kind of Senator was he?

- Well, he never struck me Bob, as the guy who was coming up with these ideas.

Food stamps were created long before Bob Dole, and George McGovern pushed the idea through Congress years later.

He was a guy who knew how to make the trains run on time.

He wasn't creating these issues and coming up with lots of ideas himself, but once he signed on, once he bought into the idea, he was the guy who could shepherd it through the halls of Congress and get it passed.

And I'm also struck by your point, Bob, he was more conservative when he first began in the early 1960s.

But once you begin to assume leadership role in Congress, you need to do that, I think to be most effective from a place that's a little bit more of a center position, middle of the road, than you would be from either the far left or the far right.

You've got to be in a position to galvanize votes, get people to come behind you.

And you do that, again, not from the left or the right on the extremes, but from somewhere closer to the middle.

Make no mistake, Bob Dole was always more to the right, but he did moderate, he did go along with some big government ideas like Food Stamps, Americans with Disabilities Act, those kinds of things I think maybe would have been a stretch for him back in 1960 or 1962 when he was a brand new member of the US House.

- Yeah, and Dr. Smith, what about his legislative accomplishments?

- Well, Dr. Dickinson already mentioned the expansion of Food Stamps with Senator McGovern, who, by the way, he considered a personal friend.

And let's be clear, Bob Dole was a conservative, he was a conservative Republican, he was extremely partisan.

He was a leader of his party for decades, but he crossed party lines from time to time.

And of course there's the Americans with Disabilities Act, and there are also legislation that he helped to stop.

And a good example of that would be the proposed healthcare reform by Bill and Hillary Clinton.

He was the leading voice to stop that from passing.

And although Dole didn't get elected president in 1996, he was very successful in particular in making sure that it didn't receive any Republican votes.

He's a different kind of conservative from a lot of people that self-identify as conservative today.

He did grow up during the depression.

He could see the benefits of everything from banking, insurance, to social security.

Conservatives in his day wanted to slow the growth of government.

Some, not all, but some self-identified conservatives today appear to want to dismantle it.

- Yeah, it's an interesting point.

And Steve, we're gonna get to you on this next one, I think 'cause you covered him for a number of years, and that's Bob Dole's, his style, his personality, his sense of humor.

I was asked about Bob Dole and it's not a very political sciency answer, but I said, some politicians have an X factor.

In Kansas, for example, Kathleen Sebelius was incredibly popular, and it was always hard sometimes to pinpoint where that popularity comes from.

But one aspect of Bob Dole we can talk about was his sense of humor.

Here's an example of Dole's sense of humor from a 1980 Presidential Debate, let's take a look.

- Mr Dole.

- Well, I had known me to gotten around the issues, yet I was hoping to have it come up before the campaign ended, whether they're single issues, all I hear is talk about momentum.

I don't know that momentum is an issue, but I hear talk about little Mo and big Mo, and I don't know who is who.

(people laughing) But whatever the issues are, I think it's time we addressed them, certainly abortion, certainly gun control, certainly energy and inflation.

That's a responsibility we have, and it's not too late for the people in this state to find out what we know about the issues.

It would be refreshing if somebody asked me about an issue instead of a poll.

It also in my case would be very helpful.

(people laughing) - You're not supposed to laugh, but we can't forbid it.

(all laughing) - You're not supposed to laugh, but we can't forbid it.

So Steve, style, personality, sense of humor, we showed some sense of humor there, but talk about that with Bob Dole.

- Well, there's so much to say about that.

He had a great sense of humor.

He very famously, Bob, as you well know, was sort of criticized after the 96 Presidential Campaign when he was the GOP nominee for not displaying more of that sense of humor during that very much uphill campaign against Bill Clinton, he very famously went on one of the talk shows right after that campaign, and lit the place up with one self-deprecating joke after another.

And people kept saying, "Well, he had showed that during the campaign, he might've beaten Bill Clinton."

I'm not sure that's the case, but that was the story.

His style was always self-deprecating, never taking himself too seriously, never letting people think he was too big for his britches, always saying something that might be to his favor, but then acknowledging that, "Hey, I'm not the only one pushing this idea."

He really had a nice way with that.

But his problem I always thought was he was a way better legislator that he was a campaigner.

His stump speeches, I just wrote this the other day, he began to letter A, and then jumped over the letter P, then back to G, down to X, up to K, he just bounced around all over the place, and the speeches didn't have much rhythm or rhyme or reason to him.

He just got up there and winged it.

And it always puzzled me in the sense that this was a man who ran for national office four times, three times as a presidential candidate himself, he clearly wanted it very, very badly.

And yet when it came down to doing the hard work of actually putting together a stump speech, sticking to scripts, doing what he had to do to sort of get the thing won, he never really was quite able to do that, very different than his wife, Lizzy, who was a perfectionist, famously walked on the floor of the 96 GOP convention in San Diego, at every step measured out, matching with the lines she was reading at the moment.

It was a perfect performance.

Bob Dole was never perfect in his performances, and it really showed a lot of the time.

- Again, yeah, he had a very interesting speaking style, and I've watched a lot of his speeches and a lot of his ads, and he almost always throws in whenever he would compliment himself, or talk about himself, almost always, he'd say, "Well, some would argue with that."

It was very difficult for him to just outright say, "And I'm very proud of this," add these little parts where he just could not almost psychologically say, "Hey, I'm awesome," or really, "What's wrong with you for not voting for me."

And who knows where that goes back to, but maybe just growing up in hardscrabble Russell, that's not something you did was it was very difficult for him to brag in a sense.

Dr. Smith, what about his personality and the role it played?

- Well, I think it's really quite simple.

He's a Kansan, and I'm multi-generational Kansan.

My family is from rural Kansas, I'm not, but my family is.

That's Kansas.

Everything about the way he spoke, including the fact that he could be mean sometimes, that's pure rural Kansas.

I agree with what Steve said about him maybe not being effective as a campaigner nationally, and he never got elected president, but he was perfect for Kansas because he was Kansas.

And if you've lived in rural Kansas any length of time, I think you know that instinctually, he clearly did, he knew his people.

- Yeah, and Dr. Dickinson to Steve's point about the difference between being a legislator and a candidate, and Michael's as well, I don't wanna be cruel here but, candidates sometimes have to be, for lack of a better term fake.

You know what I mean, and it's not awful, but when a legislator gets in a room, they can be pretty, they can get the job done.

So is that what made him an effective legislator, but maybe he was tough, more honest, and he didn't have to brag?

What do you think?

- I think part of the issues on the campaign trail is that sort of to the point that was made earlier about kind of going ping-ponging around with ideas and really just sort of this, and I don't know if it was an intentional thing, or if it was just generally an inability to stay on a specific message, but basic campaigning one-on-one is, you've got a message and you drive that message throughout an entire campaign.

And the lack of that I think could be confusing for people.

Again, truly I don't know if that was intentional or not, but I certainly think that that was a deficiency that Dole just as a campaigner he just couldn't hit that mark.

- And former Kansas Senator, Nancy Kassebaum, told a story at the Topeka ceremony that I was very privileged to attend, where she said once they're contentious, and it was among the Republican party, they couldn't get something through, and Dole walked in and said, "I'm leaving and in half an hour you better have this done," and walked out.

(people laughing) And these are all people his age basically, and he was kind of intimidating in that sense.

So moving on, Steve, you mentioned his presidential races.

He ran for the White House four times legitimately.

In 1976, he was a VP candidate nominee with Gerald Ford.

And he also ran in 1980, 1988, and 1996.

And before we get into those, here's a Dole for President ad from 1988, let's take a look.

- So how are we gonna deal with the deficit?

Nobody's told you, no other candidate will stand up and say, "I'm going to do this."

And what we ought to do is to have a spending freeze.

But what it really means is to say 1989 we don't spend any more money than we spent in 1988.

Then you're gonna keep interest rates down.

Then you're gonna keep it in place and rates down.

Then you're gonna find more jobs for more people of all ages.

For the deficit is public enemy number one.

- [Announcer] Dole for president.

- So Steve, talk a bit about his runs for president.

I mean, I can talk about 1976 where he's VP, and he was given the job to essentially be sort of a hatchet man.

He took it a little too seriously.

And then the VP debate made some comments that really did not go over very well.

But he modified that in later presidential runs.

Was his closest to 1988?

I mean, he gets the nomination in 96, but what do you think.

- 1988 was his year, Bob, and Bob Dole told me that, he told a lot of people that over the years that that was his best shot.

He was trying to become sort of the third term of Ronald Reagan, if you will.

His big rival was George H.W.

Bush that year.

He wins Iowa, wins it big, but it doesn't get much bump because the big story that year was that Pat Robertson, the televangelist had finished second in the caucuses ahead of George H.W.

Bush, that became the story coming out of Iowa, big upset, was George H.W.

Bush in trouble?

They go to New Hampshire and if Dole can win that campaign, he goes in way ahead in New Hampshire, he can win it.

He thinks he's got the momentum to carry himself, slingshot himself to the GOP nomination, but instead he crumbles in that campaign.

Things they can't figure out, the campaign can't figure out how to present him.

Is he a conservative, is he a moderate?

There's a big internal fight over that.

The campaign never resolves it, Bob Dole never resolves it, and George H.W.

Bush catches wind and manages to pull off that race.

To the end of his life, Bob, I think the New Hampshire campaign of 1988 stayed with him.

It hurt him, he knew that was his shot, and he simply couldn't close the deal.

- Yeah, we probably think he would have a defeated Michael Dukakis in the national election.

So after 1996, Michael Smith, he's defeated, but as compared to some politicians, and some times in both parties, he's not bitter, he's not angry, and he could be in his career.

And instead, he embarks on one of the most incredible post political careers of anybody I've ever read about.

The World War II memorial, various things, talk a bit about that.

- Sure.

Well, I'm not an expert on that, but I know he was very instrumental in supporting and raising money for the World War II Memorial, as was the Eisenhower family.

So that's really a Kansas project in so many ways.

He was also very well known as a lobbyist, in particular, for the Taiwanese government.

And that lasted all the way up into the Trump presidency.

- Yeah, absolutely incredible what he was able to accomplish.

And I wanna give the three of you a chance to express in about 40 seconds each or roughly, and maybe their memory, or what you think made him such a unique figure, Dr. Dickinson.

- I really admire this person's tenacity.

I certainly don't personally agree with all of the stances that he made, or the statements or the choices that he made, but I think just you can't argue how dedicated he was to championing causes that you really believed in, especially when he was facing criticism from members of his own party, and I think that's really something.

- Yeah, tenacity, I like that word, Dr. Smith.

- And humor.

I am a Saturday Night Live fan, have been since childhood.

And to have someone that was so often and so effectively made fun of on Saturday Night Live, go on the show multiple times and participate in the joke, that's my favorite Bob Dole memory.

- Yeah, thank you.

Steve.

- Bob, I wrote a tough column about him once early in the 2000s about something, well, that's really beside the point but, he wrote a letter to the editor of the Kansas City Star, or the column I'd written, had appeared there, sort of calling me a communist or a socialist or something, I can't exactly remember what it was.

But about a year later, I began my talk show on public radio, KCUR, in Kansas City, and I asked him if he'd come on the show the first day, and he said, "You bet."

And my point being, he always, everything was sort of transactional.

He never stayed mad at anybody for long, it's what made him a great majority leader and a great minority leader for so many years in Congress.

- Yeah.

Thank you.

Yeah, for me in 1976, Bob Dole, a visit to Russell with Gerald Ford, and breaks down when he thinks about where he came from.

Let's take a look at that clip.

- I wanna re-emphasize I did before if I've done anything it's because of people I have known up and down street, and I can recall the time when I needed help, the people that Russell helped.

And I think.

(people applauding) That was a long time ago and I thank you for it again.

- And thanks to our guests for joining us for this episode of IGI, and thanks to Bob Dole for all his years of service.

If you have any comments or suggestions for future topics, send us an email at issues@ktwu.org.

If you'd like to view this program again, or any previous episodes of IGI, visit us online at watch.ktwu.org, and thanks for watching.

(bright upbeat music) - [Announcer] KNEA, empowering educators so that educators can empower Kansas students.

- [Announcer] This program is brought to you with support from the Lewis H. Humphreys Charitable Trust, and from The Friends of KTWU.