CAMPAIGN '96: KNOCK 'EM FLAT

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The copycat spectacle was gratifying to Forbes, who especially savored Dole's dilemma when the majority leader stood before the cameras as Kemp laid out a dozen principles for changing the tax code. "He clearly wanted out of there as quickly as possible," Forbes observed. "He wasn't comfortable. I think he's never been one for major ideas, especially on the tax side." Editor that he is, Forbes even writes his opponent's script for him. "He could have said, 'In 30 years, I've seen what a monstrosity this system is. I may even have contributed to the monstrosity. I know as my career closes that America needs to change.' And there people would say, 'Hey, look at that. He's got experience, he's not afraid to learn.'"

But it didn't happen that way, and Forbes hopes the contrast was not lost on voters. Forbes is an amiable prophet, a genial man with a heartfelt belief that if America's entrepreneurial energies are unleashed, its families protected and its politicians chastened, everything will turn out O.K. This may be his most surprising contribution to the race: after a year in which Republicans like Pete Wilson, Pat Buchanan and Phil Gramm tried to outworry each other on affirmative action, immigration and crime, along comes Forbes, who wipes the polarizing issues off the table. In their place is the Reaganesque liturgy of hope and opportunity: "You don't have to bash immigrants," says Forbes' former media adviser Sal Russo, "you don't have to condemn minorities, you don't have to talk about flag factories. You can appeal to the best instincts and be successful."

This combination of a renegade vision and a faith that it will work distinguishes Forbes from the other candidates, whom he calls, in his charming preppy lexicon, "sourpusses" and "gloomy-doomies." Dole, with his barbed wit and allergy to abrupt innovation, is the most vulnerable to the comparison. "There's been a paradigm shift in politics, and I don't think Bob gets it," says Jan Anton, a California entrepreneur who was the state co-chair for Dole in '88 but is leaning toward Forbes this time. "Dole's a wheeler-dealer. He's just trying to hang on and avoid mistakes. Forbes is an outsider. He has a clear, coherent message, and he has the money to tell his story. So he can't be blocked."

Forbes doesn't so much transform the race as create one--if not in Iowa then certainly in New Hampshire, where his message could take hold, as well as in Delaware, Arizona, the Dakotas and South Carolina, the contests that follow. He has the means to dog Dole all the way to the convention if he chooses; and by refusing federal campaign funds, he can spend as much as he wants, wherever he wants. He has already shed upwards of $2 million in Arizona. In Iowa and New Hampshire he will spend at least twice what the law permits the other candidates to spend. His opponents claim the press has given him a free ride, whether charmed by the idea of an editor-king or just looking for a plot twist with which to torture the front runners.