A VERY IMPORTANT VISITOR

Ostling reports that President Clinton's decision to travel to Newark to meet the Pope is a reminder that the Catholic vote will be vital to Clinton's reelection chances: "The Democrats have lost one big bloc in F.D.R.'s old New Deal coalition, white Southerners (mostly Protestant but also those who are Catholic), and cannot afford to lose the other big bloc of ethnic Catholics. Hispanics and blacks are strongly Democratic, whether Catholic or not, and so are Jews, but it's impossible to win without solid support from the 60 million American Catholics. F.D.R. floated to victory with an overwhelming Catholic margin, but Eisenhower made big inroads for the GOP. Since the Kennedy election, when Catholics gave the first Catholic President the White House through a lopsided 80 percent voting margin, they have become the classic swing voters. Clinton needs them."