Democrats Pinning '70 Hopes On What They Call 'Nixonomics'
iat the led this year by the dire combination of recession and inflation. The issue in 1970 is ÛÏNixonomics," according to the able chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Lawrence OÛªBrien.</br></br>Maybe the Democratic hopes will be fulfilled, in which case President NixonÛªs administration is in & peck of trouble. But if you put economics (or ÛÏNixonomicsÛªÛª) on one side, it must be said that elaborate checking, all over the country, indicates that the liberal Democrats have a lot to worry about, too. The people who are shouting loudest, these days, appear to be so far out of touch with the national mood that one suspects them of levitation.</br></br>Some of the indicators are pretty painful. Consider, for example, the shooting at Kent State College. The liberal conventional wisdom is that this appalling episode helped Representative Robert A. Taft Jr. to defeat Gov-. ernor James Rhodes by a whisker, in OhioÛªs Republican primary.</br></br>In fact, it had the precisely opposite effect, as representative Taft rather grimly admits. Just before the shooting, Taft had had the state carefully polled. The result showed a comfortable Taft lead of between 6 and 7 per cent although the poll indicated that Governor Rhodes had already gained greatly by his represesive handling of Ohio's student protests and disorders.</br></br>THE DEATHS at Kent State then occurred on the very eve of the voting. The Taft workers throughout the state are rather solidly agreed that the immediate reaction was a spurt of support for Rhodes that fell just short of giving the governor an upset victory. This is confirmed by the horrifying "Newsweek" poll, taken by Dr. Gallup, showing that an enormous majority of Americans blamed the students rather than the National Guard for the Kent State tragedy.