South Florida Sun Sentinel from Fort Lauderdale, Florida • Page 7

Sun-Sentinel, Sunday, November 24. 1991 7A Remorg boost Ro Perot for the presidency "Talk is cheap. We need action. There are a lot of problems in this country that need to be iixed. I'm tired of people talking about them but not doing anything about them." H.Ross Perot Dallas Morning News DALLAS People are talking: Ross Perot for president? Says Newsweek magazine: "H.R.

Perot. Draft movement stirs. A REAL outsider, and with his own army, too." Says Jack Gargan, founder of Throw the Hypocritical Rascals Out, an anti-establishment group in Tampa: "There's no question in my mind, if he wanted to be president, he could be." Says Bob Balkin, editor of The Hotline, a daily political journal published in Washington, D.C.: "Something's brewing. The word on the guy is keep an eye open for a possible independent candidacy." But says Perot: "The answer is no. We can cover that in one word.

There's no chance." The Dallas billionaire said he is not interested in being president. He doesn't like politics too much talk, too many ceremonies and not enough action Perot said he will not run, despite the hundreds of letters he receives daily from people who want him to. Instead, Perot, 61, said he would go to Washington as a behind-the-scenes player to help make this country work again. To change the system. "Talk is cheap.

We need action," he said. "There are a lot of problems in this country that need to be fixed. I'm tired of people talking about them but not doing anything about them." That's the kind of talk Gargan likes to hear. That's why he and others keep pushing Perot for president. "The guy does what is right, what is needed, what is patriotic," Gargan said.

And in 1986, Perot scolded the giant General Motors which had just bought Perot's computer-services company Electronic Data Systems, for having too many executives, allowing too much bureaucracy and wasting too much time. He was off GM's board of directors by the end of the year. Perot now competes with his old company through Perot Systems Inc. "Ross Perot is one of those endlessly fascinating figures," said Howard Phillips, chairman of the Conservative Caucus in Vienna, Va. Phillips said he interviewed Perot recently about possibly being the independent candidate of the U.S.

Taxpayers Party, which he is helping to organize in Virginia. "I don't expect that he will become a candidate in 1992," Phillips said. "Or at least, that's certainly the impression I got." Perot says all the speculative talk about his presidential prospects is idle chatter. He downplayed Newsweek's decision to include him in its Conventional Wisdom list of possible candidates next year. "I just think it's a classic example of how thirsty people are for action," Perot said.

"The fact that they want me for president means they're desperate." Perot said he also doesn't like how the political campaign system works. It needs to be changed so that it is not limited to wealthy people, who, realistically, are the only ones can run without "selling their soul" to financiers, he said. "I could not run and belong to anybody but the people," Perot said. "You can't get there unless you sell out, and I'm not going to sell out." But that's not stopping Gargan, whose grass-roots, term-limit effort has gained some momentum. In last two months, he said, he has asked about 30 audiences at THRO rallies what they think about Ross Perot for president.

"I get cheers. Everywhere I get cheers," he sale. "People desperately want someone who's not a pojiti; cian. And boy, does he fit the bill." Gargan said he and Perot discussed the idea for about 90 minutes in May in Dallas. They even debated the merits of "three or four" possible running majes; though Perot dismissed them all as unsuitable and rer peatedly insisted he wouldn't be a candidate.

Perot dismissed Gargan's support as well-intenr tioned but misplaced. "I don't see a scenario that would cause me tJ change my mind," Perot said. "I don't think running for president or being president plays to my strengths." If Perot does harbor a desire to be president, he hasn't shared it with two of his closest associates-Former Texas gubernatorial candidate Tom Loce" and former Perot colleague Morton H. Meyerson sa" they aren't aware of any presidential ambitions burn ing in Perot. "I haven't heard anything like that," said Luce, who ran unsuccessfully last year for the Republican nomiJ nation for governor.

"We haven't had any conversa-J tions along those lines." Said Meyerson: "I've known him for a long time, and I don't know. I've known him for many years, dria he's always said no. But now he's giving Perot says not to make too much of that, either about 2,000 people two weeks ago in Tampa. They chanted, "Run, Ross, run," and held placards bearing the words "Perot for Prez." "People like him. They respond to him," said Larry King, host of CNN's Washington talk show Larry King Live.

Perot has appeared on the show three times, a CNN spokeswoman said. "He always breaks down the phones. As soon as you announce he's on, the phones are flooded," King said. Perot, a Naval Academy graduate, began forging his can-do, superhero image during the Vietnam War when he tried to have Christmas presents airlifted to U.S. prisoners of war.

In 1979, Perot hired a platoon of private commandos to free two of his company's employees from a Tehran jail during the Iranian revolution. uargan request, Perot spoke to an audience of -i ai v)u liX 'X-. Ml fil yryi- a 0 -O 1 "7 -p. A1 i ALL MACY S. SORRY, NO MAIL OR PHONE ORDERS.

BABAR CHARACTERS 1991 L. DE BRL'NHOFF. USE YOl'R MACY'S CHARGE. MACY'S ALSO WELCOMES THE AMERICAN EXPRESS' CARD, VISA AND MAST1 R( ARD lnur vtixiuKA a claniaiion MON. SAT.

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