Evening star., 1955-01-16
Sees President Running
And Sure to Be Elected
Writer Believes Eisenhower
To Be Unbeotcble as Of Now
By Frank r. Kent

~ sNett- ~ 9~-rt--
The farst few days Of the new
Democratic controlled Congress
showed that this session. which will
last past the middle of August. wiz be
saturated with presidential politics
from start to finish. With the two
national conventions hardly 20 months
of, and the issues still to be made,
This is normal. natural and inevitable.
1t wiz be doubly true Of the second
session.
Thus ali the talk from Democratic
leaders about non partisan O-opeIation
with the President at this session. In
the national interests. = Is, to be blunt
about it, the bunk Gen. Ike himself
is a friendly man with Z congenital
tendency to .non-partisan eo-oper-
alton and he may believe In the CO.
operative assurances that have been
publicly made BY various more or less
highly placed Democrats. But neither
the practical Republican politicians nor
the experienced political observers be-
lieye in them at all They know that
even those whose utteranceS reek most
of nobility hope IN their hearts that II
anything untoWard happens to Ike
it will be nothing trivial. 1t would
be unique ia politics for Democratic
leaders particularly those who cherish
presidential aspirations Ito feel differ
emily. There are, besides the eloquent
Adlai, several Of these In the Senate,
the most forward of whom is Senator
Estes Kefauver of Tennessee. who does
not even pretend to be noble so far
as Ike is CONCERNED.
In fact, the Democratic situation,
at what Is practically the opening Of
the 1856 campaign. Is anything but
happy. The unchallenged popularity
of the President is such that Demo-
cratic politicians privately admit that
no one In their party could beat him il
the election were held now, The arti-
Eisenhower writers are obviously
wearing themselves a little thin and
the divergence between Democratic
Spokesmen who. like their recent re-
cruit, Wayne Morse Of Oregon. picture
the President as flop, fake and q
failure. and Senator Sparkman of Ala
barna. who asserts that he would bo
q splendid President If only he were
a Democrat" is somewhat ridiculous.
1t Is made more so by those who charge
that Gen. Ike is moving more toward
the Roosevelt Truman policies and
those who allege that he is really the
captive of the Old Guard Taft element.
This would seem to sustain the Presi-
dents own definition that he is 'pro-
gressive moderate
At any rate, the hopes OF the Demo-
Gratis for 1866 seem based on two
things first, that in the next year
and half they will be able to so
damage Ike with their attacks that
he will be reduced to beatabie size:
second. that he viii refuse to run again.
Practically every candid Democrat con-
cedes these two points, though few
regard the second as in the least
probable. And, they are right. The
late Cary Grayson. who had known
Intimately many Presidents. said that
no man ever left the White House
after one term without a nostalgia
pain in the heart for which medical
science had no cure. No matter how
much they moan about the awful bur-
den Of the Office and the joys OF pri-
vate life. that lis certainly true. Bar
ring an act of God, '.Iken win run again
because there is no way out. for him
without being a gutter, which is the
last thing he is.
Not to run again would be to fail
In sustaining his own record. Not to
run again would be to leave his friends
and his party In a hole. Clearly, there
is no other Republican with anything
like his appeal to the people. Not to
run again would be to break party
precedent and mean the nomination
Of a second or third string candidate.
Not to run again would leave unfin-
ished lot of things Ike" wants to
do Unless his health breaks down,
not TO run again would be unthink-
able. He not only cannot resist the
pressure but he does not want to. At
least. such is the conviction Of those
in best position to know.
As to that first point--the ability Of
the Democrats to damage Gen.
IKE" very badly In the next 20 months
that is different For one thing. he
may get some bad breaks in both
the national and the international sit-
uations. For another. he may make
some bad blunders. He has not. so far,
made any that have injured him much,
either personally or politically. But
there always Is the chance. and his
enemies will contrive as many pitt
falls and traps for him as they can,
He may fall into one or two and get
really hurt. On the other hand. the
past two years have taught the Presi-
dent a great deal about politics and
politicians. He handles himself poifti-
cally very much better than he did at
first. This Is shown not only In hiS
contacts with members Of Congress but
also in the way he behaves at his press
conferences. He is more at home, more
sure OF himself. more urbane and con-
trolled II he does not have the afore-
said bad breaks and does not make
the before bad blunders, he
viii be renominated by acclamation--
and reelected That is the present
view Of the more astute political ex-
perts. This condition where the pros-
poets Of both parties are bound up in
one man is not unique. But it is un-
usual.
animals. @She was an ardent republican
and -Bonapartist while Louis
Napoleon was rising to power and re-
tana Il - a.