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By GEORGE BOWLES
A greet hue and cry was raised laat week by Republican John Warner and some members of the prase over a campaign ambit by fanner Del. Edythe Harrison of Norfolk, Warner’s Democratic challenger in this year’s U.S. Senate race.
In the course of a debate last weekend* Mrs. .Harrison proposed that, in the remaining weeks of the campaign, she and Mir. Warner, "travel together screes the State of Virginia, discussing the issues, on your (Mr. Warner’s) terms, and on your exfoting schedule."
Mr. Warner and his staff immediately and somewhat huffily pooh-poohed the idea as a gimmick that the senator reportedly described as "a pathetic sort of plea in the dosing weeks of the campaign.”
Mrs. Harrison, however, argued that her idea was in the finest tradition of American political dialogue going back to the Uncoln-Douglas debates.
At a news conference last Monday at the State Capitol, she was joined by Gov. Chuck Robb and State Democrat Party Chairman Alan Diamonstein. Both endorsed her proposal as a sound suggestion that would assist the voters in forming an opinion about the relative merits of the two candidates and, at the same time, offset some of the lopsided public exposure advantage enjoyed by Mr. Warner because of his for better financed campaign. At the present time Mr. Warner has raised almost $2 million compared to Mra,.. Harrison's for more . modest. war-chest of around $400,000. .
During the news conference, Mrs. Harrison heatedly denied that her proposal was a “campaign gimmick.” - She need not have done so.
Webster’s Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Etngli$k Language defines a gimmick, in addition to being a device used to rig gambling tables, as "a novel or unconventional approach to a problem.” Roget’s theeaurue supplies such synonyms as “aid,” “fortor” and Instrument” when the word is used to describe a means toward an end.
None of these meanings are exactly aha or inappropriate in their perfectly legitimate application to politics. Indeed, the politician who foils to take advantage of novel ideas, unconventional approaches, aids, factors and instruments favorable to his or her candidacy probably deserves to lose the race.
It is particularly ironic that Mr. Warner should chide Mrs. Harrison for using political gimmicks of any kind. Surely he must be aware that he owes his ownelection to the Senate in 1978 to one of the most spectacularly successful gimmicks ever used in American politics. That was the constant support of his then-wife, glamourous actress Elizabeth Taylor.
Whatever Mr. Warner’s abilities may have been, and he has Since demonstrated that they are ftitritidable, political observers ara'uianhnous in their view that Mb. Taylor's assistance ac
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