Bob Dole

WASHINGTON -- For the Republican Party, this is the time for agonizing contemplation of what might have been. It is apparent -- with 20-20 hindsight, of course -- that almost any Republican candidate other than Bob Dole could have defeated President Clinton in the 1996 election.The circumstances for the president were clearly auspicious. No crisis anywhere in the world is endangering the lives of American boys. The economy is thriving, and Americans are more optimistic than they have been at any time in the last four years.

BOB DOLE NEVER convinced voters that he wanted something more profound than a personal trophy. At times it was painful to watch this respected elder strip himself of so much -- his reserve, his old beliefs, his sense of privacy and humor -- for his ambition.Ex-candidates, like ex-presidents of countries and companies, says Jeff Sonnenfeld, director of Emory's CEO College and author of ''The Hero's Farewell,'' lead a life of action. The CEO in unwilled retirement, the political lion in winter, faces ''the trauma of a lot of time, the abyss of insignificance.

In winning his re-election bid Tuesday, President Clinton captured nine of Maryland's 24 jurisdictions, including four Eastern Shore counties he lost in 1992.Clinton maintained a 16 percent margin over Republican Bob Dole -- the same spread he enjoyed over President George Bush in 1992, which that year was second only to that in his home state of Arkansas.The president swept Maryland in Tuesday's election with 54 percent of the vote, compared with Dole's 38 percent. Reform Party candidate Ross Perot ran third, with 7 percent of the vote, while the other lesser-known candidates split the remaining difference.

WASHINGTON -- Bob Dole tapped his forehead with his left index finger to identify the mastermind of his 96-hour "campaignathon" -- and of all the other imaginative tactics that marked his race for the White House.But, as Dole acknowledged aboard his campaign plane in the wee hours Saturday, those tactics earned him only slight and fleeting gains in opinion polls. They were no substitute for a well-crafted strategy that insiders say should have been unfolding by April, when the campaign instead went silent for weeks.

RUSSELL, Kan. -- Some thought the presidential library should be near the boyhood home, while others fancied sites near the county courthouse.Either way, weary travelers on Interstate 70 would pull off in Russell, to visit "Bob Dole Country." They'd hear how the 43rd president of the United States grew up humble. International scholars would peruse his official papers.This was the dream that Russell shared with Bob Dole, until it was shattered last night."In Russell you've got BD and AD -- Before Dole and After Dole," said Dean Banker, a Russell clothier.

SAN DIEGO -- In Omaha, Bob Dole performed an imitation of Bill Clinton trying to smoke marijuana. Later, in Sioux Falls, he was making faces and trotting out phrases like "hokey-hokey."By the time the 73-year-old Republican nominee landed in Las Vegas, the 10th appearance in 10 states since he had last had a chance to shower and shave, Dole was clearly worn and sleep-deprived. (Although one might say he looked better than Wayne Newton, the cosmetically altered Vegas showman who stood near his side.

In the final days of the least memorable presidential campaign since Taft beat Bryan (campaign slogan: Why not elect a fat guy for a change?), it finally gets interesting.The tenor of the campaign changes when Bob Dole, in desperation, asks Ross Perot to give up the race. Perot goes on Larry King to call the request "weird." And then Perot, who hates to be out-weirded, demands that Bill Clinton and his whole draft-dodgin', pot-smokin', money-stashin' staff resign, ya see. Now, kin Ah finish talkin' here?

ALTHOUGH THE nation's journalists did not exactly win the hearts of voters, give the press a B to B-plus for its 1996 campaign coverage. Of course, Bob Dole would make them stay after school to write, "I must be fair to Republicans" a hundred times on the blackboard.The media kept us better informed than ever about the candidates' background, and the issues on Americans' minds. Horse coverage shrank, but mostly because there wasn't a horse race. Instead, the press blanketed campaign funding and TV ad campaigns.

AH! THE PIETY of it all. As the most heavily financed election ($1.6 billion) in history draws to its close, the voters are treated to the spectacle of Bill Clinton and Bob Dole pleading for campaign finance reform. It comes close to the old joke of "stop me before I kill." Only worse. These are two politicians who have made a killing in their last race for public office and now propose that the cops move in on their successors.True to form, President Clinton is more brazen and Senator Dole more clumsy in trying to deal with the only issue that is making a real impact on fed-up voters.

ASHLAND, Ohio -- Two former Republican presidents joined Bob Dole in challenging President Clinton's fitness for office yesterday as the GOP standard-bearer barnstormed the nation's heartland on the first leg of a grueling 96-hour sprint to the election day wire."