Exit, stage right?

0 Comments | Insight on the News, June 21, 1999 | by Catherine Edwards, | Eli Lehrer, | Jennifer G. Hickey

Best known for his plaid "I am of the people" shirts and his use of an illustrative exclamation point, Lamar! Alexander may soon be known as the first candidate to withdraw from the 2000 presidential race.

Now news alert! has learned from a Republican source that several staffers recently have been shopping their resumes around town in anticipation of Alexander's departure. The source says that the job-searching by Lamar!'s campaign staffers may mean the man who has been in full campaign drive since the end of the 1996 campaign will be heading out to pasture in the next few weeks.

Many political analysts placed Alexander -- who is joined by publisher Steve Forbes as an alumnus of the 1996 presidential race -- in the second tier of Republican hopefuls, but stressed his impressive grass-roots organization in Iowa. In 1996, the former Tennessee governor finished third in both the Iowa and New Hampshire primaries. Having tossed out his Paul Bunyan shirt in favor of the less hokey attire of a suit and tie, Alexander has held steady in the polls and has been one of the few GOP candidates willing to attack Texas Gov. George W. Bush -- taking him to task for the governor's description of "compassionate conservatism."