Campaign Roundup

Ronald Reagan ended a campaign week by dipping into the Bible belt . . . gingerly. He drew limits to earlier statements on the role of religion in government and prayer in the schools. And he added a "Judeo-" in talking of Christian values.

"Since both the Christian and Judaic religions are based on the same God, the God of Moses, I'm quite sure [Jewish] prayers are heard," Reagan told the National Religious Broadcasters Association.

The audience included Jerry Falwell of Moral Majority, a Reagan supporter who recently made a statement that some regard as anti-Semitic: that God only hears the prayers of those redeemed in the faith of Jesus Christ.

Reagan also said, "Because you are professionals, I know how much you respect and strongly support -- as I do -- the separation of church and state."

In Dallas Aug. 27, Reagan had told another evangelical audience: "I think it's quite strange . . . we've interpreted separation of church and state to mean separation of state and country from religion, and I think that's wrong. We are a nation under God."m

Air Force One is merely a shadow of its former self as President Carter cuts down on his use of the $5,000-an-hour Boeing 707 for campaign trips.

Instead he is beginning to use an eight- seat executive jet -- still called Air Force One when the President is in it, but not the familiar version.

The switch in planes bespeaks the budget problems the Democrats are having in trying to keep up with Republican campaign spending. Both presidential candidates were given, and limited to, $29.4 million in federal campaign funds. But the Republicans have raised $25 million to the Democrats' $4 million on the state level for voter registration drives and similar groundwork for the presidential campaign.

John Anderson's campaign shows signs of having drawn on Ted Kennedy's public since the senator withdrew from the race.

When Anderson spoke to labor groups earlier in his campaign, he met low turnouts and ambivalent audiences.

But this past week, in his first talk to a union group since Labor Day, he got an enthusiastic reception from an audience of mostly steelworkers as he blasted Carter's economic strategies and lauded his own plans. Anderson noted many good points to the President's latest proposal to bolster the lagging steel industry, but called his timing "reprehensible" -- that is, politically motivated.

Two boosts to a lagging campaign: Arthur Schesinger Jr., a Pulitzer Prize- winning historian and a longtime Kennedy supporter, endorsed Anderson in an article in the Wall Street Journal Oct. 3. The Miami News announced its backing of the independent the same day.m

The Carter campaign doesn't get free air time to match ads for Reagan bought by independent political committees.

The Federal Elections Commission ruled against the Carter charge that the committees are not actually independent of the Reagan campaign. Both Reagan and Anderson have petitioned for equal time to respond to politically oriented presidential press conferences. Neither attempt has yet ben successful.

Reagan is accusing Carter of not showing all his cards in the Stealth controversy -- after tipping his hand in the first place.

The card in question is national security aide David Aaron.

Carter invoked executive privilege to keep Aaron from testifying before a House Armed Services subcommittee.

Retired Adm. Elmo Zumwalt, a Reagan backer, said Aaron was the source that leaked Stealth secrets to the press. White House Press Secretary Jody Powell pointed out that the reporter who broke the story said Aaron was not his source.

Reagan says Carter is "promoting government secrecy" and putting his re-election campaign ahead of the national interest.

On another front, some observers see the President emerging largely unscathed with voters as a Senate panel decided his hands were clumsy but clean in the handling of his brother Billy's Libyan connection.m