A Quote Is Born

The moment it was out of his mouth, attorney Peter Lesser knew he’d come up with a good quote. But he didn’t expect it to take on a life of its own.

The Quote was born when David Firestone, a reporter from Newsday, called Lesser to ask about Ross Perot’s 1989 crusade to defang the Dallas Police Review Board. Firestone ended his lengthy Sunday piece, in which critics charged that Perot was an autocrat, with these words from Lesser: “Ross Perot is a good person, and he’d make a great king. But I think he’d be a bad president.”

The snowball started slowly. First, an AP reporter called to ask about The Quote. Then, on April 24, TV interviewer David Frost read the quote to Perot and asked him to respond. Perot fired back that he had no idea who Lesser was. “Is he a journalist? A politician?” Frost didn’t know. (Lesser has run for mayor and district attorney in Dallas.)

“That started the ball rolling,” says Lesser, His phone began ringing. Alex Burton picked up The Quote for his WBAP radio show. Then came The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, CNN, KERA, the Los Angeles Times, The Dallas Morning News, The Washington Post, PBS-TV, WABC television in New York and National Public Radio. A mention of Lesser and the Frost interview even appeared in The New Yorker.

“Some of the people fish for the quote, and I won’t give it to them,” says Lesser. “They’ve got to ask for it.”

Other reporters are more interested in Lesser’s interaction with Perot during the politicking over the review board. During that controversy. Lesser, who supported a stronger review board, had a “cordial” 90-minute meeting with Perot. “He knows me. That David Frost thing caught him off guard.”

Lesser himself has been caught off guard by the reaction to The Quote. Since his contact with Perot has been limited, he does not present himself as an expert on the man when reporters come calling. “I don’t regret saying what I did,” Lesser says. “But I never dreamed it would get the circulation it did.”