CAMPAIGN WATCH : Yo, Kids

It was good to see Bill Clinton on MTV the other night. Even without his sax. Musician Clinton has shown that he can carry a tune, but if he’s to carry the country in November he’s going to need a good share of the so-called youth vote--a block of Americans that make up much of MTV’s audience.

People 18 to 24 years old haven’t had much of an impact on presidential politics. “It’s not in my space,” one teen-ager said during the Clinton telecast in explaining why she didn’t vote in this month’s California primary.

The people who run MTV aren’t exactly brain-dead; after an inauspicious start in 1981, the music-television network became one of the electronic-media success stories of our time. On Tuesday the network showed some of the creative thinking that underlies that success. As part of its “Choose or Lose” election coverage, MTV allocated 90 minutes to the Arkansas governor, who fielded pointed questions on topics not discussed often enough in this campaign--ranging from AIDS to health care to the national deficit.

It was a very worthwhile effort by MTV. The network has extended similar invitations to President Bush and Ross Perot.

Like it or not, MTV is as permanent a part of mainstream TV as any element. It has its detractors; but it is innovative and, more to the point, young people watch it. Unfortunately, many watch little besides popular TV shows or read anything longer than a CD lyric sheet. But if MTV can turn young people on to politics, it may turn them on to other media too.