QUAYLE SAYS PEROT MAY BE MAJOR RIVAL

Vice President Dan Quayle said yesterday that Texas billionaire Ross Perot may be the major competition in the presidential race.

"If he continues to go up (in the polls) he could possibly replace Bill Clinton as our primary opposition," Mr. Quayle said on ABC television's "Good Morning America" program.

"That would be a very interesting dynamic if, in fact, a third-party candidate, somebody who has never run for office before, someone who has no political party, becomes the president's main opposition this fall," Quayle said.

But he said that Perot might wind up like Illinois Rep. John Anderson who in 1980 started out in a burst of favorable publicity and polls, but was swamped by Ronald Reagan in the general election.