A Kinder, Gentler Bush Offensive
BARNES, FRED
A Kinder, Gentler Bush Offensive If George W. Bush were a warrior, he'd be a happy warrior. BY FRED BARNES Nashville WHEN AL GORE suddenly urged President Clinton to open up the Strategic...
...And he's also better at marketing his issues: taxes, Medicare and Social Security, the military, education...
...It's the strength of America...
...Like Bush," David said, "I too found Christ in my forties...
...Yet Bush touted his own plan without attacking Gore's on its weak points: a $600 fee, distribution of drugs through a "government-run HMO," an irrevocable decision at age 64 1/2 on whether to enter the program...
...BY FRED BARNES Nashville WHEN AL GORE suddenly urged President Clinton to open up the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, George W. Bush was rapid in responding...
...In Ohio, for instance, tracking by the state party found the ad lured undecided voters to Bush and helped raise his standing on the health care issue...
...He's hardly a gentle soul...
...It's clear, too, that Bush's two successful campaigns for governor have shaped his style...
...As he has all year, Bush ends his speeches by citing voters who show him pictures of their kids and plead with him not to let them down...
...Polls show that a Republican National Committee television spot drubbing Gore's version of a drug benefit is working...
...It happens a lot...
...All this prevents Bush from getting ferocious in his campaign barbs...
...You just pop in?'" Four days later, Bush said he'd just learned the specifics of what David had said...
...But he doesn't act as if he's gone to war with Gore...
...He says tax cuts are "the hardest sell...
...He won both while remaining genial...
...Bush spontaneously began talking to me about his faith...
...Though Bush didn't say so, I suspect he's bitten his tongue for fear of ruining relations with those countries if he becomes president...
...He'd also advocated "good strong diplomacy...
...What's slightly odd about this mild-in-the-extreme response is that Bush was criticized in the Republican primaries when a supporter of his attacked John McCain (for allegedly abandoning the cause of veterans) at a Bush press conference...
...True, but the Bush campaign probably let the press off too easily...
...An adviser said this was "shorthand" for saying Clinton and Gore are culpable for letting Mexico, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia gouge American consumers, but I doubt if anyone in Cleveland got the point...
...Were he a warrior, Bush would surely be called a happy warrior...
...He is quick off the mark, seizing opportunities to zing Gore...
...It's another to attack his religion...
...When Bush appeared in Nashville at a rally at the Vandyland Ice Cream store, he once more shied away from skewering Gore...
...They didn't do an obvious thing like organizing a press conference of priests, ministers, and rabbis to denounce the Democrats...
...My life is so intense these days that my faith becomes magnified," he said...
...What he'd said then was that, as president, he'd "remind some folks overseas who was by their side when they needed us...
...His upbringing and his Christian faith have a lot to do with this...
...It keeps things in perspective...
...driver Susan Hawk, from the Survivor TV series, to whoop enthusiastically about the tax cut she'd get in a Bush administration...
...When the chance arose to point up Gore's character problem— "This guy will say anything," Bush says—he jumped at it...
...Then, after listing what he'd do to trim gasoline prices, Bush returned to the subject at hand and talked crisply about Social Security...
...He came into my room one night, and I said: 'What, no call...
...If you ask for tolerance about a man's religion, you ought to extend it...
...It ought to be reciprocated...
...That was as far as Bush went, and his campaign didn't go much farther...
...Strategic reserves should not be used for short-term political gain at the cost of long-term national security," he said...
...And if he is right about the country, he'll win...
...Now, Gore has reversed himself just as Election Day nears, Bush noted...
...They say, 'I'm praying for you,'" Bush says...
...It's also what Bush is all about...
...Indeed, it showcased Bush's effectiveness as a campaigner...
...When I asked Bush why he hadn't hit harder, he insisted he'd been "much more outspoken" on other occasions...
...There is something missing, however, in the freshly invigorated Bush campaign: the killer instinct...
...The same thing happened in his own first race for governor of Texas in 1994...
...Only last February, Gore had strongly opposed using the reserve to ease gasoline prices...
...Instead, he promised to work with "friends and allies in OPEC to assure greater stability in energy markets...
...My comment is, religious tolerance runs both ways...
...Despite Gore's surge, he's remained quite optimistic about his chances...
...In any case, he didn't give Gore the whacking the vice president would have given him if their roles had been reversed...
...He's sharper, instantly likable, less diffuse, and more energetic...
...It's always harder for Republicans," says Ari Fleischer, Bush's deputy spokesman...
...The Cleveland episode is a product of the new, improved Bush campaign...
...There's another thing that happens along rope lines that I suspect is an even greater spur to Bush...
...He digressed from a speech on Social Security reform at a Cleveland factory on September 21 to announce that Gore was at it again, flip-flopping and pandering...
...But the main reason he wants to campaign that way again, I'm convinced, is that that's the way he is...
...And two weeks ago, Treasury secretary Larry Summers had sent the White House a memo saying it would be "a major policy mistake" to tap the reserve...
...But he doesn't like political hardball or angry confrontation...
...And after spending an hour interviewing Bush last week—as he ate lunch on a flight from Cleveland to Nashville—I'm persuaded he'll never be as fierce and relentless as some Republicans would like...
...I've never felt more comfortable in my faith...
...He doesn't whine or carp...
...This time, with the shoe on the other foot, Bush operatives assumed the press wouldn't be interested...
...It was a case of the campaign reflecting its leader...
...On Gore's oil reversal, he scarcely mentioned the egregious coddling of OPEC by the Clinton-Gore administration...
...It's one thing to attack a man's politics...
...They suggest, in 2000 anyway, that voters don't cotton to strident and confrontational candidates...
...Why not...
...Not only did McCain hold Bush responsible, so did the media...
...It's what America is all about...
...Yes, the Bush TV ads are tougher, but Bush himself isn't...
...It's America...
...Bush uses this segue into his vow to restore "honor and dignity" to the White House...
...At any rate, he is cheerful on the stump...
...No doubt polls and focus groups play a role here...
...Even when he turns negative, he's softly negative, never harsh...
...He talked about his best issue, a prescription drug benefit under Medicare...
...Nor is Bush ready to go after Gore for the sneering remarks of a Hollywood producer at a Los Angeles fundraiser on September 18, attended by Gore and running mate Joe Lieberman...
...The producer, Larry David, mocked Bush's religious faith...
...It's so comforting...
...But when he appeared on Regis Philbin's chat show the morning of the Cleveland speech, he prompted Wisconsin truck Fred Barnes is executive editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...He recently asked his chief strategist, Karl Rove, to look at the trajectory of Ronald Reagan's campaign in 1980 and was reassured to hear that Reagan peaked in late October...
Vol. 6 • October 2000 • No. 3
