Bread & circuses - Nov 1996 elections - Column

DID GOP senators agree to include mental-health benefits in the insurance bill in order to help fellow Republicans gripped by clinical depression as they contemplate November 5? Certainly, the more morose conservatives are wondering aloud if convention delegates are bound on the first ballot. (The answer is: Yes.) But even as Bill Clinton leads in the polls, Bob Dole flounders in the Senate, and Newt Gingrich retreats in the House, one Republican seems immune to the malaise afflicting his party. Haley Barbour, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, remains focused, decisive, and remarkably upbeat.

Surveying the gloomy political landscape, he asks: "What else would you expect?" Over the past year the Republican agenda has been overwhelmed by a well-funded Democratic assault. The RNC estimates that labor unions have spent $34 million, the Clinton - Gore campaign another $4 million, and the Democratic National Committee an unprecedented $19 million since last spring. And until now, the attacks have gone unanswered.

The RNC has spent only $4 million on ads, half of which focused on tax cuts and have run in the last few weeks. The GOP has fewer allies with deep pockets as a counterweight to the influence of the unions, with their compulsory membership and dues. And to make matters worse, one putative ally, the Business Roundtable, spent $10 million on lame ads last year, urging Republicans and the President to get together and pass a balanced budget. These appeals to the spirit of bi-partisanship ran while Clinton was refusing even to propose a balanced budget, and Barbour thinks they hurt the GOP more than they helped.

With the primary season over, Barbour is now getting into attack mode. In the next few weeks, the RNC will begin a $15-million "anti-Clinton" ad campaign. Republicans intend to focus on the contrast between Clinton's conservative rhetoric and his liberal record. "There's no money to do ads on a positive agenda, and given the polls, we have to bring Clinton down and win back our issues," explains a party strategist. Barbour himself, however, is convinced that a policy agenda is critical. He expects welfare, taxes, and crime to be central to the Republican message. Unfortunately, these issues no longer hurt Clinton.

Party polls find the public sees him as a centrist on welfare, crime, and the role of government. A year ago, he was seen as a liberal. "He's only changed his rhetoric, but it's working," complains a frustrated RNC staffer.

Republicans might yet tar Clinton as liberal on taxes by advancing a major tax cut. And Bob Dole's criticism of Clinton's liberal judicial appointments is intended to make it hard for the President to look tough on crime. But in the opinion of one conservative welfare expert, it may be difficult to portray Clinton as an obstacle to what had been a jewel in the GOP's crown a year ago --welfare reform.

Douglas Besharov of the American Enterprise Institute explains that the Clinton Administration has granted scores of waivers to the states to experiment with welfare reform. Under these waivers, twenty states have imposed family caps on welfare recipients and thirty states have enacted some version of time limits on welfare. This has given the President some unexpected boosters. Republican governors, while lobbying for comprehensive reform in Washington, go back home touting "dramatic" changes in state programs. "Clinton appears to the right of Dole on this issue. He has a colorable claim to have ended welfare as we know it," says Besharov.

This is a battle Clinton wins on two fronts. Swing voters are persuaded by Clinton's theft of key Republican messages. But his liberal base, knowing better, is unified and energized behind his re-election.

And by contrast, conservative voters, according to surveys, "lack intensity" in their support for Bob Dole. A GOP insider explains that Clinton's popularity is not the problem: "The problem is us. The base has to unify." This insider dismisses the view, sometimes heard from conservatives, that congressional candidates can ignore the Dole campaign and successfully go it alone.

And campaign veterans agree with him. A GOP Senate campaign strategist reports that Republican candidates are currently doing well in their individual races, but "the national environment could be a drag on our guys. This can't go on for five months." If it does, a decisive win by Clinton could cost Republicans the House, even if they enjoy local advantages in retirements and recruitments.

Haley Barbour is working to give the GOP some direction, purpose, and a steady nerve. But when it comes to the Dole campaign itself, he is little more than an observer. Nor has he taken part in congressional strategy sessions since last fall -- when he was frozen out by Bob Dole.

It was a simple clash of styles. In leadership meetings, Barbour had argued for decisive action. Insiders speculate that Dole was more comfortable postponing final decisions in order to preserve his options.