Another 1988? Democrats Are Counting on the Differences : Campaign: The race looks much as it did the summer Bush took on Dukakis. But a bleak economy and pessimistic voters make Clinton a tougher opponent.

Two words dampen the enthusiasm of many Democrats luxuriating in Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton’s huge lead in the polls over President Bush.

Michael Dukakis.

Four years ago, Dukakis--like Clinton--came roaring out of a Democratic National Convention with a seemingly insurmountable lead over Bush, the soon-to-be Republican nominee. Then Bush plucked James A. Baker III out of the Cabinet to revive his flagging campaign, carved up his Democratic foe with a series of devastating attacks, regained the lead over him following a stirring acceptance speech at the Republican Convention in August and cruised to a comfortable victory in November.

Could history repeat itself in 1992?

There’s no shortage of surface similarities. Bush once again is turning to Baker, who reportedly soon will leave his position as secretary of state to take control of the reelection campaign. And Republicans are banking on many of the same arguments that proved effective four years ago--portraying Clinton as an unsuccessful governor and a liberal hiding behind moderate rhetoric.

But among leaders in both parties, the sense is deepening that the differences between this year and 1988 are more telling than the similarities. Even in the Bush camp, there’s a solidifying consensus that he faces a much steeper climb than at this point four years ago.

One sign of that is the polls themselves. After the 1988 Democratic Convention, Dukakis’ largest margin over Bush was 17 percentage points. Post-convention polls this year gave Clinton a lead ranging from 20 to 29 points.

Even more important than the evanescent mid-summer polls, many GOP professionals have concluded, is the fact that Bush is facing a more hostile economic environment and a more resilient and resourceful opponent, one who knows how to take a punch and deliver one back.

Analysts in both parties expect the gap in the polls between the two men to tighten. But there’s little disagreement about the magnitude of the challenge confronting Bush as he tries to once again pass on the backstretch.

“It is going to take a huge, Gargantuan effort to pull this off,” says one GOP consultant working with the Bush campaign.

Here is a comparison of this campaign’s dynamics and conditions that produced Bush’s successful comeback in 1988:

DARK MOOD: The main reason for the current pessimism in GOP circles is the pessimism in the country, particularly over the economy. Four years ago, a growing sense of satisfaction with the country’s basic direction boosted Bush; this year a persistent undertow of anxiety is dragging him down.

With unemployment declining slightly through 1988--it stood at 5.7% in January; 5.3% in November--Americans displayed increasing optimism about the nation’s direction through the campaign season. By November, the number of people who believed the country was moving in the right direction roughly equaled those who thought it was off on the wrong track, according to surveys by GOP pollster Richard B. Wirthlin.

The rise in optimism on that basic question anticipated Bush’s own ascent in the polls. Once voters’ anxieties about the country’s basic direction were muted, so was their hunger for change, says Susan Estrich, Dukakis’ campaign manager.

This year, with economic growth sluggish and unemployment rising--it hit 7.8% in June, the highest figure since March, 1984--voters are more dissatisfied with the country’s basic course than at any point during the 1988 campaign.

In the latest Wirthlin survey, taken just before the recent Democratic Convention, 79% of those polled said the nation was on the wrong track; just 15% said it was moving in the right direction. Absent an unexpectedly dramatic economic turnaround, few analysts foresee major improvement in those numbers.

That’s bad news for Bush. Historically, Wirthlin has calculated, about three-fourths of those who believe the country is moving in the right direction vote for the incumbent President or the incumbent’s party; about two-thirds who think the country is on the wrong track vote against him. Right now, that arithmetic gives Bush about 40% of the vote.

INCUMBENCY: Another key difference many see between this year and 1988 is that races involving a sitting President tend to revolve more around assessments of the incumbent than the challenger.

That’s a stark contrast from four years ago, when Bush nimbly shifted the focus onto Dukakis, painting him as a cultural elitist too risky to trust. Republicans hope to do the same with Clinton.

“The overarching battle is to make the debate about whose leadership we can trust rather than about change,” says GOP consultant David Carmen.

But diverting focus from the Oval Office won’t be easy. And another public opinion trend is working against Bush: Since pollsters began measuring such sentiment in the ‘40s, no President has won reelection while a majority of the public disapproved of his performance.

In the latest Gallup/CNN Poll, taken July 24-26, only 32% approved of Bush’s job performance while 59% disapproved. As Stanford University political scientist Richard A. Brody notes, that puts Bush in territory reminiscent of former President Jimmy Carter, who labored under approval ratings that ranged between 31% and 37% in the months before he was routed by Reagan in 1980.

TOUGHER FOE: Analysts in both parties agree that Clinton may not be as vulnerable to GOP assaults as Dukakis.

For instance, as a supporter of the death penalty and a work requirement for welfare recipients, Clinton presents less of a liberal profile than Dukakis on the polarizing cultural issues that crushed the Massachusetts governor.

Clinton and his campaign also have shown themselves more willing to counterpunch than the inexplicably inert Dukakis. Clinton already is pursuing an aggressive strategy of not only responding immediately to attacks, but attempting to defuse them by anticipating and then dismissing them himself.

Bush’s campaign, meanwhile, seems less purposeful than four years ago. Then, with campaign manager Lee Atwater and media consultant Roger Ailes honing the lacerating message, Bush regained control of the campaign debate almost immediately after the Democratic Convention. Since then, Atwater has died and Ailes withdrawn from a daily role.

Clinton still has many hurdles to cross, Democrats concede. Even though some voters have apparently worked through concerns about his personal problems, the public knows relatively little about his record in Arkansas, which Republicans hope to target. Even some insiders worry that Clinton may have left himself open to GOP efforts to portray him as a “tax and spend” liberal by proposing a four-year, $150-billion tax hike to pay for his ambitious domestic agenda, although Bush diminished his own credibility on the issue by raising taxes in 1990.

Most important, some party strategists note that despite his giddy lead in the national surveys, Clinton faces the same problem as any Democratic nominee: breaking the GOP stranglehold on Southern and Western states in presidential campaigns and amassing the 270 electoral votes needed for victory.

But the 34 percentage point lead Clinton posted this week in a Field Poll survey of California--the core of the GOP electoral “lock” since 1968--suggests that even traditional regional advantages will not save Bush unless he can reverse the national tide. “Unless you can develop a compelling case for the incumbent,” insists Stanley B. Greenberg, Clinton’s pollster, “change wins out in the end.”

Barometers of Discontent

Four years ago, then-Vice President George Bush benefited from both a rising sense of optimism about the nation’s course and general public approval of Ronald Reagan’s performance as President. This year, both conditions are reversed, with voters extraordinarily pessimistic about the nation’s direction and critical of Bush’s performance. The following table shows the percentage of voters saying the country was moving in the right direction and the percentage approving of the President’s job performance, in surveys conducted by Richard Wirthlin during both election years.

Source: The Wirthlin Group