Bush Complains Rival Is Unfair and Unknown

Drawing stark new contrasts between himself and his Democratic rival, President Bush on Thursday began a full-fledged effort to paint Bill Clinton in dark and fearsome hues.

And as he braced for cries of outrage, Bush offered a vivid allegory to complain that he was too often held to an unfair standard.

Speaking to a convention of conservative lawmakers, the incumbent likened himself to a gladiator buried up to his neck in a Roman arena while a lion--clearly Clinton--was permitted to attack at will.

If the gladiator were to take “a very ferocious bite in a very sensitive place in the lion’s anatomy,” the President suggested, the lead centurion would run into the arena screaming: “ ‘Fight fair, damn it. Fight fair.’

“Now every time I tiptoe into the water with this guy, they start yelling: ‘Negative campaigning!’ And I am going to fight back. And I am going to fight back. And I will define his record as he’s ill-defined mine.”

With the address, Bush set aside the quick-sketch tactics that have characterized his criticism of Clinton to date and devoted the first full speech of the campaign to an often-bruising comparison.

Bush charged that Clinton would implement “the largest tax increase in American history.” He said “a gulf as wide as the Grand Canyon” divided him from the Democratic nominee. And he disparaged Clinton’s “new covenant” economic plan as “simply a cover-up for some very old and tired ideas.”

“I think there’s a Trojan horse lurking in the weeds, ready to pull a fast one on the American people,” the President told the American Legislative Exchange Council. “And I simply am not ready to let that happen.”

Adopting a tone even more confrontational than usual, Bush went on to challenge both Clinton and Congress to “set politics aside” and embrace the White House’s proposals for tax cuts and a balanced-budget amendment even before the November election.

But the President confessed to having little hope that the challenge would be met. And his vow to “fight back” was tempered with signs that for all his eagerness to define Clinton, he remains somewhat ill-at-ease about how to define himself.

As he continued this week to sprinkle his speeches with references to straw men, Bush often described himself as the opposite of some ill-defined evil.

He assured veterans in Reno that he would “not let a madman get his finger on the nuclear button.” He promised that he would close “not three, not two, not one” veterans hospital.

He pledged in Colorado Springs Thursday morning to “resist the Pavlovian impulse to raise taxes at every turn.” And in discussing national security in Reno and elsewhere, he has invoked the “fundamental truism” of “peace through strength.”

Aides acknowledge privately that such cliches reflect a dilemma that is at the heart of Bush’s current troubles. So many voters remain dissatisfied with his performance that it can be politically dangerous to refer to specifics.

For example, Bush aimed perhaps his most forceful attack at Clinton Thursday for what he said was the Democrat’s support of a $150-billion tax increase over the next four years. Such a hike, he said, would be “the largest tax increase in American history,” larger even than previous Democratic nominees Walter F. Mondale and Michael S. Dukakis proposed in 1984 and 1988 combined.

The President failed to mention that the current record-holder is Bush’s own tax increase, approved in 1990. That plan, which came after Bush abandoned his “no new taxes” pledge, raised taxes by $146 billion over five years.

Clinton responded to Bush’s charges point by point Thursday, contending that his tax increase would be far smaller than Bush’s own. Clinton said his plan would amount to $5.5 billion a year, or $22 billion over four years--and that it would affect only the wealthy. Even in devoting his speech Thursday to assessing Clinton’s record, Bush seemed determined to maintain the pretense that he had not yet begun to campaign in earnest. He coyly told the crowd that he still hadn’t “even said his name in full.”

But it was evident that Bush was accelerating a timetable that had called for him to reserve such extended attacks until after the Republican Convention, which begins Aug. 17. With Clinton soaring to an unexpected lead, Bush clearly hoped to puncture his rival’s claims to be a moderate.

“My opponent is singing the same tune,” Bush charged, accusing Clinton of echoing a basic Republican message, “but the dance steps are different.”

Among thousands of federal programs, Bush noted, Clinton has identified only one that he would eliminate: “federal subsidies for honeybee farmers.”

If Bush’s address here was the most forceful of his campaign, it was complemented by far more vigorous efforts by the President himself, who has seemed in recent days to enjoy being a candidate once more.

In Reno and again in Colorado Springs Wednesday night, Bush waded into waiting crowds and did not give up the two-handed grip-and-grin until he walked the length of a security rope line. At an Air Force base, he kept up the patter even after he returned to his armored limousine, taking the vehicle’s loudspeaker in hand to announce: “I’m glad to be in Colorado.”

But the greeting he found in local newspapers in this conservative stronghold Thursday morning was markedly less enthusiastic. A new Denver Post poll that was conducted July 20-26 showed Clinton running ahead of Bush in the state by 47% to 22%.

And the local Gazette-Telegraph joined the chorus of conservative newspapers who have warned Bush on their editorial pages that his candidacy will remain in peril unless he changes course.

“Running as a me-too Republican, content with making a few minor adjustments to the status quo, will almost guarantee your defeat in November,” the newspaper said in an editorial addressed to Bush. “You might as well not run.”