http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/p...nusa02007.html
Gloves come off in fight for key states
Matthew Campbell, Pittsburgh
AFTER lurking reluctantly behind the front line, President Bill Clinton will march into America's election battle this week to launch a rare, personal attack against the Republican candidate with the aim of heightening doubts about his qualifications for high office on the eve of voting.
Clinton, who loves nothing better than the cut and thrust of an election fight, is planning to portray George W Bush, the Republican governor of Texas, as a man of "no ideas and little experience[like running Arkansas is bigger deal than running Texas ]".
According to White House sources, he will warn that Bush would reverse the prosperity America has come to enjoy over the past eight years.
His offensive against the son of the president he put out of office reflects a growing frustration among Democrats at the inability of Al Gore, the vice-president, to neutralise Bush as the day of reckoning approaches. The latest polls gave the Republican a slight lead over Gore with nine days to go before voting on November 7.
Clinton's last-minute intervention may also promote the eerie sensation that history is repeating itself.
Although former president George Bush is not expected to appear on the campaign trail this week, he has said it is hard to restrain himself from attacking Clinton. He once warned that he would "get personal" if Clinton ever jabbed at his son.
Until recently, both sides had kept a tight rein on invective. The election has suddenly turned nasty, however, over inflammatory telephone calls to voters by allies of Gore and provocative television advertisements by supporters of Bush.
Deployment of the biggest Democratic gun on the stump in California and other states follows criticism of Gore for not letting Clinton step in. Insisting that he is running as his "own man", the vice-president has studiously kept Clinton at bay for fear of being tied to his well-documented failings.
Even while letting the president loose in relatively safe Democrat states, Gore has insisted he steer clear of battlegrounds such as Michigan and Pennsylvania.
Polling there shows he might alienate swing voters who revile him for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky, the former White House trainee.
The number of such "toss-up" states has increased in recent days and Gore has been confronting a worrying dilemma. If undecided voters believe him to be more qualified than Bush, as one survey concluded last week, why are they not pledging allegiance?
The truth is that personality, not policies, is shaping the battle to succeed Clinton.
"A lot of people like Bush but they don't respect him," said Richard Green, a political consultant. "And a lot of people respect Gore but they don't like him."
Gore has struggled hard to be likeable, while admitting he will never be the "most exciting" politician on the planet. In a bizarre moment reminiscent of Clinton's revelation that he preferred briefs to boxer shorts, the vice-president suffered the indignity of being asked by a chat show host last week whether he preferred women in lace or leather lingerie. "Lace," he ventured, between clenched teeth.
If only, sighed one aide, he could be consistent, instead of overly eager to please each crowd by dishing up what he thinks is most likely to win their approval.
On Thursday up popped "Evangelist Al", a fiery, passionate figure who literally shouted his 45-minute speech at a crowd in Madison, Wisconsin. The vice-president's sermon was well received: incorporating pledges to protect the environment, it was clearly targeted at supporters of Ralph Nader, the Green party candidate.
In the mountains of West Virginia the next day, Gore had undergone another metamorphosis. Here was "Farmer Al" from nearby Tennessee. With the heavy southern twang that creeps into his speeches whenever he is campaigning below the Mason-Dixon line, the boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland, he told a group of coal miners that he was a local.
To groans from aides envisaging a revival of complaints about his propensity to embroider the truth, he said he had spent "many a Saturday night in a small courthouse filling out forms related to black lung", a common and unpleasant ailment among miners.
That afternoon, it was yet another Gore who, to the strains of a Bach partita, strutted onto the stage of a theatre in a quiet, solidly Democratic suburb of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This was the legendary "Internet Al", the technologically minded cyber buff with a computerised personal organiser strapped to his waist and a brain bulging with ideas for promoting the information era.
"Today," he said, unhitching his palm pilot and holding it up to the crowd, "there is more computer power in this palm pilot than in the space ship that took Neil Armstrong to the moon."
He marvelled at a "new age of innovation and discovery" and promised tax credits to prompt internet companies into doing yet more research and development.
This is the Gore that Bush loves to mimic. "How many of you own a rooftop photovoltaic system?" the Texan asked a crowd in a school gym in central Florida last week, mocking the Democrat's proposal to give tax credits to homeowners who install solar panels for electricity.
Just as Gore desperately needs Pennsylvania, Bush knows he must win Florida's 25 electoral votes. Yet even though Jeb, his "big little brother", as he kept calling him last week, is governor, things have not gone according to plan. One poll put Gore two points ahead in the Sunshine State last week.
If it were a matter of confidence alone, Bush would already have secured the White House. He concludes each speech by imagining the happy day of his inauguration early next year and the act of putting his hand on the Bible to swear to uphold the laws of the land "and the honour and the integrity of the office to which I have been elected, so help me God".
The implied dig at Clinton's failure to live up to that standard never fails to win tumultuous applause.
In private Bush apparently displays even greater conviction that the job is his. While he and Laura, his wife, were having dinner with friends in Texas last weekend, Jenna, one of their teenage daughters, arrived home with three young male guests.
"Hey, boys," Bush called across the room. "Come over here and meet the next president of the United States."
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Bill Clinton-OYE..'nuff said.
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