‘Electability’ Issue Hinders Tsongas : Campaign: Democratic rivals praise him, but voters question whether he can win the White House. Aides say he will try to present a forceful image.

Now comes the tough sell for Paul E. Tsongas, the no frills, low pizazz candidate for President, the tortoise in a field of hares.

For the better part of a year, the former Democratic senator from Massachusetts has traveled from town to village in this state, delivering a tough-minded recipe for economic recovery to a recession-battered public. Even his Democratic opponents lavish praise on him.

But then comes the rub: Is Tsongas, with his plaintive voice and sometimes deferential presence, presidential? Is he, to put it bluntly, electable? Doubt is implicit in the query thrown at Tsongas after a well-received speech to a few dozen Concord environmentalists.

“Who of your Democratic competitors,” a man wanted to know, “would you be willing to serve with as running mate?”

Tsongas tossed back a swift rejoinder: “At some point, I will interview them all as my running mate.” But the question cut to the heart of Tsongas’ dilemma.

He has less than four weeks to convince voters here that he should be at the top of the ticket and not the bottom, that he has not only the answers but the undefinable charisma to lead a nation out of the dismal reaches of recession.

Tsongas’ position is familiar. During the 1988 Democratic presidential primaries, then-Gov. Bruce Babbitt of Arizona was similarly star-crossed, praised for his proposals but ultimately damned to defeat by his inability to triumph on television.

“My heart goes out to Paul Tsongas,” said Babbitt’s campaign manager, Fred DuVal. “It all sounds so hauntingly familiar.”

Like Babbitt, Tsongas, 50, is blunt and his positions are contrary to traditional Democratic thought. Like Babbitt, he contends that substance should matter more than style.

But Tsongas’ campaign acknowledges that voters have increasingly begun to question whether he has what it takes to win the nomination and the presidency. Mindful, Tsongas intends to present a more forceful visage to voters in coming weeks, according to campaign aides.

Commercials meant to underscore Tsongas’ leadership are running on New Hampshire television--although, tellingly, the voice heard in the ads is a narrator’s, not the candidate’s.

Before last Sunday’s televised debate, he imported a media coach and turned out a credible performance that included an impassioned defense of himself.

“In 10 months of campaigning, never once has any pollster, pundit, business person or economist said to me that somebody else has a better economic plan--never once,” he told viewers. “That should mean something. . . . People say, ‘He’s not a movie star.’ I admit that. I plead guilty. I mean, my dog knows that. That’s not the point.”

Right now, Tsongas is stubbornly holding on in the polls, ranking either alongside or closely behind Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton in a series of recent surveys. He has consistently outpolled three other Democrats, Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey, Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin and former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr.

Although opponents contend that Tsongas’ supporters will move to someone more charismatic as the primary nears, his aides maintain that his support is firmer than anyone else’s in this largely undecided state. But they agree that he has to forcefully confront criticisms of his style.

“We understand that it is incumbent upon him to project a different image,” said Tsongas spokeswoman Peggy Connolly. “He has to get through the filter of the media. . . . Once there’s a perception out there, it’s hard to shake it.”

As Connolly implied, Tsongas is frustrated that reporters covering his campaign have focused on his stylistic shortcomings. But one media analyst sympathetic to Tsongas notes that a compelling presence is, in fact, part of being President.

Although he can appear subdued, even whiny, on television, Tsongas projects a much more compelling figure in person. To underscore his assertion that he is a strong leader, he frequently invokes his diagnosis of cancer, which prompted him to leave the Senate in 1984. His doctors say that his lymphoma was eradicated by a bone-marrow transplant and that Tsongas is in good health.

“I’m not afraid,” he said the other day after a woman asked whether he would stand up to special interests. “There’s no interest group, no lobby, there’s no power that is more of a threat to me than cancer.”

His campaign until recently has been dominated by discussions of his economic plan, which is enclosed in an 85-page book that he hands out to all within reach. He favors a capital gains tax cut for long-term investment, accelerated spending on transportation systems and tax credits for research and investment, among other things. He opposes a middle-class tax cut and the harsh trade rhetoric favored by most of his Democratic opponents.

This week, Tsongas moved to broaden his appeal by appearing with environmentalists who heralded his past support, including his authorship of the 1984 Alaska Lands Act that set aside 104.3 million acres of forests and parklands. On Thursday, the League of Conservation Voters praised Tsongas for his environmental record.

“I find it interesting that people talk about leadership,” Tsongas said pointedly. “That’s leadership. It’s not the words; it’s what you’ve done.”

Neither voters nor many political strategists are ruling out Tsongas in New Hampshire, where he has many advantages. He is from neighboring Massachusetts, he has spent more time in New Hampshire than any of his competitors and he has a coherent and consistent message on the subject most important to voters here: the economy.

And many voters who meet Tsongas tend to appreciate him for the very thing that prompts others to fault him.

“He doesn’t talk like a politician. He doesn’t look like a politician,” said Jack Donnelly, whose Pembroke, N.H., modular-home manufacturing firm Tsongas visited recently.

“That’s the kind of guy who wins this sort of thing.”

Former Gov. Babbitt suggests that if Tsongas runs well in New Hampshire, he will have a “second chance” to impress voters.

Tsongas himself concedes that without a strong showing in the primary here, his campaign is over. Still, he confidently points to his electoral record.

“I’ve been in six elections. I was never supposed to win, always written off, the same kind of criticism,” he said. “But when the smoke cleared, I won.”