Baker Gives Bush Campaign Shot in Arm : Politics: Staff members say his presence has given once-floundering operation a new sense of direction.

Call it the “Baker effect,” although it may be as much illusion as reality: former Secretary of State James A. Baker III has barely unpacked his bags at the White House, but staff members say his presence has already injected a new sense of direction into a once-floundering operation.

Monday’s decision to scramble President Bush to hurricane-ravaged South Florida in time to be filmed for the evening news was made in record time for this sometimes-stodgy Administration. Baker’s phalanx of policy aides, imported from the State Department, are scouring the bureaucracy for new policy ideas to try to seize the campaign initiative. At Bush campaign headquarters, some staff members have even begun coming to work at 7 a.m. to keep up with the accelerated pace.

“There has been a real change in the atmosphere,” said Torie Clarke, the campaign’s spokeswoman. “You can feel a real step up in the intensity.”

Other Bush aides say the new urgency isn’t Baker’s doing, but the effect of the real beginning of the campaign after last week’s Republican Convention.

“Baker and his people haven’t really begun running the place,” said one mid-level aide. “They’re still taking stock, still trying to figure out where to start.”

And the main policy initiative that Baker has backed, the tax cut Bush proposed at the convention last week, has drawn as much criticism as praise--including some complaints from conservative economists.

But the psychological impact of Baker’s arrival on campaign morale appears real.

Campaign insiders point to three places in which the former secretary of state has made a difference merely by arriving.

One is the White House’s new-found ability to make tactical moves on short notice.

“It’s already clearly more dynamic and quicker at making decisions,” said Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), once a critic of the White House operation.

A case in point, several aides said, was Monday’s quick decision to send Bush to Miami from a campaign stop in Connecticut without the usual preparation for presidential trips.

“In the past, there would have been a thousand reasons not to go,” one official said. “But Baker just basically said, ‘Do it.’ ”

After the Los Angeles riots last spring, Bush and his aides debated for days before finally deciding to visit the city--long after Democratic candidate Bill Clinton. By scrambling, Bush arrived in Miami in time for live coverage on the local news in a state that is one of the election’s key battlegrounds.

A second area where Baker’s presence has been felt is in tighter lines of authority in both the White House and the campaign. “There used to be endless meetings that often reached no conclusions,” one Republican operative said.

Baker, who managed Bush’s successful 1988 campaign, appears intent on running the presidential staff the same way he ran the State Department for the last three years: through a small, close-knit team of personal aides.

He moved his entire State Department inner circle into the White House.

A third area where Baker’s impact has apparently been felt is in policy initiatives. Campaign aides say they want Bush to announce a series of new policy ideas to “take the offensive,” but the pre-Baker White House was better at holding up proposals than at pushing them.

This week’s proposal for a job-retraining program to help workers displaced by technological change was an example, officials said, although the decision to announce it was made last week, before Baker formally moved.

“We’ve been working on the program for months, but the obstacles were cleared away only last week,” said one official.

Baker’s most important effect, however, may not be easily measurable: the essential task of focusing his candidate on a single, consistent, steady message--something George Bush has not always done well.

Officials say Baker, a Bush tennis partner, friend and aide for 35 years, is one of the few men who can talk tough to the President--and keep his eye on the ball.

“The first thing he did was to cancel all the meetings,” one Bush aide said. In place of four daily White House meetings that were often large and unwieldy, Baker intends to hold only two high-level sessions each day.

White House officials said the attendance list at the meetings will be the key to who wields power in the newly remade White House.

The main daily meeting, at 7:30 a.m., will probably include Baker aides Robert B. Zoellick and Margaret Tutwiler; National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, budget director Richard G. Darman and Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater, the pillars of the remaining White House staff. The only members from the reelection team will be campaign chairman Robert M. Teeter and campaign manager Frederic V. Malek.

An evening meeting may shrink to only two participants, Baker and Teeter.