Bush Rolls Up His Sleeves for Labor Day Campaigning : Politics: President is using long weekend for a seven-state tour designed to highlight his programs. Health care is ‘Republican issue,’ he says.

From a German-style pancake breakfast to a mountain-town apple festival, President Bush on Saturday set forth on a seven-state Labor Day weekend swing with a message intended to give a more substantive cast to his reelection campaign.

At the breakfast in Painesville, Ohio, Bush laid claim to health care as “a Republican issue.”

“This is what the election is about: Who’s got the good ideas and who’s got some lousy ones,” he said. “We’ve got the good ideas on health care. (The Democrats) have the wrong ones.”

After his appearance in Ohio--currently viewed as one of the key swing states in the election--Bush went on to accept a longstanding invitation from a North Carolina couple to sit down with their little girls and “tell them what you’ve done for them.”

While focusing on his own programs, the President continued his hard-edged assault on Democratic challenger Bill Clinton. Responding to criticism of the way he has doled out federal largess in the last week, Bush noted angrily that it was Clinton who was labeled a “pander bear” by former Sen. Paul E. Tsongas (D-Mass.) when the two were vying for the Democratic nomination earlier this year.

And at an airport rally in Greenville, S.C., he said Clinton--despite being endorsed Friday by the Sierra Club--was “struggling with the worst environmental record in the world.”

The jumble of appeals reflected some of the dilemmas faced by Bush’s reelection team. As the campaign races toward its post-Labor Day high gear, advisers acknowledge that the President must still find ways to spell out the themes that might win back wavering supporters.

At the same time, Bush must confront doubts stirred both by his foe’s attacks and a recent flurry of economic bad news. As he arrived in Ohio on his way to Painesville, for instance, the banner headline of the Cleveland Plain Dealer newspaper concluded that the nation was “Mired in an Economic Rut.”

At the self-styled Oktoberfest breakfast in Painesville, Bush was clearly determined to call new attention to the health care proposals he put forward last February, as well as to draw contrasts between them and a Clinton-backed initiative that the President said would “put government in charge of health care.”

He told a pancake-and-bratwurst-fed crowd of about 2,000: “This year, you watch, health care is going to be a Republican issue.”

Both candidates have vowed to address the inadequacies of a health care system that has left 30 million Americans without health insurance, and their proposals--as far as they have been defined--differ in significant ways.

Among other measures, Bush has called for tax credits and deductions to help low- and middle-income families buy health insurance on their own. He has proposed reforms in the insurance market and other changes to help drive down health care costs.

By contrast, Clinton has endorsed a “play-or-pay” system that requires employers to either provide health insurance to their employees or pay to enlist them in a government program. He has said he would cap health care costs by limiting the amount the federal government would pay.

The Clinton-backed plan stops short of a nationalized health care system. But Bush contended that the Democratic proposal would ultimately achieve the same result and that it could only be financed through higher payroll taxes.

“This ‘play-or-pay’ is no different from nationalized health care,” Bush said. “And I’m tempted to call it ‘pay and pay and pay again.’ ”

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Bush’s visit later in the day to the modest Asheville, N.C., home of the Roy Harris family came about after Harris visited the White House earlier this year as part of an audience that questioned the President in a forum broadcast by CBS News. Harris had asked whether Bush would be willing to explain his policies to his two young daughters.

It was unclear exactly what Bush told the two girls--Stacy, 8, and Lisa, 5--but he said as their private meeting began that he intended to share with them and their parents “the views I have on education, family, community itself.”

After the stops in Ohio, South Carolina and North Carolina, Bush ended his day in Louisville, Ky., where he was to spend the night and then campaign in the morning. He is also scheduled to campaign today and Monday in Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin.