When Negative Campaigning Finally Fails : Election: On Thursday, voters pressed home the point that they want to know what the candidates propose to do. Bush had little to say.

Negative campaigning isn’t working any more, at least not for George Bush. Four years ago, he questioned his opponent’s character and patriotism, hammered at the trust issue and said virtually nothing about what he’d do as President. And it worked. Now, running the same campaign, the President is miserably far behind. The difference isn’t just that Bill Clinton has fought back more effectively, although he surely has. It’s that America in 1992 wants more, and better, and the President hasn’t got the goods.

People always say they hate negative campaigning. Candidates ignore them because, no matter what they say, voters tend to be moved by negative information about the other guy. That is what the Republicans were counting on last week. Their theme was that you can’t trust Clinton. He went to Russia 23 years ago, organized anti-war demonstrations at Oxford, changed his position on abortion and plans to raise taxes. Can you trust him to be President?

The effort began with Bush’s appearance on the Larry King Show, continued in the first debate and climaxed in Tuesday’s vice-presidential brawl. The President’s strategists sent him into Thursday night’s debate ready to follow in Dan Quayle’s footsteps--until the voters asking questions stopped him in his tracks and frustrated the GOP game plan.

The Richmond, Va., questioners are not the only ones turned off by these personal attacks. This year, every single poll is telling the same story: The Republican attacks are not moving voters.

They aren’t working for two reasons. First, while many Americans do have their doubts about Clinton, they’re sure they don’t trust the President. He lied about taxes; probably lied about Iran-Contra, and almost certainly hasn’t told the full story of what he knew and didn’t know, and did and didn’t do, with respect to the arming of Saddam Hussein.

More important, far-fetched rumors about Clinton having contact with the KGB, and even facts about his anti-war activities in England, just can’t compete with the economy in most voters’ minds. Refighting the Vietnam War is a luxury when you’re barely making ends meet. Rumor-mongering by a President is never attractive, but Ronald Reagan could get away with making jokes about Michael S. Dukakis’ mental health four years ago--thus turning an unfounded Republican rumor into front-page news--because unemployment was at a nine-year low. When Bush goes on national TV to repeat Rep. Robert K. Dornan’s late-night ramblings about Clinton’s college travels, he underlines how little he has to say about what really matters.

So it was not surprising that, when the voters got their chance to ask the candidates questions Thursday night, they had no interest in the rumors, no interest in the Vietnam War, no interest in any of the character issues that the Bush campaign has emphasized. They wanted to know about jobs and health care, the deficit, Social Security, education and kids. Indeed, the early questioners were so explicit in their dislike for the negative tone of this campaign that they insisted the candidates “take the pledge” to be positive. It was Clinton’s best moment, and the President’s worst. Stripped of his attack points, the President had nothing to say. He seemed like a man desperate to be somewhere else--even looking at his watch several times.

As Thursday made plain, the President is out of step with the 1992 electorate. Four years ago, when things were going well, attack points were all he needed. This year, the President needs a positive message, and he doesn’t have one. He has yet to tell the voters what went wrong with the U.S. economy, why it took his Administration so long to recognize and what they will do to stimulate the economy the next time around. He’s clear on what’s wrong with the Clinton approach (tax and spend, liberal, liberal) but not what he has to offer.

Last Sunday night, Bush announced that, in a second term, James A. Baker III would take over domestic policy and the old team would go. A big speech discussing this was supposed to come on Friday--delivered by Baker. After the uniformly lukewarm response to the Baker announcement, the speech was canceled. Now it appears there’ll be no major address by anyone. Certainly, Bush had nothing to add Thursday night.

Given the state of the economy, it’s not clear that Bush could say anything that would win this election for him. But it certainly should be closer than this. Had he taken control of the economy a year ago, instead of playing golf and downplaying the recession, this would be a real race. A different kind of State of the Union, with a clear, pointed, positive approach, and solid follow-up with the Congress, might have given Americans the sense that at least we were beginning to change course.

Even as late as the GOP convention, Bush could have turned this race at least part-way around with an acceptance speech that explained what was broken and what it would take from all of us to fix it. Instead, the President and his team figured the easy route would work again, that they could get away with talking about Clinton’s failures instead of their own--that if they poked enough holes in his plan, they wouldn’t need one of their own. They were wrong.

Clinton and Al Gore have hardly been choirboys in this campaign. They’ve engaged in more than their share of negative attacks. The Democrats’ punching and counterpunching have certainly helped to neutralize the Republicans’ attacks, but it’s not, ultimately, why the Clinton-Gore team is poised to win. Sometimes, at greater length than we’d like, Clinton has put forth a plan for the future. That--and greater experience with the Oprah-like format--is why he did so well Thursday, and why he’s winning the election. There are 12 points on the economy, four on education and five on health care. There’s a welfare plan, a jobs plan and a new covenant.

Americans certainly don’t know all the details--sometimes it has seemed that there are too many details. But there is a sense, at least, of a positive vision for the country. These two talk about change. Our lives might be better. At their best, Clinton and Gore are offering a frightened America a gleam of hope and possibility. Bush has yet to do that. After last week, he’s running out of chances.