Bush Cites Trust; Clinton Upbeat : Democrat: Arkansas governor basks in an emotional satellite rally from New Jersey. New polls boost confidence.

With confetti flying and spirits soaring, Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton reveled Sunday in an emotional climax to his 13-month campaign for the presidency, urging 20,000 supporters to “fight on” for another day to ensure victory.

One more day remains--one that Clinton will fill with most of a 30-hour, 4,106-mile journey to 10 states--but Sunday night’s get-out-the-vote rally in the Brendan Byrne arena here served as a symbolic conclusion, in symmetry with the Democratic National Convention that propelled him and running mate Al Gore into the general election.

“My fellow Americans, in this last year and a month, I have done everything I could to reach the heart and the mind of America,” said Clinton, his laryngitis-stricken voice rasping painfully. “I have done everything I could to make you believe that we could close the gap in this country between what is and what ought to be in the lives of every man and woman and every boy and girl in America.

“And I ask you now to remember that all the long walk is still to be consummated by Election Day . . . . I ask you to remember that there are 36 hours in which we can fight on, fight on for victory, fight on for a new future for America.”

As he spoke, his ebullient supporters chanted: “One more day!”

The night was intentionally reminiscent of the triumphant close of the convention, held just across the river in New York City in July. The same Mylar confetti fell from the ceiling, the same music blared, and Gore even took a turn dancing with his wife, Tipper, as he did during the convention.

Gore, like Clinton, spoke emotionally of the close of their quest, in remarks laced with gibes at President Bush and Vice President Dan Quayle.

“This campaign has been a long and arduous campaign but one filled with excitement and hope,” he said. “We are about to prove as a nation that nothing can stop us now.

”. . . We believe that it is time to end the division that they (Bush and Quayle) have promoted, to bring our people together, and we believe that it is time for leadership to bring forth from our nation the best that is within us.”

He added a plea against complacency: “Remember, there is still a lot of time between now and when the polls close.”

At heart, however, neither the candidate nor the campaign appeared to be truly worried.

A CNN tracking poll, which inspired fear among the Clintonites earlier this week when its margin between Clinton and Bush hit a razor-thin one percentage point, showed a seven-point lead for Clinton Sunday morning and an eight-point lead by Sunday night. Other polls also showed a comfortable lead for the Democratic presidential nominee, and internal campaign polls put the gap at seven points.

“There’s an emerging consensus in the polls, and that’s reflected in our internal polls,” said Clinton spokeswoman Dee Dee Myers.

The get-out-the-vote rally was linked by satellite to six other gatherings around the country, including one at the Museum of Flying in Santa Monica.

Clinton said that 100,000 people watched the revelry in all seven sites.

The rally closed out what had been a day filled with undeniable confidence for the Democratic presidential nominee, even if his voice was down to a croak.

In Cincinnati on Sunday morning, Clinton was able to rasp out only 21 seconds of talk before his mouth opened and nothing came out.

“We’ve fought for a year. We’ve got two days to go . . . . Fight on. Don’t give up. Go!” he whispered.

In Wilkes-Barre, Pa., where he managed three minutes of talk, Clinton remonstrated against a last-minute barrage of criticism from the campaigns of Bush and independent candidate Ross Perot.

“Don’t forget there’ve been a lot of charges and countercharges and ups and downs, but when you strip it all away, this election is a race between hope and fear, between the courage to change and the comfort of the status quo,” he said, “between those who say things are fine and those of us who believe that we can do better--that America deserves better.”

The governor’s aides ascribed the voice troubles to overuse and lack of sleep. At several points in the campaign, Clinton’s voice has gone raw--in New Hampshire in February, when he was struggling to maintain his candidacy, and in the spring, when he was forced to take a week off to regain his voice.

Such was the state of Clinton’s confidence on Sunday that he never so much as mentioned Bush’s name nor Perot’s.

Instead, Clinton’s staff issued a broadside aimed at the half-hour infomercial Perot ran on television Sunday night, calling it a “multimillion-dollar smoke screen” that demonstrated a “detachment from reality.”

The Perot commercial attacked Clinton and Bush. In response, the Clinton campaign released two pages of statistics contradicting Perot’s criticisms of Clinton’s record in Arkansas.

“During the entire program, he never once mentions how he would rebuild America; he only attacks the other candidates,” said Clinton’s communications director, George Stephanopoulos. “He offers no solutions, because he doesn’t have any.”

Despite his confidence and his laryngitis, Clinton still planned to end the campaign with an underdog’s schedule. In a surge that begins at dawn today and does not end until Tuesday morning, Clinton will appear in the key states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Missouri, Kentucky, Texas (twice), New Mexico, Colorado and finally Arkansas.

The journey was scheduled to last 29 hours--if it ends on time, which was questionable--and clock out at 4,106 miles. The strategy behind the locations was simple.

“They’re big states, without exception states that the Republicans won in 1988, states that, many of which, the Republicans need to win this year for an electoral majority,” said Myers.

The barnstorming schedule demonstrated Clinton’s strength going into the final 24 hours before the polls open.

Surveys taken last week in the individual states showed Clinton with leads in all but Michigan, which was a tossup, and Texas, which Bush controlled.

Clinton had planned one Texas stop but then threw on another, indicating the campaign’s hope that Bush’s lead in his adopted home state was withering.

Analysts have suggested that Perot, a Texan, could take more votes away from Bush than Clinton in his home state, and thus theoretically give the Democrat a chance.

Where Clinton will not go was also telling. As recently as last Tuesday, Clinton was in Florida as part of his longstanding effort to wrest that state from Republican control.

The fact that Florida is not on the list of states to be visited in the closing 24 hours suggests that the Democrats have conceded it, which, of course, they would not admit.

Clinton does have the luxury of not having to worry about three states worth 109 electoral votes--California, Illinois and New York--that the Democrats have struggled to win in recent years to no success.

In Cincinnati, where Clinton opened his day at church, the choir greeted him with a hymn: “I Don’t Feel No Ways Tired.” And he looked the part. At a tailgate party near Riverfront Stadium before the Cincinnati Bengals-Cleveland Browns football game, he bounded onto the stage and saluted Mayor Dwight Tillery with a rambunctious high-five.

“My voice’ll be better by this afternoon, and I’ll be there Monday, I’ll be there Tuesday,” Clinton said.

After his raspy, 21-second speech--perhaps to demonstrate that his illness was limited to his vocal cords--Clinton tossed around a football with his strategist Paul Begala.

In Wilkes-Barre, Clinton shook hands along a rope line for 35 minutes, hatless in the 45-degree cold.

“You can see I may have lost my voice, but with your help on Tuesday we will win a new day for America,” he said. “I will fight for you every day in Washington if you give me a chance to do it.”

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