NEWS ANALYSIS : Words, Deeds Often Clash in Clinton’s First 100 Days : Government: President has been an effective voice for his causes, but his ability to deliver remains in doubt.

Last fall, President Clinton campaigned across the country arguing for “change.” Today, as his Administration reaches the traditional, albeit arbitrary 100-day measuring point, he can justifiably claim to have brought about a sweeping change in the psychology and expectations of Washington.

But whether he has the ability to meet those expectations remains as much a mystery as when his quest for the presidency began.

As he demonstrated during the election season, Clinton is a superb campaigner with a seldom-matched ability to focus public attention on issues that concern him. But as he demonstrated during his 12-year tenure as chief executive of Arkansas and in his first three months as President, his actions in office often fall short of the sweeping promises that his rhetoric seems to imply.

So it is, for example, that in February, Clinton the campaigner delivered a masterful speech to the nation that rallied support for the idea of raising taxes and cutting existing programs to reduce the federal deficit.

But by April, Clinton the chief executive had backed away from some of his deficit-cutting plans, most notably a proposal to include higher fees on Western miners and ranchers. And the specifics of his tax proposals face an uncertain fate in Congress.

Campaigner Clinton helped rally international support behind new aid to Russia and thereby almost certainly contributed to President Boris N. Yeltsin’s recent election in a referendum there. But Clinton the executive admits that he may not be able to win congressional approval of the new money needed to back up parts of his aid plan.

Adding to the challenge of turning his largely domestic goals into reality is the looming threat of problems such as the situation in Bosnia, which can derail the best-laid plans of any President.

Seeing their new President in action, both his strengths and his weaknesses, the public has responded with an unusually high degree of activism but also a high degree of polarization.

Telephone calls and letters pour into Washington by the hundreds of thousands, testimonials to his power to stir voters; but in recent polls, both Clinton’s positive and his negative ratings have risen.

In February, for example, Republican pollster Ed Goeas and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake asked voters if they thought Clinton “keeps his promises.” At the time, 39% thought that was a good description of the President and 48% thought it was not. By last week, when asked the question again, 46% agreed and 52% did not. The percentage expressing neutrality had dropped from 13% to 3%.

Similarly, increased polarization showed up in questions about whether Clinton is a strong leader, whether he fights for the middle class and whether he is too ready to raise taxes.

At the same time, the brief surge of public optimism on which Clinton rode into office has begun to fade. Voters are not nearly as pessimistic as they were during much of 1991 and 1992, but recent polls show voters growing uneasy yet again and annoyed with slow action in Washington.

The President’s aides have taken to pleading for patience.

“George Bush didn’t stumble in his first 100 days because he wasn’t trying to move,” said Clinton political adviser James Carville. “The only way not to stumble is to stand still.”

“The true test of presidential leadership is not instant popularity,” said Democratic Party Chairman David C. Wilhelm. “Governing is hard. Governing is difficult.”

Those sentiments cannot be denied. They also do not make very good reelection slogans. As most voters know, expecting huge results after a mere three months in office makes little sense. But as Clinton aides know, the time will come when voters insist on results, not explanations.

“The President has to show that he can break gridlock,” said Clinton pollster and strategist Stanley B. Greenberg. “They elected him to get things moving.”

Because of that, as he moves toward a potentially difficult summer of negotiations with Congress over his budget, his health care plans and his proposals to reform the nation’s campaign finance system, Clinton now faces a pivotal decision, advisers say.

Put starkly, the President must either scale back his ambitions to meet what the traditional rules of the Washington political system define as achievable, or else find a way to rewrite those rules and bend the system to his will.

“There’s a clash of cultures” between the ambitious Clinton agenda and Washington’s ponderous, risk-averse political system, Carville said.

The pressure to scale back comes constantly.

As Clinton put together his budget package in February, his legislative strategists repeatedly urged him to leave one or another potentially controversial item out for fear of alienating key congressional barons.

In March, members of Congress warned against proposing a strong campaign finance reform package. Then, this month, Clinton’s budget director, Leon E. Panetta, began warning that proposing a controversial health care package next month could fatally compromise the effort to pass Clinton’s budget.

But while Clinton’s Washington advisers caution that reaching for too much could mean losing all, his political advisers worry that incremental change will lose the one thing Clinton cannot do without--the attention and support of the public.

Unquestionably, Clinton has managed to achieve substantial change on the intangible, but important, level of psychology and expectations.

Earlier this month, a senior official of a Washington-based human rights group, who for the last 12 years had battled U.S. officials over policies toward Central America, found himself sitting in an ornate room at the State Department along with roughly a dozen colleagues, discussing policy with some of Secretary of State Warren Christopher’s top deputies.

“My government is courting me,” he later recalled saying to himself with more than a bit of wonderment. “They’re interested in our issues. In fact, they’re taking our agenda. After all these years, its a strange feeling, it really forces you to reassess how you look at things.”

A few days later, two leaders of Washington-based women’s organizations ran into a reporter at the White House gate. They were on their way to a meeting with Carol H. Rasco, Clinton’s domestic policy chief. “You know, we’ve been here more in the last 12 weeks than in the past 12 years,” one said.

The President has also changed the shape of many issues. Throughout the Ronald Reagan and George Bush years, for instance, the question of whether abortion might once again be made illegal in the United States ranked toward the top of the public policy agenda.

With Clinton’s inauguration, that possibility vanished, taking with it much of the intensity of the abortion debate on the national level. Now, even prominent Republicans say their party likely will modify the adamantly anti-abortion language of its platform before the 1996 election.

A year ago, comprehensive reform of the health care system seemed all but impossible. Now, as the frenzied activities of new lobbying coalitions and trade associations indicate, the smart money in Washington is betting that health care reform will pass before the next election and is scrambling to influence the result.

In much the same way, Clinton has drastically changed the dynamics of the age-old debate over taxing the wealthy. Republicans opposed increasing such taxes with such political success that Washington lawmakers came to believe that raising any taxes at all would amount to political suicide.

But when Clinton actually proposed tax increases, the public reaction was surprisingly mild.

As he tries to move beyond those changes to more permanent ones, Clinton has several assets.

First, public impatience with “business as usual” in Washington remains a potent force. Clinton advisers confidently assert that while Republicans can hurt the President in the short run by blocking his programs, they will hurt themselves more in the long term if they seem consistently negative.

Clinton and his top aides concede that they erred in believing they could get bills through Congress without dealing with the Republicans, particularly in the Senate. But having learned that lesson, they say, they are now hopeful of striking deals with a handful of GOP moderates to win passage of key bills.

Republicans “have gained nothing” by opposing Clinton, asserts Rahm Emmanuel, the White House political director. Many will want to cooperate, he predicts.

The next test, White House aides hope, will be a scaled-down version of the supplemental appropriations bill--Clinton’s economic stimulus package--that a Republican filibuster defeated last week.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), a key Republican moderate, introduced a $9-billion version of the bill recently, and White House aides hope to work with him on it.

An even more important asset is Clinton’s own drive to succeed. Unlike Bush, who seemed bewildered about how to respond when his support faded, Clinton, as he demonstrated during his campaign, seems to thrive on getting back up after being knocked down.

Through all the buffeting of recent weeks, he exhibits the contentment of a man who, at a relatively young age, has gotten a chance to fulfill his life’s dream.

Clinton remains prey to the occasional flash of temper at a critical newspaper story that he thinks is unfair or by what he perceives to be a betrayal by a member of Congress. But most of the time he appears to be genuinely enjoying his job--from the contact with the crowds to the detailed analysis of policy options.

“He’s excited,” said White House Communications Director George Stephanopoulos, “he enjoys the act of everything he’s doing.”

Moreover, Clinton is “a perpetual optimist,” said Stephanopoulos, himself a noted pessimist.

Tuesday night, after a day in which Panetta’s gloomy appraisal of the Administration’s chances to pass a budget had dominated the news, Clinton called his budget director at home not to chastise him but to cheer him up.

“Pick up your head. Let’s go,” the President told him, according to an aide. “We’ve got a job to do.”

That spirit--with its broad appeal to the nation’s inherent hopefulness and generosity--helped Clinton win the White House in the first place, and it helped bring him through his first 100 days without a catastrophic setback and with most of his goals still potentially realizable.

The question for the next 100 days is whether he can also summon up and sustain the laser-like focus on the dull, unglamorous details of legislative politics that will be necessary to carry his specific programs, step by step, to victory.

Is Clinton Keeping Promises?

Here is the status of major promises made by President Clinton during his campaign and the post-election transition of power:

PROMISES KEPT

Immediate steps to reverse Reagan-Bush anti-abortion policies, including revoking the “gag rule” against abortion counseling at clinics that receive federal funds.

Support and sign the Family and Medical Leave Act requiring employers, with some exceptions, to provide unpaid leave to employees for the birth of a child or family emergencies.

Support “motor voter” legislation making voting registration easier and in some cases automatic when citizens apply for driver’s licenses and other government permits.

Propose an expanded Earned Income Tax Credit, a measure designed to lift the working poor above the poverty line through refundable tax credits.

Propose a national service trust fund to allow students to borrow for college and repay money through payroll deduction or national service.

Propose reducing federal government employment by 100,000 through attrition.

Require senior Administration officials to sign ethics guidelines prohibiting them from lobbying in their area of government work for five years after leaving their post.

Commit the nation to the global biodiversity treaty and to cutting carbon dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2000.

Propose deeper cuts in defense spending than recommended by the Bush Administration and propose lower troop levels in Europe.

PROMISES BROKEN

To seek a middle-class tax cut.

To reverse Bush Administration policy of forcibly returning Haitian refugees.

To lift the immigration ban on individuals with the HIV virus. Clinton had proposed to lift the ban but abandoned the idea after Congress voted overwhelmingly to keep the restriction.

PROMISES HEDGED

A campaign call that the United States take tougher steps against Serbian aggression in the former Yugoslavia. Clinton has taken incremental steps, but none equal to the tone of a July, 1992, statement in which he criticized Bush for doing too little and said the crisis demanded “the greatest possible urgency.”

To reverse the military’s ban on gays. Clinton says he is committed to keeping his pledge but has delayed final action until July pending a Pentagon study and hearings in Congress.

MAJOR PROMISES PENDING

Implement national health care reform. Plan expected to be unveiled in late May.

Propose “ending welfare as we know it” by expanding training of recipients but in return capping most benefits at two years.

Source: Associated Press, Times staff