The Nation : To the GOP’s Dismay, the Real Clinton Emerges--as a Non-ideological Blur

The recent change in Bill Clinton’s political fortunes represents: a) gains from his new sounding-like-a-Republican crime, welfare and budget policies; b) losses in Febru ary poll ratings after further developments in Whitewater and other Arkansas-related scandals; c) favorable public reaction to better news on the economy; d) uncertainty about his get-tough tack with Japan, or e) all the above?

The best answer is “e) all the above”--and it’s a confusing set of crosscurrents. Today’s reality is that Clinton is both weaker and stronger than he appears, and the politics of 1994--and perhaps also 1996--will be confused accordingly.

The notion of Clinton as a blurry, non-ideological centrist is gaining ground--with good reason. Talk that he now sounds like a Republican on issues like welfare reform and crime is an exaggeration voiced most easily by liberals who know few Republicans. But his crime policies--from lifetime incarcera- tion for three-time violent felons to advocacy of 100,000 added policemen--do represent a significant shift for a Democratic President.

Whatever Clinton sounds like--committed centrist or talented opportunist--what he no longer sounds like is clear: the type of liberal Democrat who Americans started getting tired of in the 1960s and ‘70s.

That is the great benefit for Clinton-era Democrats. They are free to take middle-of-the-road, even moderately conservative positions on crime, federal spending cuts and welfare reform. This is tough for the GOP, because Democrats have stopped being a liberal-caricature opposition and started taking reasonable positions on issues the GOP used to dominate. The result is that Republicans, who started losing domestic- and economic-policy credibility during the Bush years, in January actually found themselves trailing the Democrats as the better party to handle crime, welfare reform and reducing the budget deficit.

Health-care reform, meanwhile, has become an unexpected yellow light for the Democrats. True, they have a large lead in the polls as the better party to deal with health-care reform, but that is in the abstract. The actual Clinton health plan, designed back in the 1993 period of Hillary and Bill Clinton’s ambitions for a bigger role of government, has been losing support.

When first announced last fall, national polls showed Clinton’s program had a lopsided 65% support to 25% opposition. But by early 1994, as doubt about its bureaucracy and costs grew, pollsters found a standoff: Supporters and opponents more or less balanced each other, and the all-important middle class was tilting toward disapproval.

In short, health reform, which Democrats had counted as their high-scoring issue, was turning out not to be. Swing voters were beginning to think the Clinton program was too ambitious, that it raised as many problems as it answered.

Assuming that Clinton and Congress produce a compromise health-care package this year, the President should still profit. But even this proposal must be qualified by the evidence of a new global political reality. Many welfare states that expanded in the 1970s and even the 1980s--Britain, Canada, Scandinavia and Germany, for example--are now retrenching. Too many people are finding services reduced or new charges imposed--or both. Fewer governments are finding health coverage a winning issue, and the Clinton White House may ultimately count itself in this group.

The other big question mark with an increasingly negative tilt for the President is his collection of alleged Arkansas scandals--ranging from the Madison Guaranty-Whitewater land deal to the charges of sexual misconduct made by two Arkansas state troopers. Several women have come forward to confirm the troopers’ account, and Whitewater special counsel Robert B. Fiske Jr. has taken office space in Little Rock on a lease that runs through January, 1997.

Republicans are excited at the prospect that both these issues--and, with them, Clinton’s ethics and alleged untrustworthiness--could be major undertows working against him in the 1996 race. This could be important, because when Iran-Contra charges echoed against George Bush in the last days of the 1992 campaign, they cut short a Bush resurgence. Republicans may have the same thing in mind for Clinton in 1996.

They are certainly going to need all the help they can get. Not only has Clinton’s move to the center preempted several once-Republican themes, but also the GOP has a number of other emerging weaknesses. First, like many parties out of power after a long period of rule, it doesn’t have much of an agenda.

Second, the GOP could gain enough seats in Congress in November’s elections to get blamed for what could be 1995-96 gridlock. Meanwhile, strains between their leaders--Bob Dole of Kansas in the Senate, Newt Gingrich of Georgia in the House--could add to the problem.

Finally, there’s the lack of any strong GOP presidential nominee for 1996, coupled with significant ideological splits in the party and the possibility of a second independent presidential bid by Ross Perot. These GOP weaknesses--all hard to correct--count as pluses for Clinton.

But at the same time, any assessment of the President’s circumstances must take several points into account. His job ratings, which hit 60% last month, have dropped into the mid-to-low 50s, and one recent Newsweek poll had him slipping to 49%. The public remains standoffish toward Clinton, and, in the next three years, two issues now relatively quiet--the economy and the perils of U.S. foreign policy--are likely to come to the fore. Right now, both are “X factors.”

There’s no doubt that the improving economy has been a boon to Clinton, helping to pull his ratings up from the high 30s in some polls and the low 40s in others. Too many people forget, though, that a similar economic surge in late 1992 raised Bush’s ratings from the high 30s on Election Day in November to the mid-50s in January as he prepared to retire. Part of Clinton’s gain over the last three months could be just as shallow--especially if the economy starts to sag again.

That is a possibility no Democrat strategist can ignore. But in a few weeks, believe it or not, our current economic recovery--it officially started back in March, 1991--will be entering its fourth year . In other words, we may not be looking at economic or cyclical springtime; because the typical postwar business cycle has lasted 3 1/2 to 5 years, we could now be looking at some pleasant autumn economic weather, with a possible winter chill not too far off.

Moreover, there are some specific cautions to keep in mind. Experts worry that the huge amount of money put into mutual funds over the last few years has created a stock-market bubble, while others are now concerned that the possibility of a trade war between the United States and Japan could wind up damaging the international financial structure.

The second “X factor” that should haunt the Democrats is the unpredictability of international affairs and the possibility of some debacle linked to America’s declining power to control overseas events. Democrats have particular reason to be nervous, because three of the last four Democratic Presidents left office in disrepute partly because of a failure to effectively apply U.S. military power: Harry S. Truman because of the Korea War, Lyndon B. Johnson because of Vietnam and Jimmy Carter because of the botched Iranian hostage crisis.

In short, this President may not be in as good shape as many think because of the extraordinary economic, moral and international crosscurrents at work. Sometimes, it’s not even enough to be blessed with a second-rate opposition.*