NEWS ANALYSIS : President Going on Campaign Trail--for Bill Clinton

As President Clinton begins a final, weeklong sprint to Election Day, his energies are focused not only on a clutch of endangered Democratic congressional candidates, but also on one key figure whose name appears on no ballot this year: Bill Clinton.

While he crosses the country in an effort to preserve Democratic control in Congress and state capitals, Clinton is using the campaign season to begin the formidable job of rebuilding his own political fortunes for 1996. In his choice of campaign destinations and rhetorical themes, he is trying to reshape the way voters look at him at a time when potential Republican presidential contenders are only beginning to jockey for position.

While a President never lacks for speaking opportunities, the fall campaign season gives Clinton a concentrated series of forums for reaching voters in a purely political context that is not ordinarily available. He can speak not only to the general electorate, but also to the party activists whose loyalty he must hold--and in some cases regain--to prepare for Republican and possibly even Democratic rivals.

The immediate concern is the midterm elections, says one Administration aide, adding that “he’s got to look ahead to 1996--and think about how he’s doing right now.”

Joan Baggett, the White House political director, observed with a chuckle: “Do you think I’d be very believable if I said the President of the United States didn’t think of 1996?”

Clinton’s destinations are in part determined by the location of tight races. At the same time, many places are out of bounds because of his unpopularity in certain regions of the country. It is no accident, aides acknowledge, that Clinton has almost entirely written off the Southern and Rocky Mountain states to concentrate on the Northeastern, Midwestern and far Western states that he must assemble to win reelection.

After trips last week to California, Washington state and Ohio, Clinton’s schedule this week will take him back to those states and to Pennsylvania, Michigan, New York, Delaware, Connecticut and Rhode Island. Vice President Al Gore and Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen, the Administration’s other senior Southerners, have been handed the job of representing Clinton in the Southern and border states.

The Democrats’ national campaign strategy calls for Clinton to concentrate on contrasting their party’s agenda with Republican proposals that Democrats say would return the country to 1980s-style Reaganism. But as he moves around the country, Clinton veers time and again from this script to talk about his own record, and to ask for more time to accomplish the objectives he set out in 1992.

Last week, during a fund-raising appearance in San Francisco, Clinton devoted six paragraphs of a speech to praising the event’s beneficiary, gubernatorial candidate Kathleen Brown. In another 60 paragraphs, Clinton uncoiled a detailed defense of what he has accomplished in his first 21 months, focusing in particular on his efforts for California, whose 45 electoral votes are the most crucial ingredient for any 1996 victory.

He touched on the $11-billion federal contribution for earthquake relief, the decontrol of once-embargoed high-technology exports, stepped-up border enforcement, shipbuilding contracts for San Diego, a new $2-billion contract for the Lawrence Livermore Laboratories and trade negotiations that enabled U.S. agribusiness to sell rice to Japan.

Alluding to California’s critical contribution to his election, he said that when the state has encountered a problem, “I have tried to help you solve it.

“We do not pretend that there is nothing left to be done,” he acknowledged, but asked voters to give him credit for “a pretty good start.”

Another regular feature of Clinton’s speeches is the Administration’s recent string of foreign policy accomplishments, which, by his account, include U.S. diplomacy or intervention in Haiti, North Korea, South Africa, the Persian Gulf and even Northern Ireland.

Foreign policy, like health care, “is just not an issue in the campaigns,” said Charles E. Cook Jr., editor of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. But Clinton’s comments serve a different purpose, he says. The President’s objective is to convince Americans that he has the basic foreign policy competence that the public considers necessary for all Presidents.

Clinton is clearly delighted to be immersed once more in the campaign trail environment that was so rewarding for him two years ago. His enthusiasm comes through clearly in speeches, even those before tiny fund-raiser crowds.

And he often lingers long into the night.

His extended remarks in San Francisco last week delayed his departure for Seattle, stretching out his workday to nearly 24 hours. But it didn’t faze him. “I wouldn’t trade this for anything,” he gushed to the crowd.

Some analysts argue that it makes sense for Clinton to focus on shoring up his own popularity at these appearances because any President’s ability to persuade voters to back the party’s candidate is quite limited. (Even Ronald Reagan, they say, could add only a few percentage points of support to candidates’ poll numbers, and even then only for a few days.)

Clinton’s final week of travel reflects the White House’s understanding of what he clearly can accomplish for candidates: raising money and rousing a demoralized Democratic base.

Up until now, his appearances for candidates have been almost exclusively fund-raisers. But this week he will show up at nearly as many public rallies, as he visits a series of cities that have both tight races and huge Democratic bases.

He will campaign for Sen. Harris Wofford and gubernatorial candidate Mark Singel in Pennsylvania; senatorial hopefuls Joel Hyatt in Ohio and Rep. Bob Carr in Detroit, and New York Gov. Mario M. Cuomo. In New York, Clinton and Cuomo will share the stage with New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who last week crossed party lines to endorse the governor.

On Friday, Clinton returns to California to appear with Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Brown, and to take part in get-out-the-vote rallies.

White House officials maintain Clinton’s recent appearances have bumped up the poll numbers of several candidates, including Brown, Carr and Bill Curry, the gubernatorial candidate in Connecticut. “Our numbers have been going up, and so have the candidates,” Baggett said.

Some outside analysts say they aren’t convinced that Clinton has contributed that much in some races. But they concede that the party’s candidates are likely to fare poorly in the tight races if Democratic turnout is low.

The difference in motivation is evident in an NBC-Wall Street Journal poll released last week. Of those surveyed, 65% of Republicans but only 55% of Democrats expressed “great interest” in the election. Similarly, 71% of religious fundamentalists, who tend to vote Republican, expressed great interest, compared with only 53% of black Americans, who vote in greater numbers for Democrats.

If Clinton’s travels manage to help beleaguered Democratic candidates, it seems no more than fair.

The Administration’s shortcomings have clearly hurt the election prospects of Democrats in recent months. Yet some polls show that Democratic congressional candidates haven’t shared in the bounce that Clinton has enjoyed from recent foreign policy gains in the Persian Gulf and Haiti. Although the President’s approval ratings have risen to nearly 50%, respondents in those polls are still favoring Republican over Democratic congressional candidates.

Indeed, the bleak outlook for Democratic candidates makes it all the more understandable that Clinton is focusing on his own future, Cook says. “Considering how bad it’s starting to look out there, maybe it’s only natural,” he said.

Times staff writer John M. Broder contributed to this story.