President Ridicules GOP Stands : Politics: Clinton lambastes Republicans at an Anaheim appearance, saying his foes refuse to give him credit for economy. He then calls for bipartisanship and an end to ‘verbal bombs’ in campaigning.

President Clinton poked fun at Republican candidates Saturday, likening their anti-government campaign rhetoric to the statements of a person who seeks a job while promising to not do anything if he gets hired.

Speaking to an audience of about 5,000 Realtors gathered for their annual convention here, Clinton compared the GOP candidates to a person who says, “Hire me to work in your real estate office because the real estate industry is inherently sick, and you couldn’t do anything right if you wanted to, and if you hire me I’ll sit in the office all day and I won’t try to sell a house.

“We’re seriously entertaining giving our votes to people who tell us these things.” Government, he said, “is neither inherently good or bad. It is our tool. It is the instrument that reflects us. It is what we make of it.”

Clinton’s remarks, which came in the form of a long digression from a speech about a new Administration initiative on housing, underlined his frustration with what he sees as a lack of credit for his Administration’s role in improving the economy.

He has repeatedly commented on that in recent weeks, saying at times that he needs to do a better job of communicating his record to the public, but at other times complaining that the press and the Republican opposition have failed to give him a break.

This time, he pointed to the Republicans. Noting a series of encouraging economic statistics, including Friday’s announcement that unemployment has dropped to a four-year low, Clinton said the GOP has taken the position that “if anything good happens in this country while Mr. Clinton is in office, it’s either in spite of him or unrelated.”

Having lambasted the GOP for its anti-government stance, Clinton then asked for bipartisanship and an end to negative campaigning, saying that “we can solve our problems, but only if we speak with one another and listen to one another and stop just throwing these verbal bombs across the fences that divide us and turn us into cynical and negative people.”

That remark drew a loud ovation from the audience, one of several Clinton received from a group that traditionally has included considerably more Republicans than Democrats.

Later in the day, speaking to several thousand Democratic activists at a get-out-the-vote rally in Oakland’s Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center, Clinton put a far more partisan cast on the same line of argument.

The Republicans, he told the cheering crowd, say that nothing government does “makes a difference.” He then reeled off a series of measures that he said his Administration had accomplished, ranging from expanded trade with Mexico and Asia to increased immunization for children and more spending for Head Start to reducing the federal deficit, saying for each one: “It does make a difference.

“Don’t tell me that we’re not stronger, and it doesn’t make a difference. I say it does make a difference.”

Clinton also repeated his attacks on the anti-illegal-immigrant Proposition 187. Backers of Proposition 187, he said, are trying to appeal to anger, not reason. “187 says: ‘Let’s be real mad and take it out on the kids.’ ”

On his way to the rally, Clinton got a direct view of the intense views that 187 supporters hold.

Leaving Los Alamitos Naval Air Station, Clinton, as he usually does, worked his way along a rope line, shaking hands with those gathered to see him off. Usually in such settings, Clinton exchanges only brief remarks or greetings with those along the line, but this time, he encountered a serviceman who began to argue with him about the proposition. The two spent roughly five minutes discussing the subject before Clinton moved on.

Afterward, the man, who identified himself only as Sgt. Wozniak, said Clinton had laid out his reasons for opposing the proposition, and that he had laid out his reasons for supporting it, but that neither man had changed positions.

Clinton also pushed his attack on the Republicans in his weekly radio address, returning to his charge that the GOP promise to cut taxes, increase defense spending and still balance the budget “would require a 20% cut across the board in every other part of government. That’s cuts in Social Security, Medicare, student loans, assistance to farmers, veterans benefits, the crime bill--the things that make us stronger, smarter, more secure.”

In the Republican response, Senate GOP leader Bob Dole of Kansas denied that his party has any plans to cut Social Security and said that “in a state of near panic,” Clinton and Vice President Al Gore “are resorting to scare tactics.”

Dole then indulged in some scare talk of his own, charging that the Administration was considering large cuts in farm programs.

In fact, neither party has been willing to acknowledge publicly what nearly all independent experts on the federal budget agree on--that over the long term, the budget deficit cannot be eliminated without some trims in popular entitlement programs, a category that includes both Social Security and farm spending.

Clinton’s ostensible purpose in the Anaheim speech was to announce a new initiative on affordable housing.

As he noted in his speech, the Administration has taken several actions that were urged by real estate brokers, most notably a series of tax-law changes that restored deductions aimed at stimulating the real estate market. In the new initiative, he said, he hoped to work closely with the industry again.

While Clinton portrayed his proposal as a major initiative, it basically is little more than a plan to begin planning. Under the initiative, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry G. Cisneros will meet with real estate industry officials, bankers, community activists and others to develop a strategy to reduce regulatory, financial and social barriers to home ownership.

Also Saturday, White House officials said Clinton may travel to Haiti in the next few weeks to visit U.S. troops.

Clinton, who recently visited American troops in Kuwait, could travel to Haiti over Thanksgiving week or early in December in connection with a Latin American summit scheduled for Miami in the second week of the month.

Officials said Clinton hopes to boost morale among U.S. troops in Haiti by a visit but that final plans had not yet been made. National Security Adviser Anthony Lake visited Haiti earlier this week. He met with troops and Haitian government officials and has discussed the situation there with Clinton since his return, officials said.