Contented Electorate Eludes Gore’s Grasp

Everything is going great. So it must be time for a change.

At the core of Vice President Al Gore’s problems in the early stages of the 2000 presidential race is the unusually large number of voters expressing that conflicted sentiment.

Ordinarily, a solid majority of voters satisfied with the country’s direction vote for continuity in presidential elections--supporting either the incumbent or his party’s chosen successor. But this year, several polls show Democrat Gore holding surprisingly small leads over Republican George W. Bush among voters who believe the country is moving on the “right track.”

Bush, meanwhile, is enjoying the challenger’s typical advantage among voters dissatisfied with conditions in the country: Those who said the nation was moving in the wrong direction preferred the Texas governor over Gore by fully 2 to 1 in the most recent Times survey, enough to give Bush a solid overall lead in the contest.

Theories abound for Gore’s weak early performance among contented voters. Some analysts believe it reflects deep personal doubts about Gore; others say it reflects Gore’s inability so far to present Bush as a threat to the past decade’s positive trends; while others believe it signals a nascent public sense that, in this “new economy,” the president’s policies are less relevant to the nation’s economic health.

The Gore campaign insists the rub is simply that voters don’t yet know enough about the two candidates and their agendas.

But whatever the problem’s cause, its consequence is clear: Unless Gore can significantly improve his showing among voters optimistic about the country’s direction, he is unlikely to overcome Bush’s early lead.

“It’s the key problem that Gore’s got,” says one senior Bush strategist. “And it is the fundamental question ahead. It is either a problem he can’t fix, or it is a problem that the [Democratic] convention will show that he can fix. That question, to me, is unanswered. Basically, for the last year, he hasn’t been able to fix it.”

Pollsters and political analysts have long recognized that voters’ assessments of the country’s basic direction are a critical--some say the critical--factor in presidential elections. For that reason, many political strategists watch the percentage of Americans who consider the nation on the right track and the number who consider it off in the wrong direction.

When Ronald Reagan in 1984 and Bill Clinton in 1996 won sweeping reelection victories, for instance, at least half of Americans said they believed the country was on the right track. By contrast, when voters swept Jimmy Carter out of office in 1980 and George Bush in 1992, about 70% of Americans said they considered the country on the wrong track.

Today, the country’s mood is presenting Gore with two interrelated, but distinct, problems. One is that the percentage of Americans who say the country is on the right track has been steadily slipping since earlier this year; that reduces the pool of voters most open to Gore’s case for continuity. The second is that, by historical standards, Gore is not attracting nearly enough of those contented voters.

Of the two, the easier problem for Gore to confront may be the increasingly ambivalent public mood. There’s no question about the trend. Surveys by Republican pollster Bill McInturff show the share of Americans who say the country is moving in the right direction has dropped from 59% in January to 46% now; similarly, the most recent Times poll found 46% of Americans satisfied with the country’s direction, down from 55% last summer.

In both parties, there’s little certainty about the reasons for the decline in optimism. The most commonly cited culprit is the increasing volatility in the stock market. Other possible explanations include the spike in gas prices, the controversy over Elian Gonzalez, and the doomsayer reflex that the economic expansion can’t last forever. Republican pollster Ed Goeas, whose recent Battleground 2000 national survey showed a much more pessimistic attitude than other polls, believes the trend may reflect sharpening anxiety about the nation’s moral direction.

Unless the country’s underlying conditions significantly deteriorate, Gore advisors are confident that the nation’s mood will brighten at least somewhat by election day. At their national convention this summer, and in their party advertising, Democrats are likely to argue that compared to eight years ago, when Republicans last held the White House, the trends are pointing in the right direction on everything from the economy, to crime, to the federal budget.

“By the time we get to election day, I think there will be a decided advantage for right track over wrong track,” said one senior Gore advisor. “And I think we can move that somewhat by the story we tell about America and where it is now compared to where it was when the last Bush was president.”

Increasing the country’s level of optimism, though, is unlikely to do the job alone for Gore, unless he can also win a bigger share of the optimistic voters.

Richard B. Wirthlin, Reagan’s longtime pollster, has postulated that the president (or his party’s nominee) usually wins about three-fourths of voters who consider the country on the right track, while the challenger usually takes home about two-thirds of voters dissatisfied with the nation’s direction. That differential can allow the incumbent party to win when the right track number rises to the high 40s--where it is now.

Both the elder Bush in 1992, and Clinton in 1996, validated Wirthlin’s rule by winning about three-fourths of voters satisfied with the country’s direction, according to Times exit polls. But Gore is woefully under-performing with that group today. A Times Poll earlier this month showed him leading Bush only by 52% to 43% among voters who said the country was on the right track.

Gore’s problems with contented voters appear to spring from several sources. Some satisfied with the economy nonetheless want to close the book on the ethical controversies of the Clinton era. An even larger problem may be personal doubts about Gore himself.

“I don’t think Al Gore has the ability to keep things going well,” said Frank Buyan, an independent voter in Pennsylvania, who indicated in the recent Times survey that he intended to support Bush even though he believed the country was doing well under Clinton.

Gore is also facing the inverse problem: Despite his relentless attacks on Bush’s economic proposals as “risky,” the vice president does not yet appear to have convinced swing voters that the Texan represents a threat to the economy or to the other gains the nation has experienced since the early 1990s.

Adding to that challenge is another trend. Polls show Americans are more likely to attribute the economic boom to the explosive advances in technology than the policy decisions made in Washington--which could make it tougher for Gore to argue that changing policy direction will endanger the expansion. That may help explain a striking finding in the Times Poll: One-third of voters who did not want the next president to change Clinton’s economic policies now say they will vote for Bush.

Mary Ellen Whitman, a Democrat from Baltimore, was one of those voters. Though she’s skeptical about Bush’s tax cut, she finds Gore “condescending” and doesn’t believe that the economy’s health will change much regardless of who wins the presidency. “Basically I don’t know if the president can do that much anyway because the economy goes by itself,” she says. “And I just would not vote for Al Gore if you put a gun to my head.”

Gore advisors believe the solutions to these complaints are time and information. Once voters learn more about the two men’s level of experience, and the implications of their agendas for the country, more voters satisfied with the country’s condition will see Gore as the better bet to sustain the good times, said one senior Gore aide.

“There is a sense that people want . . . the next president to build on the success of the past decade and not move away from it,” the advisor said.

Yet what’s clear at this early stage is that even many voters who feel that way aren’t sure Gore is the best choice to continue the job.