Bush-Dean Matchup Could Be a Battle of the Risk-Takers

The Bush presidency is a high-wire act. The Democrats are the party of the safety net. That’s the script for the 2004 campaign. But a race between Howard Dean and George W. Bush, which looks increasingly probable now that Al Gore has endorsed Dean, may not follow the script.

Bush is certainly a president who takes risks. And shows nerve in the face of criticism. His tax cuts were a huge economic risk. And a political risk too.

There was never much pressure for tax cuts, not even in 2001 when Bush took office. The public thought tax cuts were risky. They would throw the country back into debt. Too much of the money would go to the rich. They would starve the public sector of funds for higher priorities, like education and health care.

“The president’s plan is too risky,” then-House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said in February 2001. “His proposal is based on projections that are just that -- projections. Too much is unpredictable.”

But Bush, convinced his tax cuts were right for the country, made them a test of his leadership. He pushed them through Congress. When the economy slipped into recession, Bush kept the policy and changed the justification. Tax cuts became his economic stimulus plan. Economists scoffed at the notion, claiming that tax cuts would take years to have any effect on the economy.

Guess what happened? Public debt has skyrocketed. The public sector has been starved of funds. And the economy has begun to recover. “The tax cuts are working,” Bush said. He took a risk that’s paying off, he argued.

Bush’s whole 2000 campaign was about risk-taking and competition. He argued for giving parents vouchers so private schools could compete with public schools. He wanted to let private investment compete for Social Security funds. “It’s time to have new thinking in Washington that says we trust younger workers to invest their own hard-earned money in the private sector,” Bush said in September 2000.

The Medicare reform bill he signed last week encourages private insurance to compete with Medicare. “The lack of competition meant there was no real need to provide innovation,” the president said. “We’re helping to change the system by giving seniors more options and more choices.”

Democrats have said the Medicare reform is too risky. At last month’s Iowa debate, Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) argued, “The impact on seniors will be that they cannot choose their own doctors, they’re going to pay more money if they stay in Medicare or they’ll be pushed into HMOs.”

No Bush policy has been as risky as the war in Iraq. Talk about nerve -- the president went to war in the face of opposition from virtually the entire world.

Three pictures have become icons of that war.

The first was the toppling of Saddam Hussein’s statue in Baghdad. Remember how spooked U.S. officials got when a Marine put an American flag over the face of the statue? That gesture risked making Iraq look like a war of conquest.

Then there was Bush’s “Top Gun” landing on an aircraft carrier in May. That was a nervy -- and, as it turned out, untimely -- display that’s already showing up in Democratic campaign ads. It’s become a symbol of the president’s foolhardiness.

The third was the president’s surprise trip to Baghdad on Thanksgiving Day. Bush had a message of bold resolve for the troops: “We did not charge hundreds of miles into the heart of Iraq, pay a bitter cost in casualties, defeat a ruthless dictator and liberate 25 million people only to retreat before a band of thugs and assassins.” In other words, bring ‘em on!

The public sees Bush as a strong leader. It’s his most admired quality. Two-thirds of Americans endorsed that description in a Time/CNN poll last month -- a figure that has hardly wavered since Bush became president. What Americans see, and like, in Bush is resolve. When he decides something is the right course, he shrugs off criticism and does it. Whether it’s criticism from the rest of the world, from Democrats or even from his own party.

It’s true. Bush has occasionally taken the risk of offending his conservative base. On Medicare, for instance. “The bill would add a universal drug entitlement to a largely unreformed Medicare program,” Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) complained during the debate in the House of Representatives. The Wall Street Journal ran an editorial warning, “Entitlements Are Forever.” Actually, that’s not quite true. Bill Clinton was the first president to end an entitlement program (welfare). Bush is the first Republican president to create one (prescription drugs).

Still, Bush is unlikely to have problems with his conservative base. Conservatives feel nothing like the anger they felt toward his father for breaking his “no new taxes” pledge. Clinton’s reelection shut down liberal protests over welfare reform. If Bush is reelected, Republicans expect to be able to make the same argument to conservatives: “It worked. Shut up.”

Bush’s resolve in the face of criticism -- even from the American people -- earns him high marks for leadership from those same people. There is a fine line, however, between resolve and stubbornness. That’s the problem the president faces in Iraq. Americans would like to tap the president on the shoulder and say, “We admire your resolve, sir, but you need to know something. This isn’t working.”

That’s where the Democrats come in. They’re supposed to be the party of the safety net. You know all those risks Bush is taking with your jobs and your old-age security and the lives of your sons and daughters in Iraq? We’re there to catch you if you fall.

It was Ronald Reagan who coined the term “safety net” in politics. He used it defensively, to reassure his critics that he would “never do anything to shred the Social Security safety net.” When Clinton became president, he didn’t have in mind a safety net. He had in mind a bold, large-scale and risky venture to reform the nation’s health-care system.

But Clinton got burned on that issue. Then the Republicans took over Congress and started their own revolution. Clinton saw his opportunity. He embraced the safety net in 1996, when he ran against Rep. Newt Gingrich and the reckless Republican Congress.

Clinton offered a small agenda -- a minimum-wage hike, the assault-weapons ban, anti-smoking measures, more police on the street, education tax breaks and curbs on television violence. The message? Safety first.

“Our opponents have put forward a very different plan,” Clinton told the 1996 Democratic convention, “a risky $550-billion tax scheme that will force them to ask for even bigger cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, education and the environment.”

In 2000, Gore was the candidate of the safety net. “Our national government should do what so many families have done for years,” Gore said during the campaign. “Set aside some money for a rainy day, to be absolutely certain that we never spend money we don’t have.”

That earned him mockery from Bush, who told the Republican convention, “Every one of the proposals I’ve talked about, he’s called a ‘risky scheme’ over and over again. It is the sum of his message -- the politics of the roadblock, the philosophy of the stop sign. If my opponent had been at the moon launch, it would have been a ‘risky rocket scheme.’ ”

The 2000 campaign also produced a huge gender gap. A lot of men admire Bush’s nerve and daring. Women tend to be more risk-averse. They want a safety net. The 2000 election was actually two competing landslides. Men voted for Bush by a 10-point margin. Women voted for Gore by exactly the opposite margin.

And now? According to the Time/CNN poll, men are likely to vote to reelect Bush by about 10 points. And women are likely to vote against him by about 10 points.

Democrats now have to decide how they’re going to run against Bush in 2004. They can run on the safety net. Or they could come up with their own high-wire act. Like former Vermont Gov. Dean, who said in response to Bush’s Thanksgiving trip to Baghdad, “Mr. President, if you’ll pardon me, I’ll teach you a little about defense.”

Dean is no wimpy liberal. He’s tough and feisty. That’s exactly what Democrats like about him. “We can’t wait to see our guy in a debate with Bush,” his supporters will tell you at Dean meet-ups. “When Bush punches him, he’ll punch back. Hell, he might even punch first!”

Liberals feel bullied. They feel bullied by the Bush White House and the Republican Congress and the radio talk shows and the growing right-wing influence in the media. Look at how CBS got bullied into canceling its miniseries on the Reagans. Liberals are looking for a candidate who will stand up to the bullies. That’s what Dean promises to do.

But will Dean -- who once called himself a “balanced-budget freak” -- promise to protect the safety net? That’s why Gore’s endorsement is important. Gore, a charter member of the party establishment, is saying to Democratic insiders: “We can trust this guy. He’s one of us.” Or more likely: “We can’t stop this guy. So we hope he’s one of us.”

Bush comes from the world of sports and business. A world that rewards risk-taking and competition. A man’s world. Dean is a physician. A caring profession. Doctors are supposed to offer reassurance and security. Perfect for a safety-net campaign. But that’s not the campaign Dean is running. And it’s not the campaign Democrats seem to want.

Democrats seem to want a high-wire act of their own. What’s the difference between a Democratic and a Republican high-wire act? Simple. The Democratic act comes with a safety net.