TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/092192/09219939.000

Text File | 1993-04-08 | 3.6 KB | 81 lines

                                                                                THE WEEK  

NATION, Page 14

Getting Down To Business


At last the race is focusing in on an issue voters care about:
the economy


    Finally, there has been a sign that the 1992 presidential
campaign will find relevance after all. Between the Republican
Convention and Labor Day, the traditional start of the general
election contest, odds of that happening seemed slight. George
Bush and his minions seemed fixated on "family values," Bill
Clinton's draft record and a deceptive numbers game over tax
increases in Arkansas. The Democrats sounded on the verge of
declaring class warfare -- trying to scare the elderly, veterans
and students with unfounded charges that Bush would savage
programs on which they depend. But suddenly last Thursday, Bush
jerked attention away from all that and onto the issue many
Americans suspected he had been doing almost anything to avoid:
the nation's economic future. Overnight, the President had moved
toward a clarification of the choice between his approach and
that of his rival.

    In a speech to the Economic Club of Detroit, Bush
presented an "Agenda for American Renewal" with more
cohesiveness than he had shown heretofore. Then he aired
prime-time commercials on all the networks to offer voters
copies of his program -- a technique Clinton has been using with
success since last winter in New Hampshire.

    The core of Bush's pitch was hardly surprising. Sounding
like a born-again preacher of Reaganomics, the President
promised to "stimulate entrepreneurial capitalism, not punish
it." He argued for lower taxes, less federal spending, less
regulation. To make America an "export superpower," Bush
proposed an expansive network of free-trade arrangements going
well beyond the North American Free Trade Agreement now pending.
For the Beltway bureaucracy bashers, he offered to cut the
salaries of higher-paid government officials and to pare the
White House operating budget by one-third -- if Congress does
the same.

    Clinton quickly rebutted, alternately dismissing Bush's
proposals as a compilation of old ideas at one campaign stop,
then demanding at the next to know why it had taken the
President so long to offer them. On the latter point, to be
sure, Bush is vulnerable. But by bringing his proposals
together, relating them to each other and treating the subject
seriously, Bush at last faced the reality that the economy is
this year's predominant issue. Bush committed himself to
free-market solutions with minimal direction from Washington.
Clinton, for all the neo-liberal filigree on his rhetoric, would
increase federal intervention and spending in a variety of ways.

    With less than 50 days until the election, these
distinctions are beginning to solidify. Clinton's plan to
provide universal health insurance would involve
government-imposed cost control as well as higher taxes. Bush's
approach centers on making private insurance more affordable for
individuals. Clinton wants an elaborate new national service
program as a means of giving young people a way of repaying
college loans. Bush promises to scale down the federal
bureaucracy.

    If a presidential campaign is supposed to offer large
options, it is also supposed to provide something of an
education to voters. Here Bush's performances are still lacking.
Like Clinton, he has yet to offer a detailed and realistic plan
to cut the federal deficit. But if last week's bracing change
is an indication, voters may yet find their choice for President
based on issues that actually matter to them.