While the White House doesn't want to announce it just yet, its favorite political analogy harks back to 1946: Harry Truman, with a 35 percent approval rating, stayed away from his own congressional candidates, and Republicans ran on a platform that asked, "Had enough?" Democrats didn't turn out to vote; Republicans captured the Congress. Yet over the next two years, Truman metamorphosed into a leader -- challenging the Republican- sponsored tax cuts for the wealthy, vetoing what he could get away with and handing the GOP Congress a moniker that stuck: do- nothing. In 1948, Truman was re-elected with coattails that cost Republicans 75 House seats and nine seats in the Senate. By Inauguration Day, 69 percent of the public liked him again.
But can Bill Clinton get the public to take him back in 1995? His personal political history is full of comebacks. Clinton lost a gubernatorial re-election bid in 1980 yet won the next election. Gennifer Flowers derailed his presidential campaign, but after the candidate and his wife admitted to marital problems, the voters were understanding. These days, the public is fond of political redemption, and Clinton is probably a convincing candidate for forgiveness.
Political luxury. No matter what the size and shape of Republican gains, the changed landscape will hand the president a huge political luxury: He gets to reinvent himself. Clinton can become the centrist New Democrat he once promised, courting moderate Republicans; he also can morph into a president of principles, pushing for political reform and vetoing bad legislation for good reasons. If the Republicans win control of either the House or the Senate, Clinton will have an enemy to demonize. If conservatives win ideological control, he can challenge them to bipartisanship and substantive debate. The president can become the outsider, telling the voters he has heard their message. He can become the alternative to Washington's ruling class. With Congress's own disapproval rating at 70 percent, Clinton can win that debate.
The Republicans understand the dilemma. If Clinton is smart, they admit, he will seek to divide and conquer. House Republicans will be split between the newly elected group of Sun Belt Reaganites and some 20 or 30 moderates. Senate Republicans will still include a half dozen or so willing to work with a Democratic president. He can try for a bipartisan vote on a world trade agreement and cut an early deal on the budget. Like Truman, he can dare the Republicans to take yes for an answer.
He can also punt. Democratic strategists want consistency and humility; they fear they will get neither. They want Clinton to become a "radical reformer," as Will Marshall of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council puts it. A bold agenda is in order -- a tilt rightward on welfare reform, a plan to decentralize government, not simply reinvent it. Clinton can spar with his own party's left wing by pushing for scaled-back health care reform. "The best Bill Clinton," says former Ronald Reagan Chief of Staff Ken Duberstein, "is the one who stands up to his own constituencies and says no" as he did to organized labor on the North American Free Trade Agreement. That Clinton could run as a moderate against the Republican ideologues -- so long as the government is not paralyzed for the next two years.
Such a Trumanesque strategy seems workable -- except that Bill Clinton does not have Harry Truman's credibility. "His fundamental competence and character are still in question," says GOP strategist Vin Weber. In fact, this week's U.S. News poll shows that the trait that bothers voters the most is Cinton's personal credibility gap: Seventeen percent said he does not have the "moral leadership" to be president. Even though Ronald Reagan lost 26 House seats in the 1982 midterm elections, 35 percent of the voters still considered him honest, sincere and a man of "high moral principles."
To boost his credibility, Clinton needs to pick an issue and fight for it. If he is lucky, the Republicans will overplay their hand. Of course, neither may happen. But there is some solace for Clinton in the voters' ambivalence: While only 34 percent say he deserves re-election, 43 percent still believe he is trying to bring about change. If his performance improves in this next round, so will his odds.
