This has been a sickening season for those who have had bright hopes for the Clinton presidency. Before the Paula Jones lawsuit, it was widely believed that Bill Clinton wasn't suffering much from doubts about his character: Liberals smugly bragged that voters knew bad things about him and elected him anyway, while conservatives angrily complained that voters weren't punishing him enough. But both sides were wrong then and are more wrong now, because Clinton is paying a clear and measurable price for voters' concerns about his character. His job approval ratings are way below where they should be.
The previous three presidents, in times of perceived economic growth, had much higher job ratings: George Bush's Gallup approval hovered around 70 percent from spring 1989 to summer 1990; Ronald Reagan's was in the mid-60s from summer 1985 to fall 1986, and Jimmy Carter's was between the mid-60s and the low 70s in the first half of 1977. In contrast, from last December through February, when voters were responding to the strong fourth-quarter surge in the economy, Clinton averaged only 52 percent approval (and reached 60 percent only once) in 25 polls tallied by American Enterprise magazine. Since the spate of Whitewater stories in March, his approval has fallen, hovering below 50 per-cent. All of this suggests that Clinton was paying a 15-point penalty for his personal shortcomings before the Whitewater story took off; it has now grown to around 20 points and may go higher. Clinton defenders are quite right in saying that a 50 per-cent president can be re- elected. But no politician gives up 20 points hap-pily. Clinton is a strong and spirited horse. Still, he is carrying an awfullot of weight around the track.
His problems are not helping him on his issues -- most notably on health care finance reform. Public support for the Clinton plan is now stuck far below 50 finance reform. Public support for the Clinton plan is now stuck far below 50 percent, and it is a dead letter in Congress. The lead there is being taken by dedicated and talented Democrats who want a bigger role for government in health care -- Edward Kennedy, Dan Rostenkowski, John Dingell and Pete Stark. But none has yet put together a majority in his full congressional committee, much less on the floor.
Health-reform blues. There is a growing possibility that Clinton's plan will crash and burn. Liberal leaders see this as perhaps their only opening in a quarter century to build a government-guaranteed health care system, and they may hold out so long for a maximalist plan as to leave no time to patch together a less ambitious approach that could easily win a majority. Clinton strategists have long argued that public demand for reform is so great that Democrats and even Republicans dare not go home to voters this fall without passing a major bill. But recent polls say just the opposite. Some 59 percent in an April USA Today/CNN/Gallup poll say they would rather see Congress change the health care system gradually. And a 58 to 34 percent margin in the May NBC/Wall Street Journal poll says Congress should act next year rather than this. In an era of distrust of government action, the evidence is strong that voters would prefer no action to the risks they see in a legislative redesign of one seventh of the economy.
The operative precedent for members of Congress, Clintonites have argued, should be the 1991 Pennsylvania Senate victory of Democrat Harris Wofford, who called for health care reform legislation about which his opponent was indifferent to hostile. But the operative precedent in the minds of many key Democrats on health-bill writing committees is the catastrophic health care act. It was passed overwhelmingly by Congress in 1988 but repealed in 1989 after angry protests that included a mob of elderly citizens surrounding Rostenkowski's car in downtown Chicago. For lawmakers, it would be worse to pass something bad -- and many now think Clinton's is bad -- than to pass nothing at all. Clinton originally hoped that public opinion and the force of his leadership could pass his health plan. Now, neither is working, and he is hoping that parliamentary legerdemain -- a favorable rule in the House, draftsmanship behind doors in a conference committee -- will result in the passage of something that can plausibly be described as similar to his proposal.
Clinton pollster Stan Greenberg is one of many liberals who hoped that Clinton could transform his 43 percent 1992 victory into success for a program of government benefits for the middle class and a solid Democratic majority in 1996 and after. He hasn't made much progress yet. A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll in late March showed Clinton trailing "the Republican Party's candidate for president" by 50 to 43 percent. And Republicans stand to make gains -- possibly big gains -- in the 1994 off-year election. The assumption around Washington is that Bill Clinton will probably be re-elected in 1996. But Clinton, personally mistrusted and programmatically unfulfilled, may find himself in the uncomfortable position of a candidate whose re-election strategy has as one of its essential steps: "Your best hope -- the other guy screws up."
