Gore, on the other hand, has emerged from his primary fight with Bill Bradley in good shape for the fall. To be sure, Bush will try to remind independents of Gore's role in the administration's political scandals, but, after having run a scurrilous campaign against McCain, the Texas governor will have a hard time passing himself off as an advocate of good government. In a March 5 speech at New York' s 92nd Street Y, Gore, speaking without a text, synthesized his programs on education, health care, the environment, and gun control with McCain's and Bradley's commitment to campaign finance reform in a way that will likely appeal to independents this fall. That is the issue. The same kind of campaign that could accept a flood of special interest money will lead to an administration that acts on behalf of these special interests.
Campaigns like to suggest comparisons with past elections.
When Bush was riding high in the polls, his campaign manager, Karl Rove, predicted that the coming election would resemble 1896, when William McKinley crafted a new Republican majority in opposition to Democratic populism. Bush, of course, was to be the McKinley of 2000. Sadly for Bush and Rove, this year looks more like the status quo election of 1988, when the vice president of a popular administration, whose policies and whose party the public was not yet ready to repudiate, routed a seemingly successful governor. In this comparison, Gore gets to play the elder Bush, and Bush becomes Michael Dukakis. They may be right, but it won't happen by fall.