Pocketbook issues, not war, top Americans' agenda

CHUCK RAASCH, GANNETT NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON -- The state of the political union is tenuous: Unity in Washington, D.C., is fading, but America's appetite for getting along has grown.

The bipartisanship shown immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks has transformed to sharp election-year divisions over energy and the economy.

And, as President Bush prepares to deliver his first State of the Union message Tuesday, the economy -- not the war -- has risen as the top issue. The Enron scandal has helped refocus Americans' concerns on pocketbook issues, especially their retirement security.

A new "Battleground" poll by Democrat pollster Celinda Lake and Republican pollster Ed Goeas found that about four in 10 Americans listed economic concerns as their top worry. Only 15 percent named terrorism and national defense. And 70 percent said they felt the economy was either in fair or poor shape.

"It is the economy, not the war, that is topping the agenda," Lake said.

As President Bush delivers his message Tuesday, his party controls the House of Representatives by a scant 11 votes. Republicans lost the Senate last year with the defection of Vermont independent Jim Jeffords. Future control of both bodies could be a major mystery of the year. Most observers expect Republicans to lose governorships this fall. They now control 27 states.

Still, Republicans are positioned better than they might have dreamed possible before Sept. 11. They are led by a popular wartime president. Bush has 84 percent job approval in the Battleground survey of Jan. 4-6, and has been at that level or above for more than four months. The poll of 1,000 Americans has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

Issues that could have hurt Republicans in congressional elections in November -- especially if the recession persists -- are no longer clear Democratic advantages. Indeed, both Lake and Goeas said the Republicans' resurgence on which party is best able to improve education is one reason why Bush's approval rating has remained so high after the Sept. 11 attacks. He is also seen as more attentive to the economy than his father was.

Democrats' woes

And Democrats have image problems.

Their leader in the Senate, Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., has only a 35 percent to 26 percent negative-to-positive ratio in the Battleground survey. Their previous leaders, Bill Clinton and Al Gore, are seen negatively by roughly half of the voters, while Bush's negative rating is only 16 percent.

Democrats are caught between rallying behind the war effort and wanting to regain the initiative for the November elections. Increasingly, they are pushing populist positions on energy, taxes and health care and framing Bush and the GOP as tone-deaf to the recession's cost on jobs, profits and government revenue.

But being loyal opponents is made harder by the public's wariness of too much partisanship. Even amid recession, war and a call for campaign finance reform, both political parties raised record amounts of money for the year after presidential elections. The top three Democratic committees took in about $118 million in 2001. The top three Republican committees raised a combined $200 million.

Prime movers

Four big factors are pushing 2002 politics:

- A hazardous public opinion undercurrent: Despite signs that Congress and the White House face potential gridlock on issues such as taxes and energy, Americans expect comity this year -- far more than they did a year ago. In a Jan. 9-13 poll of 1,201 adults, the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that 53 percent of respondents expected more bipartisanship in 2002, up from 41 percent a year ago. So the expectations for this Congress and Bush to get things done -- even in an election year -- are very high. The poll's margin of error was plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

"In the face of a struggling economy and the continuing war on terrorism, Americans begin 2002 upbeat about (Bush's) job performance, his coming State of the Union address and the prospects for bipartisanship," Pew concluded. "... Preventing future terrorist attacks and mending the economy are the biggest priorities this year."

- The new Bush: Denigrated and doubted a year ago when he arrived in Washington, D.C., after the disputed 2000 election, Bush has enjoyed approval ratings exceeding 80 percent for more than four months. Even his pollster, Matthew Dowd, expects the ratings to settle back into the 60 percent range. The question is when, and whether that will preclude Bush from having any coattails for other Republican candidates in the handful of races that matter in November. Bush's wartime popularity mattered little in New Jersey and Virginia governor's races last year, which Democrats won.

But Goeas said he believes Bush's coattails are partially responsible for a rise in Republican fortunes. After Bush's first 100 days in office, Americans said they preferred Democrats in Congress by 5 percentage points. In early January, Republicans had a 2-point edge, for an overall gain of 7 points. "It is clear that (Bush) has connected with the voters in a very deep way," Goeas said.

- The state of the war: Will successes in Afghanistan be followed elsewhere? Will Americans entering the voting booths in November still see terrorist threats at home and a need to vigorously prosecute the war abroad? Bush's biggest challenge this year may be to keep wartime urgency in a dispersed global conflict that could be largely covert.

Republicans have to be careful not to overreach on the war. When Bush political adviser Karl Rove told Republican leaders this month that Bush's war record was an important part of his political success, Democrats counterattacked Rove for injecting partisanship into what has been a bipartisan effort since Sept. 11.

- Democrats' early presidential sweepstakes: Democratic leaders in Congress are making early moves at the White House or are appearing on party wish lists. Former Vice President Gore has markedly divorced himself from public life.

Maneuvering or appearing on lists: Sens. Daschle; John Kerry, D-Mass; John Edwards, D-N.C.; Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn.; Joseph Biden, D-Del.; and House Democratic Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo.

This year, these presidential wannabes will run into one another more frequently as they seek advantages on issues and among key Democratic constituencies.

An early example: Jeffords, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats and chairs the Senate Energy Committee, has acknowledged stepping back from the energy policy spotlight to allow Kerry to become the leading Democrat pushing an alternative to Bush's. Several potential Democratic presidential candidates took trips to Afghanistan and other foreign countries during the congressional recess -- a foreign policy prerequisite for anyone interested in challenging Bush in 2004.

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