EDFORD, N.H. - Texas Governor George W. Bush is burning. He can't believe what Vice President Al Gore just did, showing up in Texas to chide the governor for letting children be taught in trailers.
This, Bush says, is exactly the trouble with Gore. While Bush braves controversy, calling for federal tax dollars for private schools, Gore talks about building new schools, doubtless after consulting with a pollster.
''I'm sure the polls said something about buildings,'' says Bush, scrunched behind a kitchenette table in the campaign Winnebago known as Minnie the Winnie. ''I talk about children, and he talks about buildings. Therein lies the difference.''
Bush scans a semicircle of aides, smiling and satisfied. There is just one problem: On the very day Bush is lashing out against Gore for ignoring children, the vice president has unveiled a plan to provide health insurance for every child in America.
Bush has no child health plan - not yet. An aide later says that advisers are crafting one.
It is a moment that says much about the way the Texas governor is campaigning for president, scripted to the sentence when the issue is familiar; improvising, sometimes awkwardly, when it is not.
At campaign stops in the key states of Iowa, New Hampshire, and Michigan, plus an unexpected detour to Texas to deal with the Fort Worth church shooting, Bush emerges as a candidate almost forming before your eyes, substance racing to catch up to the famous name and front-runner status.
He is a consummate campaigner, tending to the crowds on the trail like a host at a barbecue, glad-handing every comer, grinning at flashbulbs of a thousand cameras. He seems bemused by it all, this cowboy-booted son of a former president, barely known nationally until this year, and now treated like a political incarnation of a country-and-western star.
But as Bush travels through the key caucus and primary states, the layers of complexity behind his incandescent smile are slowly revealed. On the stump, he plays it safe and predictable, rarely risking a new phrase.
But in question-and-answer sessions that follow, Bush sometimes seems stumped, struggling to answer questions about federal repayment of immigration costs to states and the use of US troops in East Timor. But he does it all with a wink and a pleading smile that seems to say, ''Go easy on me.''
And mostly, the voters do.
On one recent day, the bandwagon makes a hastily arranged stop at a sunny plaza outside the Holy Redeemer Church in southwest Detroit, a heavily Hispanic area that usually votes solidly Democratic. Amid the mariachi music, an announcer's introduction booms across the crowd assembled to celebrate Mexican Independence Day: ''Senor George W. Bush!''
The Texas governor strides on stage, speaking Spanish for a few minutes, before bellowing, ''God Bless Mexico!'' to thunderous applause. Beaming with delight, he sweeps his hand across the audience and says, ''This is the American dream.'' The hundreds of people, many of them waving Mexican flags freshly signed by Bush, roar back their approval.
''Bush, Bush!'' the chant begins. ''Viva Bush!''
Among those in the crowd is Benjamin Leiva, 42, who has never voted before, but plans to back Bush. When Bush approaches a booth set up by the Jobs Corps, Ranada Reid, 29, excitedly comes out from behind the counter and tells the governor she has seen people criticize him on television.
''You ignore them and be a good president,'' Reid tells Bush.
''I will, or my Mom's going to get down on me,'' Bush says, grinning.
Later, Reid said she has always supported Democrats but will vote for Bush because ''he is a different kind of Republican. He really cares about people.'' So what did Reid think about Bush's father, former President Bush? Reid's face turned sour. ''President Bush was plastic,'' she said. ''Governor Bush is different.''
Bush, when asked, speaks warmly about the bond of love and gratitude between son and father. But the former president's political legacy is not an unalloyed blessing, which may explain this: At more than 20 campaign events observed by a reporter this summer, Bush never brought up his father's name except when the two met at the family compound in Kennebunkport.
Bush leaves the Detroit event with a grin as wide as the festive Mexican hats. His political strategy rests greatly on the theory that he can win over Democrats and independents, by ''going where Republicans usually don't go,'' as he puts it. If Bush wins the Republican primary and becomes president, aides say, the key could be groundwork laid in places like the sun-splashed courtyard of Holy Redeemer Church.
The flip side of the Bush campaign sometimes is not so sunny. In an ongoing Doonesbury cartoon strip, written by Bush's fellow Yale alumnus Garry Trudeau, the governor is mercilessly portrayed as an airhead who wears a cowboy hat, with frequent allusions to Bush's refusal to say whether he used cocaine or other illegal drugs. It is an issue rarely raised by voters at Bush's public events, but often comes up in encounters with the news media.
On one recent day in New Hampshire, after traveling the state in his Winnebago, Bush is pumped, smiling, his eyes handsomely crinkled at the corners, ready for any question. Until, that is, a reporter asks: Has the governor ever broken the law himself?
Just hours earlier, Bush had lectured an audience about his plan for a ''new era of responsibility,'' deriding a decade when people said, ''If it feels good, do it.'' Bush warned of the evils of drug use and alcohol abuse, and suggested that he had a place for those who break the law: ''In Texas, we call it jail.'' The crowd loved it, hooting and hollering as a beaming Bush left the podium.
But now, in the confines of ''Minnie the Winnie,'' the candidate recoils, seeing the question as yet another way to pose the drug question. ''I'm not going to talk about what I did.'' Bush says sternly, looking like he might show his visitor the exit. Then, winking, he smiles and says: ''Nice try!'' And a moment later, ''It was clever!'' But then he is stern again, declaring: ''It was not clever. I have answered the question all I am going to answer it.''
And then it passes. If there is a contradiction between his words and deeds, Bush won't acknowledge it. He is having too much fun as the front-runner, campaigning for president, and he knows the fun might fade in the coming months. The son of a former president has seen his father lose campaigns in 1964, 1970, and 1992 for the House, Senate, and presidency, so one of his favorite lines is that he is ''not afraid of failure.''
''What happens on a campaign trail is you end up looking at the unvarnished person.'' Bush says in a moment of introspection. ''I get tired. It is a grueling experience.''
In Milford, N.H., a village-turned-suburb near the Massachusetts border, the streets are blocked off and lined with security agents, as if the president were about to arrive. Bush is swarmed as he leaves the restaurant and takes a carefully choreographed walk to the fire station.
Such scenes raise the question: How did Bush soar so high so fast in the polls? The answer is circular. He is high in the polls because he has always been high in the polls, thanks to his name recognition and the belief of many Republicans that he is most likely to be elected.
Yet ask Bush about the polls, and he displays nothing but contempt.
''People want to know principles,'' Bush says. ''People are sickened by the politics of taking polls. I've never taken a poll as governor to figure out what issue I should take a stand on.''
In the same vein, Bush insists he is running a grass-roots campaign, albeit with $50 million in the bank, including a huge amount from the party establishment.
''To me, it's fitting to launch a grass-roots campaign in a fire station,'' Bush tells the crowd of 200 or so people inside the sweltering fire station. The audience may not have grasped Bush's logic, but most loved his message.
Bush's speech rarely varies. He always starts by saying he loves his wife, Laura - ''the best decision I ever made'' - and his twin 17-year-old daughters. He wants to restore ''dignity to the Oval Office,'' an allusion to President Clinton's infidelity. Then he urges the audience to reject ''the politics of personal destruction'' - the sort of politics that would force him to say more of the ''young and irresponsible'' ways he says he has left behind.
His is a broad-band message, crafted to appeal to Republicans, independents, and even Democrats. And where he seems to contradict himself, it seems not to bother the candidate or most in his audience. Bush, for example, says the government can cut taxes largely by eliminating many programs, but he has implied he would boost the defense budget by billions of dollars because the country must have a ''sharpened sword.''
But when encountering the unexpected, he seems to lose his edge. After Bush's stump speech to the Greater Salem Chamber of Commerce in Windham, N.H., a member of the audience rises to tell Bush about his 25-year-old mentally retarded son. What will Bush do to help the mentally retarded get jobs, asks Philip A. Pearson.
Bush does not appear to have thought about the matter. When Pearson seems unsatisfied with Bush's vague promise to discuss the issue, Bush shrugs and curtly ends the question-and-answer session.
''Sorry,'' he says.
Bush knows he must fill in the blanks. For one thing, voters, even admirers, tell him as much.
Nancy Ryer, a recently relocated Texan who lives in Amherst, N.H., greets the governor in Milford and says she is a big fan of his. But she says that she has gone from definitely supporting Bush to probably backing him, partly because she is intrigued by the life story of Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican and former Vietnam prisoner of war. ''I do look forward to hearing more about the issues,'' she says.
Bush says he plans to fill in many of the blanks this fall with a series of policy announcements, but he sees no reason to hurry, or to shift his overall message or tone.
''People seem to like the message and if it is working, why change?'' Bush says, then adds, as if in confidence: ''By the way, in the '94 campaign [for governor] I pretty much said the same thing the entire campaign there, too.''
