hen last we left the presidential campaign, the script was clear: Having demolished Democratic rival Bill Bradley, Al Gore had successfully remade himself as a lean, mean, politicking machine. As for Bush, his acrimonious primary fight with rival John McCain had pinned him down on his party's right wing, and revealed him as an intellectual featherweight.
Based on their primary colors, Gore looked like the man to bet on in November. Or so the story line went.
But as public and media attention has focused elsewhere, this campaign - already filled with revelatory reversals and sudden switchbacks - has turned things on their ear once again.
Bush has been on the offensive with an array of thoughtful policy proposals - ranging from education to the environment to health care to home ownership - that have brought him determinedly back to the political center.
Gore, meanwhile, has suffered from self-inflicted wounds for much of the same period, clumsily breaking with the White House on Elian Gonzalez, the shipwrecked Cuban waif-cum-political pawn. Until Friday, Gore had not met with the national press in two months.
''It is a long time till November, but certainly one can say the roles have been reversed,'' says Stephen Hess, a senior fellow in governmental studies at the Brookings Institution.
In the primary campaign, the prevailing critique of Bush was that his so-called compassionate conservatism was little more than a few rhetorical blandishments, a smattering of Spanish, and clever photo opportunities with minority children.
But since wrapping up the GOP nomination, the Texas governor has moved quickly to unveil ideas that inform his rhetorical framework. As one might expect from a Republican governor, his is a program that emphasizes incentives rather than mandates and state flexibility rather than federal decrees. And in the age-old private-goods-vs.-public-goods debate - in this case, tax cuts vs. new government spending - his package of plans is certainly skewed toward the former.
Still, what's notable is that Bush has pushed aggressively on issues Republicans more generally pay only lip service to or concede to Democrats altogether.
First he proposed a $5 billion, five-year program to focus intensively on reading in the lower grades. Then he offered a $2 billion plan to hasten the cleanup of brownfields.
Next came a $35 billion, five-year plan to offer refundable tax credit of up to $2,000 a year to help moderate-income families purchase health insurance, plus a $3.6 billion, five-year scheme to build new health care clinics in needy or remote areas.
This week, Bush called for $1.7 billion in tax breaks to entice developers to build and rehab homes in struggling areas and for letting people use Section 8 rental vouchers toward down payments on homes of their own.
The specifics of those proposals will be the subject of months of campaign debate; and as Gore demonstrated in the Democratic primary, he can focus with laser-like accuracy on the weaknesses - real or imagined - in an opponent's proposals.
Still, taken together, Bush's first month as the Republican nominee presumptive sends an unmistakable signal: He intends to conduct his campaign in the center, where elections are won and lost, and not on the ideological extremes, where the congressional Republicans have steered their party.
Says GOP pollster Neil Newhouse, ''This is a guy who has been a governor who governs from the mainstream - and he is using issues to demonstrate that.''
Now look at Gore.
Two big events define his campaign in the time since the primary campaign ended. The first is his plan for campaign-finance reform. But rather than supporting true public financing, Gore hopes to build an endowment fund on the cheap, by offering tax deductions for contributors.
One problem: How, exactly, would a tax deduction - which, after all, amounts to only a fraction of the actual value of the donation - induce anyone to contribute to a fund that would also finance candidates he opposes?
By far the bigger issue, however, has been Gore's abrupt break with the Clinton administration's position that Elian Gonzalez should return to his father and Cuba.
Gore's sudden support of legislation to grant the boy and his father, as well as other family members, permanent resident alien status and to move the matter to family court is hardly beyond the policy pale; that really only brings him into sync with Bush.
However, in abandoning the Clinton administration to strike that pose, the vice president leaned hard into his reputation as an expedient politician willing to mortgage principle in pursuit of electoral victory.
''It's almost as if Gore said, `Let's see, what criticism is Bush using against me that has the most reality to it and how can I prove him right?''' says Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia's Center for Governmental Studies.
''I haven't met a single Democrat who thinks he did a smart thing with his Elian Gonzalez comment,'' adds Democratic consultant Dan Payne.
Since his widely panned initial foray on the subject, Gore has redefined his position several more times, but without ever neutralizing the issue.
Most recently, he has said the estranged branches of the boy's family should reach ''a family solution'' - something that seems exceedingly unlikely - and avoided other comment.
''Bush has helped himself by stressing things popular with swing voters, while Gore has had a bad month because of the Elian issue,'' says Bruce Buchanan, a professor of government at the University of Texas at Austin.
The most recent Gallup survey, released April 12, bolsters the widespread perception that Bush has done well, while Gore has performed poorly. That poll shows Bush now leads Gore 50 percent to 41 percent. Not a huge gap, certainly. But it does show a significant improvement from the previous Gallup survey, when the race was a statistical tie, 46 percent to 45 percent.
A Zogby poll released April 17 has a smaller Bush lead - 4.5 percent, which is just outside the margin of error - but shows the same trend toward the Republican.
No wonder Republicans are heartened about their chances.
''There was a perception after the primaries that George W. was not nearly as strong as he had appeared early on and that Al Gore was significantly stronger,'' says Newhouse. ''The last month has shown they are fairly evenly matched, which means it should be a hell of a stretch run.''
Even some Democrats acknowledge Bush has done better than expected - though with some important qualifiers.
''Bush has always operated well when not pressed, but when he gets into the fray of battle he looks weak and diminished,'' says Democratic strategist John Sasso. ''Gore has proved that hand-to-hand combat is his strength, so when the battle is really joined, I think Gore will shine.''
Or, as Mary Anne Marsh, a Democratic consultant, puts it: ''In April, it is a personality contest, and Bush is winning that race. But in October, the race is about trust, and that is one Al Gore should be able to win.''
All that may well be true. Nevertheless, at this early juncture, Bush has surprised everyone by winning round one - handily.
