ASHINGTON - When Al Gore appeared last week in Little Rock, Ark., he introduced what he called ''the tale of two candidates.'' With rhetorical flourish, he said one candidate - himself - has a plan to eliminate the national debt and has downsized government. Gore said the second candidate, George W. Bush, has a ''welfare plan for the wealthiest.''
It was a speech that top advisers had waited weeks to hear. Indeed, perhaps at no time during his campaign has Gore given a more impassioned description of himself as a moderate ''New Democrat.'' Gore said he would not allow Bush to run against him as ''a mythical big-spending candidate, a cartoon candidate from campaigns past.''
But the speech was also notable because Gore's campaign has its own tale of two candidates. Except for the Oct. 24 speech and a few other occasions, Gore has almost never focused on his role in organizing the New Democrats, and he rarely takes on liberal constituencies within his party, as President Clinton has often done.
Instead, Gore has been forced to continue to appeal to his liberal base in an effort to stop losing votes to Green Party nominee Ralph Nader. Only in the last two weeks, at the urging of some advisers, has Gore begun to renew the New Democrat theme.
Gore, in effect, is being ''triangulated,'' to use a phrase first applied to Clinton's split with congressional Democrats and Republicans. Gore is caught between his two-pronged effort to appeal both to the liberal Naderites and the moderate suburbanites. Bush, meanwhile, has long since sewn up most of the conservative vote and has spent months single-mindedly focusing on moderates, running to the middle as a ''compassionate conservative.''
''There is no question that Bush saw the winning formula,'' said Al From, president of the Democratic Leadership Council, the moderate New Democrat group. ''Bush saw Bill Clinton win by capturing the political center, and there is no question he is trying to do that. The issue is whether his policies, when you look at them, are conventional conservative.''
In the last few days, for example, Bush has said, ''I will spend more for education,'' and that he would not put a cap on government benefits for prescription drugs. Bush has played down any emphasis on his opposition to abortion rights and avoided any direct attack on affirmative action.
The result of Bush's appeal is clear even in a season of wildly shifting polls. Bush faces no serious threat on the right, with Reform Party candidate Patrick J. Buchanan making little headway. Moreover, polls show that conservatives are the largest group of likely voters.
The most recent Gallup Poll found that 43 percent of likely voters identify themselves as conservative, with Bush winning among that group by a nearly 3-to-1 margin. Moderates, who make up 39 percent of the electorate, favor Gore by 19 percentage points. Liberals, who make up only 15 percent of the electorate, back Gore 8-to-1, with Nader picking nearly all of his support from that group.
The bottom line is that Gore appears to have a much smaller ideological base than Bush, and must win a sizable portion of moderates in order to become president.
Gore may, indeed, feel he is in a no-win situation. For example, when he travels to Oregon, he promotes himself as an environmentalist. But some in Oregon believe Gore has caved too often on environmental issues and are supporting Nader.
But when Gore goes to West Virginia and proclaims himself on the side of the coal miner, he is attacked by some as being too strict on the environment. Thus, for opposite reasons, Gore faces the possibility of losing two of the most reliably Democratic states in presidential elections.
''This is a very frustrating moment for Gore,'' said Senator Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, a leader of the New Democrat wing. ''He has had to appeal to the people moving toward Nader, which tends to be the more liberal wing.''
When Gore picked Joseph I. Lieberman as his running mate in August, many Democrats hailed the decision as a much-needed victory for the New Democrat wing.
But shortly after selecting Lieberman and signaling a centrist strategy, Gore switched gears when he got to the Democratic National Convention. Fending off criticism from liberals and some black leaders that the Lieberman choice hinted a rightward turn, Gore presented himself as a populist, taking on an array of corporate interests. The pitch patched up the Democratic base, and the Gore campaign thought it would be free to woo moderates as the election wound down.
But a sizable group of independent-minded voters and disaffected Democrats still were not satisfied. This group of voters was generally upset by some of the actions that defined Gore as a New Democrat. They recoiled at his support of free trade, scoffed at his inability to pass the tough environmental laws he has advocated, and rued his support of welfare reform. It is mostly from this group of voters that Nader draws his support.
Six weeks ago, even when Gore's boosters among the New Democrats were euphoric about his rise in the polls, some warned that they saw danger signs ahead.
''It's important for Gore to pursue the New Democrat agenda laid out in the Democratic Party platform,'' From wrote in a September memo to members of the Democratic Leadership Council. ''That's the only proven formula for winning the Democratic base and the key independent swing voters.''
From, asked whether Gore has been articulating the moderate themes needed to win, said: ''Gore has had a lot of proposals. What he hasn't done as much is to put it all into context thematically. As you get to the end of the campaign, you get to do that some more.''
Still, to the New Democrats, Gore gave no better speech than the one in Little Rock. He mixed in plenty of populism, including his standard line about how he will ''fight for you,'' but tempered it with lines that seemed written by Clinton.
''I don't want to ever see another era of big government,'' Gore said. ''But I certainly don't want to ever see another era of big special interests that wield more power than the American people.''
