ANCHESTER, N.H. - Shifting into the final phase of his New Hampshire primary campaign, Vice President Al Gore arrives here tomorrow with a question for voters.
''I'm asking people, `Can we do even better?''' said Gore during a telephone interview this weekend from Waterloo, Iowa.
The question, he said, comes in response to another question his opponent, Bill Bradley, has posed to the farmers of Iowa.
''A couple of weeks ago, Senator Bradley said, `Are we better off now than we were seven years ago?' Throughout New Hampshire and New England, the answer is obvious,'' Gore said.
As he crisscrosses the Granite State, Gore said he plans to remind voters of a not-so-distant but very bleak past, when the state was losing 10,000 jobs a year. He wants voters to remember how far they have come from that recession. And he intends to issue a challenge, too, for an even better future on education, the economy, and health care.
''The answer to his question is obviously yes, but the question is, can we do even better?'' Gore said. ''This message is one that embodies proposals in the economy, health care and education and really provides a blueprint for answering that question with a resounding yes.''
On the economy, Gore plans to remind voters here that today, jobs are being created at a rate of 16,000 a year, and New Hampshire has the highest concentration of high-tech jobs in the nation. He said he wants to continue the pace by maintaining a balanced budget and paying down the national debt each year.
On health care, Gore will reminisce about protecting Medicaid from assaults by Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker. Now, he said he wants to provide coverage for every child by taking steps that ''are both bold and practical.''
On education, Gore said he will remind voters that the administration hired 100,000 new teachers and connected students to the Internet. Now, he said, he wants to bring ''revolutionary change'' to education from pre-kindergarten to post-high school. ''I will make the greatest commitment to education since the GI bill,'' he said.
Gore is winnowing his message into a few easy-to-remember topics, similar to the way Bradley has campaigned this year. Bradley has said that he is seeking a mandate, should he be elected president, and he sticks to health care, gun control, child poverty and race relations when speaking to voters.
Gore has criticized Bradley for that approach, and he insisted that he is laying out an agenda not just on a single challenge, but on all the challenges facing the voters.
''I believe in my heart it's just the beginning,'' he said.
Over the past year, Gore has made several adjustments to his campaign style and message, struggling for the right tone and substance to impress voters. Initially, he approached the Granite State as a vice president, with staged backdrops of blue drapery and the official seal on a tall, formal podium. When a Boston Globe poll showed his appeal to voters was plummeting in the face of Bradley's challenge, Gore decided to throw out the White House props and get closer to the people.
But Gore was also paying close attention to the lofty rhetoric and the limited number of issues Bradley was using to inspire people. Frequently, Bradley will ask voters, ''if not now, when?'' And Bradley himself was the first to insist ''we can do better.''
As Gore focuses on education, health care, and the economy, and as he asks voters if it is not possible to do better, it appears he is engaging in the sincerest form of flattery.
''I've gotten a whole lot better as a communicator and a candidate,'' Gore said of the metamorphosis of his message over the year. ''Partly, it's in response to the stiff competition from Senator Bradley and the fine people helping him. Partly, it's in response to the suggestions and advice my friends and supporters have offered. But mostly, it's the result of total immersion in this intensive conversation with people in New Hampshire and Iowa and elsewhere and learning the music of the year 2000,'' Gore said. ''Once you catch the tune, it stays with you.''
But there are voters who have yet to make up their minds, and Gore calls these last days crucial to his race.
''For one thing, there are people I have not yet met personally and I want to continue and even step up my efforts in the final week to meet as many people as possible,'' he said. His schedule includes rallies to energize supporters, tours of successful businesses to show off the economic progress of the state, and a whirlwind of hand-shaking at factory gates, cafes, and in neighborhoods. He will be hitting Democratic strongholds, such as Manchester, Nashua, Portsmouth, Concord, and Lebanon.
Gore said he does not believe any of the polls that have just begun to show his support slightly surpassing Bradley's.
Gore said the polls are ''just fleeting snapshots in time'' and that the majority of them still show Bradley ahead in New Hampshire.
Gore said he continues to approach the race as if he were far behind his opponent.
''I'm campaigning like an underdog, whether I am or not,'' said Gore, who is also banking that his volunteers will feel the same way. ''All of these folks that are helping me are filled with the kind of determination that is not deterred by any of these public opinion polls that are going up or down or sideways.''
