ALUDA, S.C. - Moving toward tonight's critical debate in the Republican primary race, Governor George W. Bush hinted yesterday he would attack Senator John S. McCain's record, while McCain charged Bush with conducting a ''trash and garbage offensive.''
Tensions between the two camp s ran as high as ever. And as polls showed Bush and McCain locked in a virtual tie in South Carolina, where the primary on Saturday could determine the outcome of the Republican race, the candidates struggled to hammer home their plans to change the political establishment.
Bush, returning here after a day home in Austin, Texas, said he would highlight ''differences of opinion'' with McCain during tonight's three-candidate debate. But Bush's aides predicted the governor would roll out new allegations, in keeping with his recent pattern of accusing McCain of a different inconsistency each day.
''I think we'll see Governor Bush outline very clearly the differences between what chairman McCain says and what he does,'' Karen Hughes, Bush's communications director, said of the debate strategy. ''I think it will be new to the audience on television.''
In anticipation of Bush's line of attack, McCain, who chairs the Senate Commerce Committee, told reporters aboard his campaign bus that it might be possible ''for 200 staffers'' parsing the record to ''find contradictions'' in his Senate votes. ''You obviously rethink your position on some things,'' he said. ''To have total rigidity in a position over 17 years in Congress would be foolish.''
McCain, Bush, and Alan Keyes are scheduled to square off at 9 p.m. EST tonight, in a 90-minute debate hosted by CNN's Larry King. The format is expected to be less formal, and, given the host, more freewheeling, than the previous GOP debates, with some 400 local business leaders and residents and 300 reporters in attendance.
The debate, sponsored by the South Carolina Business and Industrial Political Education Committee, or BIPEC, will allow candidates ample time to question each other, a spokeswoman said. Given the contentiousness of the GOP campaign in recent weeks, as McCain and Bush have sparred via the media from separate cities, several campaign aides said they expected the debate to be heated, if not bitter.
Still, McCain said yesterday neither he nor Bush could afford an escalation in hostilities. ''There's too much at stake here,'' he said at a crowded American Legion post in Greenwood. Last Friday, McCain pulled two of his TV advertisements, saying the negativity in the race had gone too far.
McCain also continued to say he was being maligned by his opponent, a tactic Bush also uses.
A prominent McCain supporter, Representative Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, told a crowd the Bush campaign is ''trying to take our good man and paint him something he ain't.'' And McCain repeatedly portrayed himself as a victim of the Bush attack. ''Our politics should not be about savaging each other,'' McCain said. ''This negativism has got to stop.''
Since last Monday, Bush has described almost every day what he calls inconsistencies in McCain's platform and legislative record. In addition to saying McCain's campaign finance reform proposal would harm the Republican Party, Bush has criticized McCain for taking campaign money from lobbyists, riding on corporate jets and, yesterday, for voting five times for the public financing of congressional elections.
McCain now opposes such public funding, and said those earlier votes were the sort of compromises that constitute ''the essence of legislating.'' He suggested Bush's attempts to portray them as anything else were insincere. And McCain asserted: ''This kind of savagery is not necessary in an American political campaign.'' McCain, saying he would ''not let the perfect be the enemy of the good,'' described his votes as necessary to reach a campaign finance compromise.
Bush ridiculed McCain's use of the word ''savagery.''
''I think it's important for us in the Republican Party to understand, our candidate is going to have to withstand a savaging attack if Al Gore is the nominee,'' he said.
If McCain succeeds in derailing Bush in South Carolina, the senator's momentum could wither the Texas governor's image as a winner. Bush entered the campaign with a $70 million treasury and the support of much of the Republican establishment.
The next primaries will be held a week from today in Michigan and Arizona, McCain's home state. The potential impact of South Carolina's results was described by Sage Eastman, spokesman for the Republican Party in Michigan. ''Clearly, if John McCain wins in South Carolina, if he wins the debate, a lot of people are expecting it to snowball as it heads into Michigan,'' Eastman said.
Bush's South Carolina communications director, Tucker Eskew, said the debate ''will give us a chance to show George W. Bush's personality, his command of the issues and his record of getting results. People are talking. The buzz is very good. We want the debate to continue that.''
Meanwhile, the two men also sparred over McCain's efforts to draw support from Democrats and independents, who are free to vote in South Carolina's open primary.
''People are welcome to come into the party, that's fine with me,'' Bush said. ''I just don't want Democrats coming in to vote against me because they think my opponent will be easier to beat in November. We're trying to get rid of the Clinton era, not reinforce it.''
McCain defended his efforts to reach out to new voters. ''I'll reach across the partisan aisle and extend a hand to Democrats,'' he said. ''The American people are weary of us constantly, constantly fighting with one another and getting gridlock and never getting anything done.''
Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.
