ORTLAND, Ore. - From the misty mountain forests to this city's thriving high-tech economy, it is hard to imagine a state more suited to Al Gore. But as the presidential campaign increasingly comes down to what happens in a handful of states, the closeness of the race in Oregon and Washington underscores the electoral challenge for Gore, and suggests that the victor could be determined far from the usual battlegrounds.
Here, more than anywhere, Gore is being hurt by the candidacy of the Green Party nominee, Ralph Nader. In 1996, when Nader spent just $5,000 nationwide in his little-noted first run for the presidency, he got nearly 4 percent of the Oregon vote. This year, with a $5 million effort, the Green Party nominee could swing the outcome in as many as six states, analysts said.
Nader's support may shrink toward Election Day, but it already has had far more effect on the national campaign than either campaign anticipated. Gore is being forced to spend millions of dollars to compete in the Pacific Northwest, and he has added a campaign stop today in Portland and tomorrow in Seattle. It is a costly diversion that few Democrats imagined earlier this year. Republican George W. Bush has taken advantage of the turmoil, spending millions of dollars as well in hopes of sewing up a national victory by capturing Oregon and Washington.
''If Bush is competitive in Oregon, let me tell you, Katy bar the door, he can take the country,'' said Darryl Howard, executive director of the Oregon Republican Party. Asked whether Nader's showing in the state is the major reason why the race is statistically tied between Bush and Gore, Howard responded with the favored superlative of the political season. Nader's impact, he said, is ''big time.''
Images of Gore on the defensive are not hard to find here. In a scene unlikely to occur in other states, Governor John A. Kitzhaber, who supports Gore, held a news conference in a riverfront park here last week to announce that the author of ''Earth in the Balance'' - the vice president's impassioned ecology tome - is, in fact, an environmentalist. Then Kitzhaber and some Gore backers attacked the Nader candidacy, something the Gore campaign officially insists is unnecessary because Nader is supposed to be a non-factor.
But some environmentalists who back Nader are not convinced about Gore's credentials. They say Gore helped broker a deal intended to save the spotted owl that allowed some tracts of virgin timber to be felled. They also scowl at Gore's noncommittal statements about whether he would tear down some dams that harm the salmon population. (Bush would retain the dams, and says the fish can be preserved in other ways.)
Xander Patterson, cochairman of the state's Green Party, scoffed at suggestions that a vote for Nader would be a vote taken away from Gore. Gore, Patterson said, cannot take bold environmental steps ''because he is owned by the corporate cabal.'' While campaign aides concede that Nader has no chance to win the race, they say a vote for the consumer advocate could build the Green Party into a permanent power, and could earn federal funding like the Democratic, Republican, and Reform parties. A Nader rally here drew 10,000 supporters recently, and signs in support of his candidacy are plentiful.
All of this has hurt Gore here and in Washington, forcing him into a two-front battle. Indeed, of the top six cities where presidential advertising airs, Seattle has the second-highest number of ads and Portland is sixth. By comparison, the race here was all but ceded to the Democrats in the last three presidential elections.
''It is very possible that Ralph Nader could wind up sinking Gore here,'' said Tim Hibbitts, one of the state's leading pollsters. ''Nader is further complicating what already is a very tricky situation for Gore.''
But it is not just Nader, according to Kitzhaber. Bush is also doing well in his own right because he has been able to present himself as a moderate. Indeed, Bush's ''compassionate conservatism'' is in many ways based on the model used in recent years by moderate Oregon Republicans.
''Oregon is a moderate state and George W. Bush has been able to present himself as a moderate out there, even though he is not a moderate,'' Kitzhaber said, adding that Democrats must do a better job of explaining what Bush really stands for.
But, Kitzhaber said, Gore is also part of the problem.
''He has a style that you have seen in the debates that I think is hard for some people; it is hard to warm up to him, he has a certain personality he has to work to overcome,'' said Kitzhaber, who was himself a late convert to Gore. The governor endorsed Bill Bradley in the primaries in the belief that the former New Jersey senator spoke more forcefully than Gore about the environment and health care.
Still, Kitzhaber said the race wouldn't be close if Nader were not in the race, and leading Republicans agree.
In much of the country, Nader's presence on the ballot is not expected to have much effect. But Nader's low numbers in national polls obscure his real potential. Pollsters said that Nader's support is greater than the margin between Bush and Gore in six states: Oregon, Washington, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Maine, and Florida. Dick Bennett, president of American Research Group, which has surveyed in all 50 states, said that even a 3 percent showing by Nader in some states could tip the balance in Bush's favor.
Another wild card is Michigan, where Nader has avidly courted auto workers and union members.
Clearly, however, Nader's biggest impact is expected to be in Washington and Oregon. Some analysts said that for all the attention lavished on Midwestern ''battleground'' states, it would be the height of irony if Gore lost the presidential campaign by losing the Pacific Northwest. Not for nothing did Gore climb to the peak of Washington's Mount Rainier last August, but the effort to secure the 11 electoral votes in Washington and seven votes in Oregon is proving even more difficult. A candidate needs 270 electoral votes to become president.
A Gore spokesman, Chris Lehane, asked why the race is so close in the Pacific Northwest, responded: ''People are just using an outdated electoral map. There is obviously a strong Green Party contingent in Oregon.'' Lehane said that Gore also is benefiting from the redrawing of the electoral map, suggesting that the vice president could win in states that lean Republican, including Florida.
In the past three presidential campaigns, Democratic presidential candidates easily won Oregon and Washington by similar margins, always by at least eight percentage points.
As Hibbitts views the race, half of Nader's supporters would never vote for Bush or Gore, agreeing with Nader's view of them as Tweedledum and Tweedledee. But the remainder of Nader's backers would vote three-to-one for Gore if the consumer advocate were not in the race, Hibbitts said.
While part of Nader's appeal is attributed to the popularity of the Green Party here, the state also is ideally suited to a third-party independent voice. Ross Perot received 24 percent of the vote in both Oregon and Washington in 1992, and many independent voters in both states continue to look for an alternative to the major parties. Reform Party candidate Patrick J. Buchanan has attracted little support, leaving the field to Nader.
From a distance, Oregon would seem to be so ideal for Gore that, as some backers joke, if it didn't exist, the vice president would have to invent it.
Gore has lavished much attention on the Pacific Northwest, working throughout his vice presidency to mediate between timber companies and environmentalists and leading the way in promoting free-trade deals that have helped bring prosperity to the region. And, not withstanding mockery of Gore's claim that helped invent the Internet, the vice president has worked closely with many of the region's high-tech entrepreneurs.
But this record has set off political chain reactions that have combined to hurt Gore. Gore's support of free-trade deals - a position matched by Bush - has inspired opposition from Nader allies, some of whom played a major role in Seattle protests last year against the influence of the World Trade Organization.
As for Gore's support of the high-tech industry, it is marred by the government's antitrust suit against Microsoft, which has its headquarters in Redmond, Wash. The suit has played a role in this year's plummet in the value of Microsoft stock, as well as having a negative trickle-down effect on other high-tech stocks, which in turn has hurt the fortunes of thousands of influential voters in the region. While Bush has not promised to drop the government's suit if elected president, some Microsoft stockholders are backing Bush in hopes a Republican administration would amicably end the case.
