peaking to a group of senior citizens in West Des Moines, Iowa, Bill Bradley was explaining his push for universal health care and sweeping campaign finance reform when one listener rose with a simple question.
''I admire your program and hope it works out,'' the man said. ''But what do you think the chances are that if you're elected, Congress will pass those bills?''
Last week, publisher Steve Forbes had just finished explaining to a group of workers the benefits of his 17 percent flat tax, when one of them raised his hand with a similar query.
''Say you've now been elected, all the elections are over, there's now a Democratic Congress,'' the worker said. ''What are the things you're going to do to implement your flat tax? How are you going to get it through?''
For both Bradley and Forbes, the questions were not unfamiliar. Along the campaign trail, both men have faced frequent skepticism - even among voters who support their goals - that they could achieve their goals if elected.
Bradley, a Democrat, and Forbes, a Republican, have virtually nothing in common. But they do share campaign platforms built around proposals that are unusually ambitious and specific. And they both face questions about whether those plans could survive a journey through any Congress, regardless of its party makeup.
Bradley's chief goal is a new system of health care subsidies for all Americans, estimated to cost $65 billion a year. As the former New Jersey senator notes, that would entail revamping an industry that comprises about one-seventh of the US economy.
Forbes, meanwhile, is seeking a flat tax that would total $684 billion over five years. As Forbes likes to note, that would mean doing battle with the 67,000 tax lobbyists he hopes to put out of work.
While polls show that universal health care is more popular - and perhaps more attainable - than a flat tax, both men say voters are looking for bold change, not the more incremental approaches of rivals such as Vice President Al Gore and Texas Governor George W. Bush.
But day after day on the campaign trail, in interviews and through questions posed to the candidates themselves, voters have expressed reservations about whether these policy dreams can come true.
For instance, Nashua warehouse worker George Lavoie, 29. ''Everyone says they're going to cut taxes, do this and that, do the flat tax.'' Lavoie said during a visit by Forbes to his workplace Tuesday. ''You've got to look at them all and decide which one is realistic.'' To Lavoie, Forbes's 17 percent flat tax plan is not. ''It's hard for me to really believe,'' he said.
Voters like Lavoie may be reacting to recent history in Washington, where neither party has achieved many sweeping legislative goals in recent years. Republicans have pushed multibillion-dollar tax cuts since winning control of Congress in 1994, but have had to settle for piecemeal reductions. Bill Clinton campaigned on a huge middle-class tax cut in 1992, but abandoned it soon after taking office and learning of bigger-than-expected budget deficits.
Most memorably, Clinton's 1993 effort to pass universal health insurance was pummeled by both Democrats and Republicans as well as a huge lobbying effort by the health care industry. (Clinton's humbling experience, at the hands of a Democratic Congress, also showed that the makeup of the House and Senate is no sure predictor of legislative success.)
The memory of Clinton's battle seemed to trouble a voter who spoke to Bradley in Ottumwa, Iowa, recently.
''You have a very good health care plan,'' the man told Bradley. ''But I'm worried that once it hits Congress, the special interests are going to nitpick it apart.''
Bradley and Forbes, as it turns out, also share a similar response to such concerns. Both men argue that they have presented detailed proposals, leaving no uncertainty among voters about what they intend to do. Each man says that, if elected, he would assume a mandate from the public that opponents would defy at their own political peril.
''People say, `How can you get it done?''' Forbes said in Nashua last week. ''First, we get a mandate from the people. Then they can't say people didn't know what they were voting for. ... I've laid it out.''
Using strikingly similar rhetoric, Bradley also says his election would make his health plan difficult to oppose.
''When you are leading on a big issue, you have to have the credibility to lay something out there that is specific enough to say, `This is the direction we're going,''' Bradley said in Iowa recently. ''If I win by a sizable margin, I believe I have a mandate.''
While some voters may remain unconvinced, Forbes insists that the electorate can still force major change in Washington.
''Ronald Reagan said the best educator on Capitol Hill is not sweet reason,'' Forbes tells his audiences. ''The best educator is the heat from an aroused and informed public.''
