OLUMBIA, S.C. - Six days after his stinging defeat in the New Hampshire primary, George W. Bush burst back onto the campaign trail with a slew of bright blue posters and a catchy new self-description: ''Reformer with Results.''
It seemed, at the time, a longshot.
That strategy called for Bush, the son of a former president and the darling of the Republican establishment, to steal the insurgent aura of Senator John S. McCain, lay claim to the issue of campaign-finance reform, and convince the voter that he was more down to earth.
Bush aides brushed such doubts aside. And last night, Karen Hughes, the communications director who dreamed up the slogan while driving to get a haircut, took Bush's solid victory in South Carolina as vindication of the message. Expertly melding Bush's slogans into a single phrase, Hughes declared the primary a ''victory for a message that is conservative and compassionate, and a messenger who is a reformer with results.''
In truth, it was just one part of a strategy that also focused on turning loyal Republicans and social conservatives against McCain, through a drumbeat of phone calls and TV and radio appearances by sharp-tongued Bush surrogates. And Bush undeniably benefited from the muscle of the Republican Party in South Carolina, as well as the devotion of religious right.
But in a campaign that has hardly shifted an inch since it was launched last year, and for a candidate who rarely adds even a new word to his stump speech, the ''reformer with results'' platform may turn out to be the most radical addition of the entire Bush candidacy.
Despite its obvious similarities to the McCain platform, Bush aides insist the message grew out of his Texas gubernatorial race in 1994, in which he promised to enact changes in four key areas: Crime, education, taxes, and the legal system.
Hughes joined the Bush staff that year. She helped him repeat the mantra again in 1998, when he ran for reelection and won. But it was not until Feb. 5, the Saturday after the New Hampshire primary, she said, that the now-ubiquitous phrase gelled in her mind.
As the campaign gathered in South Carolina the day after the surprising blow, aides scrambled to reshape a longstanding message - compassionate conservative - that had obviously failed to grip the imagination of the voting public. At one strategy meeting in particular, a number of ideas were proposed.
But Bush, still reeling, did nothing to change his message that week, waiting until he returned home to Austin that weekend to, as he puts it, ''retool.''
It was then that Hughes, driving in her car that Saturday, conceived the phrase.
''I'd been increasingly frustrated,'' she said, ''because in some ways, our success was a double-edged sword. We were so successful at earning support from party leaders that that began to be used against us.''
She called senior adviser Karl Rove from her car phone. Rove, in turn, called Bush, who was spending the day at his half-built ranch just outside Waco.
Bush said it was an ''interesting idea.'' Then he asked Rove what he thought.
''I said, `She's absolutely right,''' Rove recalled. ''It's how you ran in 1994, 1998. You used the word endlessly. Where did we get away from using it?''
Bush aides are at a loss to answer that question. They vehemently deny it is any way part of a plan to steal McCain's message. But it helps further several of the goals Bush has laid out since his Feb. 1 loss, especially differentiating himself from McCain.
Rarely over the past two weeks, did Bush get bogged down in details of his Texas record, where opponents dispute his claim of reforms. Instead he stuck to ''reformer with results,'' again and again and again.
According to CNN's exit polls, a full 61 percent of those who voted yesterday saw Bush as the ''real reformer.'' McCain, by contrast, was perceived that way by just 54 percent.
And McCain seemed burned by the tactic. During a vitriolic concession speech last night, McCain hardly bothered to disguise his contempt for Bush's claim. He offered voters a choice: ''Between a record of reform and an empty slogan of reform.''
Bush aides, watching the speech on TV, laughed.
