POLITICS

These are fighting words

By Michael Kranish, Globe Staff, February 28, 1999

WASHINGTON -- Lamar Alexander calls them "weasel words." Dan Quayle says he has ordered his staff "never, ever" to utter such language. Even Al Gore mocks the notion.

What is this controversial idea that so many presidential hopefuls find appalling? Something to do with drugs and violence? Not at all.

It is a concept labeled "compassionate conservatism," a philosophy espoused by Texas Governor George W. Bush, in some polls the front-runner for the Republican nomination. The debate over compassionate conservatism is taken so seriously by Republicans that many believe the outcome could determine the party's nominee.

On the surface, it may seem bizarre that a fight would break out over a concept intended to sound as American as apple pie or the Statue of Liberty. Many Republicans are conservatives, so that part is not controversial. But when it comes to compassion, some Republican temperatures rise. "Compassion" is interpreted as a code word for "moderate."

While the attacks on the language clearly are preemptive strikes at Bush's still-unannounced candidacy, the controversy can be best understood by remembering the words of Bush's father, the former president.

It was 1988 when George Herbert Walker Bush, then the vice president, said at the Republican National Convention that he would be a "kinder, gentler" president, an implicit criticism of President Reagan.

The line got a lot of applause from the party's moderates and, outside the convention hall, from many Democrats.

But conservatives suspected that Bush's kinder, gentler America actually meant a bigger, more regulatory government. After a couple of years of the Bush administration, conservatives believed that is exactly what had happened, with the passage of the Clean Air Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the president's broken "no-new-taxes" pledge.

Now some rivals think Bush's son has merely found a kinder, gentler way to say he, too, is a, well, kinder, gentler Republican. The controversy started when Bush made the following statement after his overwhelming reelection victory in November: "A leader who is compassionate and conservative can erase the gender gap, open the doors of the Republican Party to new faces and voices, and win without sacrificing our principles."

To Governor Bush's supporters, this sounded like a centrist formula cooked up to win the presidency; it was the "big tent," redux.

Which may explain why some of Bush's potential opponents promptly cried foul. They haven't come right out and called Bush a "wimp," as Newsweek once tagged President Bush in a cover story, but the implication coyly has been put into play.

Quayle, Bush's vice president, who says he follows the party's "11th Commandment" never to attack a fellow Republican, appeared to have done just that in a fund-raising letter that implicitly attacked Governor Bush. "I have ordered my staff to never -- ever -- utter the words 'compassionate conservative,' " Quayle wrote.

Alexander, the former governor of Tennessee and secretary of education under President Bush, and whose best chance for winning the nomination (in his second attempt) may lie in portraying himself as the most moderate member of the field, said the words were "empty shells . . . cleverly and deliberately put together to confuse people by meaning nothing."

Former Reagan aide Gary Bauer, a social conservative who also is running for the nomination, took a different tack, saying the words were "redundant."

These potshots have revived memories of why President Bush was unpopular among many Republicans. He was accused of lacking a vision, of not "getting it" when confronted with the problems of ordinary Americans.

Clearly, Governor Bush hopes to avert such problems by declaring himself to be a compassionate conservative.

Indeed, if anyone has benefited from the controversy, it may be Governor Bush. Those who complain about compassionate conservatism may be unintentionally sending a signal that they are uncompassionate, which hardly seems like a theme for a presidential resume.

It was Joseph J. Jacobs who helped popularize the phrase with his 1996 book, "The Compassionate Conservative: Seeking Responsibility and Human Dignity."

"Why do they attack the words 'compassionate conservative?' " Jacobs says in an interview. "Do they want to be known as conservatives who are not compassionate? It is a silly obfuscation. It is truly because they are worried George W. Bush has touched an important factor among conservatives."

Jacobs, chairman of the Jacobs Engineering Co. in Pasadena, Calif., has never spoken with Governor Bush, but Jacobs's friends in Congress and elsewhere have discussed the book with Bush. Jacobs's own view of compassionate conservatism is instructive. He runs a family foundation which, instead of providing grants to poor people, makes interest-bearing loans to inner-city entrepreneurs who want to start a business.

The theme of Jacobs's book is that a government giveaway can do more harm than good if it strips away initiative from the intended beneficiary. Jacobs says that his belief in sparking initiative, instead of creating dependency, is more compassionate in the long run.

All of this leaves these two questions about Governor Bush: Is he truly a compassionate conservative? And what does that mean?

Karen Hughes, a spokeswoman for Bush, described a philosophy that mirrors the one outlined in Jacobs's book. "It is conservative and compassionate to move people from welfare to work," she said. "It helps welfare recipients to have better lives. That is a compassionate philosophy. We are perplexed about why fellow Republicans would criticize a popular conservative governor about a winning philosophy."

Indeed, that philosophy has similarities to the view that President Clinton espoused when he supported a bill to overhaul welfare.

Vice President Gore, however, is prepared to argue that Bush is anything but compassionate. A political aide, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Gore's associates have researched a number of areas where he believes Bush should be attacked for being less than compassionate, such as his position against abortion rights.

"We plan to challenge him to explain where he differs from Pat Robertson," the Gore aide said.

In December, in what was considered a kickoff for his presidential campaign, Gore told the moderate Democratic Leadership Council: "Some now say that we need a 'compassionate conservatism.' I wonder where they got that from? Let us be clear. We welcome all who truly want to join us in this vital center. But there is a difference between using the rhetoric of the center, and actually governing from the center."

Gore followed up by announcing a philosophy he called "practical idealism," which he defined as "strengthening the bond between progressive goals and responsible government."

Gore's anthem prompted more than a few snickers among the audience, partly because the concept seemed even more vague than Bush's theme. Alexander, for example, has said Gore's words are as empty as Bush's. But behind the rhetoric, there is hope that a real debate is in the making for Campaign 2000: What will be the role of government in the next millennium?

After the scandals and controversies of the Clinton presidency, the public just might be ready for candidates who talk earnestly about compassion and idealism.