If Reimer is right, Gore's team played right into Bush's hand after the governor unveiled his detail-free plan. The vice president used the word "risky" so many times to describe the plan that the New York Times suggested in an editorial that someone "send the vice president a thesaurus." Bush is "leading people down a path here that could end up in a complete privatization of Social Security," said Gore campaign spokeswoman Kathleen Begala. "This is a risky, risky plan that is going to put workers at risk, and eliminate the current guaranteed Social Security benefit."

The Bush campaign seemed to welcome the attack, accusing Gore of "demagoguing" the issue, and refocusing the discussion on political leadership. "I think there is a growing risk for the vice president that people don't hear his message, just that he attacked," said Bush spokesman Ari Fleisher. "Meanwhile, from Governor Bush, they're hearing positive, substantive proposals, even in areas where Republicans have dared not tread."

Though his proposals on Social Security and most other issues have consistently been woefully short on detail, Bush is making rapid-fire policy pronouncements which, taken together, position him as a candidate of change. These policy statements are the fruit of seeds planted throughout the primary campaign. Back in February, even as Bush was in danger of being sunk by the John McCain tidal wave, his advisors were hitting the news-show circuit to talk about Bush the younger.

On the night of Bush's South Carolina primary victory, Hughes boasted to Fox News, "We won in every age group, once again attracting a lot of young voters."

Two days later, Fleisher hit those same buttons on PBS's "News Hour." "If you look at the number of young people, first-time voters, who came out, they are drawn to his candidacy," Fleisher said. "He well over-performed the younger voter vote compared to the rest of the demographics. So he's going to continue to unify Republicans, reach out across the center."

Certainly, capturing young voters will not guarantee electoral victory for any candidate come November. In the 1996 presidential general election, 18- to 29-year-olds represented 33 percent of the voting-age population but accounted for only 24 percent of voters, according to U.S. Census Bureau statistics. And polling consistently shows that education and the environment tend to be more important to these voters than Social Security. Republican strategists are betting on that fact changing.

"I think there's one thing that's motivating young people and that's their future," said Chris Paulitz, spokesman for the Republican National Committee. "Over any other issue in this election, their personal financial future is a huge issue. If there's anything that will get young people out to vote it will be that."

In positioning himself as a New Republican, Bush is not only following in the footsteps of Democrats like Clinton and Kennedy, but in those of America's oldest president, Ronald Reagan.

Veteran Washington observer Lou Cannon notes that what candidate Reagan did so well, notably against Walter Mondale, was "casting his opponent as a candidate of the past. Clinton did the same thing to [President] Bush in '92," says Cannon, author of "President Reagan, The Role of a Lifetime."

"If [Gov.] Bush is able to do that -- and he's trying to do that on every issue -- he may be successful."

Recent Stories