Taking Aim at 2004
Can Bush win a second term running on a platform of tanks and tax cuts? An inside look at the playbook for the 2004 presidential campaign

Two of the men George W. Bush most admires–his father and Winston Churchill–led their nations to military triumphs only to be tossed out of office by restless voters who wanted attention paid to the home front. At the moment, the President is on top of the world, a foreign policy neophyte who has two wars under his belt, a loser of the popular vote whose performance as President now wins the approval of more than 7 of 10 Americans. But voters are turning their attention away from Iraq just as Bush begins his quest for the validation that escaped him in 2000: a real majority and a mandate from the American people.

ENDLESS WAR

As the first statue of Saddam fell in Baghdad three weeks ago, the White House was putting into motion a plan that would allow the President to pivot from his focus abroad to mending fences at home. Bush's "hardware in the heartland" tour follows the battle plan for his re-election effort: from now until November 2004, he will blend martial images with rhetoric about tax cuts and never let the nation forget that we're at war both abroad and at home.

KARL KNOWS ALL

To make sure they are shaped for maximum political benefit, travel schedules, speeches and policy details all run through the office of Karl Rove, the President's celebrated political strategist. Excluding his home state of Texas, 70% of Bush's travel as President has been to states considered critical in the 2004 race. Florida alone has seen him 10 times. Rove played a crucial role in shaping the President's decision to hike tariffs on foreign steel, a move cheered in such crucial industrial states as West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

PAY OFF YOUR BASE

Bush has united his party by employing a strategy that Grover Norquist, a White House ally and the president of Americans for Tax Reform, describes as "delivering on first-tier issues." For the fiercely antitax crowd, Bush supplied his $1.1 trillion tax cut in 2001. By sticking with his core supporters on the issues they care most about, Bush has given himself leeway to disappoint them on what Norquist calls "second- and third-tier issues."

USE THE POWELL DOCTRINE

The Bush team leaves nothing to chance, and so for 2004, Rove is applying the Powell Doctrine of overwhelming force to politics. The $120 million Bush raised in 2000 was a record. This time, aides say, Bush will raise nearly twice that amount. That means he'll have tens of millions of dollars to spend next spring on television ads to shock and awe his Democratic opponent, who will have just emerged penniless from a bruising nomination battle. "Just watch," says a Bush adviser. "We'll have more money than God."

Comparing Bush I with Bush II has become a familiar parlor game, but there are plenty of differences between 41's situation and 43's. A look at the numbers:

$5.9 trillion Annual gross domestic product $10.6 trillion 6.8% Unemployment rate 5.8% 81.1 Consumer-confidence index 62.5 $269 billion Budget deficit $304 billion

CHALLENGERS Bush got hit three times: with Pat Buchanan's primary challenge, Ross Perot's pesky independent bid and Bill Clinton's upset STRATEGY Sat on his lead and tried to run the clock out RUNNING MATE Bush stuck with Dan Quayle despite questions about his competency CAMPAIGN WAR CHEST $27 million CHALLENGERS Even though Bush is riding high, nine Democrats are fighting for the chance to take him on STRATEGY Stress national security and the need for more tax cuts RUNNING MATE Bush says he will stick with Dick Cheney despite questions about his health CAMPAIGN WAR CHEST at least $200 million

WE'RE NOT STUPID; IT'S THE ECONOMY

The economic news continues to be pretty bleak. In recent weeks, cash-strapped states and cities across the country have announced new taxes and painful spending cuts. Though there are flecks of good news, such as an unexpected rise in purchases of big-ticket items, the grumpy economy is still Bush's greatest vulnerability. Here is what the White House is doing to lower the risk:

1. For Bush, tax cuts are what the grand unified theory is to cosmologists: the secret to everything. Bush is having a hard time convincing the public–only 42% think tax cuts are a good idea–but he continues to push headlong into the battle.

2. Voters soured on the first President Bush less because the economy was stagnant in 1992 than because he didn't seem to care that people were hurting. His son won't make that mistake. "If he's working hard to get a growth package enacted, that's more important than actually getting it enacted," says a key Bush adviser.

3. Preaching confidence may be a far more effective tonic for the economy than any single piece of legislation. That may explain why the President refuses to give up on trying to end the tax on dividends. His advisers also believe that elimination of this so-called double taxation can provide a quick "optimism boost" to the stock markets. White House officials point to forecasts of a rise in the Dow of between 5% and 20% if the measure is passed. "There is no more important measure of consumer confidence than the markets," says a senior adviser. If the markets go up, so do the odds of a second Bush term in the White House.

Presidential elections often come down to the simple question Ronald Reagan asked in 1980: Are you better off now than you were four years ago? Democrats will be asking that as they challenge George W. Bush in the months ahead. In 1992, with the world at peace and the cold war over, change seemed safe, and voters walked away from Bush's father, taking a chance on a relative unknown named Bill Clinton. If the economy does not recover, the President won't be able to tell Americans they are better off than they were four years earlier. But in the post-9/11 world, George W. Bush knows that better off is not just about money and financial security. Flanked by planes and guns, he will tell voters that in this new world, with the threat of terror all around us, change can be a dangerous thing.

—from TIME, May 5, 2003

Questions

1. What is the Bush administration's strategy for fixing the economy?

2. How can the Powell Doctrine be applied to Bush's re-election campaign?