Faith of his fatherGeorge W. Bush gets specific with a plan to fund private
charities. Did someone say 'points of light?'By James Carney/Austin
July 26, 1999
Web posted at: 4:25 p.m. EDT (2025 GMT)
George W. Bush was falling into a rut. For all his early
success--a gaudy lead in the polls, a $37 million-and-rising war
chest--the Texas Governor, after a month of delivering the same
airy, slogan-rich speech, was sounding stale and tired by
mid-July. His Republican opponents were calling him the
all-money-and-no-message candidate, and the label was beginning
to stick. (Sensitive to the charge, Bush half seriously asked
his finance chairman if there was any way "to slow down" the
flow of contributions.) And to make matters worse, Bill Clinton
was trying to provoke Bush from the presidential podium, archly
recalling how in 1991 he began his presidential bid by telling
voters exactly what policies he would pursue. Pressed by a
reporter in Ames, Iowa, to say when he planned to start talking
substance, Bush pursed his lips and suggested he wouldn't be
rushed: "There's a pace to a campaign that's important to
maintain."
The pace suddenly got quicker last week. At a church in
Indianapolis, Ind., Bush laid out a detailed list of
proposals--complete with a promise of $8 billion in new federal
spending--aimed at expanding the role of charities, churches and
community groups in helping the poor. A Republican's pledging to
increase federal spending for the poor is novel in its own right.
But the speech was less remarkable for its topic--supporting
faith-based institutions is in vogue with candidates from both
parties--than for how Bush used it to neutralize his critics on
both the left and the right. By pursuing a liberal end with
conservative means, Bush placed himself and his guiding
philosophy of "compassionate conservatism" smack in the center of
the political spectrum. Sighed a top Democratic operative in
Washington: "I hate to admit it, but it was a damned good
speech."
Even as he appealed to Christian conservatives by extolling the
"transforming power of faith" to change lives, Bush chided his
own party for hardheartedness. "We must apply our conservative
and free-market ideas to the job of helping real human beings,"
he said, "because any ideology, no matter how right in theory, is
sterile and empty without that goal." And while he labeled his
chief Democratic rival, Vice President Al Gore, an out-of-touch
"Washington politician," Bush also lectured conservatives that
"government is not the enemy of the American people." Even Bush's
father was an indirect target. "It is not enough [just] to call
for volunteerism," said W., suggesting that simply praising
charities as President Bush once did with his "points of light,"
without offering them government assistance won't cut it.
Yet much of the younger Bush's rhetoric about compassionate
conservatism is taken directly from his father's. In 1988, more
than a decade before W. made "prosperity with a purpose" a
presidential campaign slogan, then Vice President Bush was saying
that "prosperity with a purpose means giving back to the country
that has given you so much." The difference is that the elder
Bush's compassion for the less fortunate came across as noblesse
oblige, while the younger Bush has made it the emotional core of
his campaign.
Bush and his staff love to boast about how, in contrast to the
current Administration, they don't rely on polls to set policy.
But TIME has learned that while Bush's campaign hasn't done any
polling, earlier this year it did play videotapes of the
Governor's explaining his compassionate conservative philosophy
in front of several focus groups, testing the participants'
reactions to what he said. His proposals may succeed in capturing
the center of the electorate, but whether they can succeed as
policy is another matter. Will Marshall, president of the
Progressive Policy Institute, a centrist Democratic think tank,
warns of "a tendency among conservatives to overstate the
capacity of churches and civic actors to deal with social
problems." Robert Rector, a welfare-policy expert at the
conservative Heritage Foundation, is concerned that Bush's plan
would funnel tax dollars to left-leaning groups with effective
lobbyists. "Why would any Republican come up with a proposal that
preferentially gives money to these groups?" Rector asks.
Such fears haven't spread within the G.O.P. Many rank-and-file
Republicans are like Tom Kapanka, 43, a school administrator from
Waterloo, Iowa, who prefers social conservatives such as Gary
Bauer but says he's voting for Bush anyway. "The candidates I'm
drawn to are good at speaking to America," said Kapanka as he
waited for Bush to arrive at a rally in Waterloo. "But I decided
we need someone who can speak for America." That could be good
news for Bush. After all, telling voters what you believe is part
of running for President. But getting those who don't agree to
vote for you anyway is part of winning.
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Cover Date: August 1, 1999
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