The Post poll found Americans split over whether Bush has governed in a compassionate way, with 49 percent saying he has and 45 percent saying he has not. That is down sharply from February 2003, when a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll found that 64 percent of Americans thought he had governed compassionately.
While a majority of Americans (58 percent) say Bush has governed as expected, the Post poll showed that the rest are about twice as likely to say the president has been less compassionate (25 percent) than to say he has been more compassionate (13 percent). Forty-four percent now believe Bush cares most about serving upper-income people, an increase from 31 percent in September 1999 and 39 percent in July 2000. Forty-one percent believe Bush cares equally about all people, with small numbers saying he favors the poor or the middle class.
Whether this loss of compassion credentials is a problem for Bush depends on which voters prove to be the decisive bloc in November. Political strategists say the Bush campaign is gambling that it can win largely by mobilizing core GOP voters in large numbers -- a departure from recent elections, in which many moderate "swing" voters were the key.
Republican pollster Bill McInturff has determined that both Democratic- and GOP-leaning voters have made up their minds early this year. With fewer voters crossing between parties in recent elections, "there's not much flexibility on either side," he said. "Bush folks have been preparing for this type of election for a long time. There's a handful of groups up for grabs."
Republican strategist Scott Reed, who managed Robert J. Dole's 1996 presidential campaign, predicts that 4 percent of the electorate will be truly undecided in the fall, rather than the usual double-digit number. A Washington Post/ABC News poll conducted earlier last month found that 6 percent were uncommitted. The compassion theme "got you to the dance" in 2000, Reed said, but in 2004, "Bush needs to be seen as the warrior in the war on terrorism who also understands the need for job growth."
Democrats, though working to turn out their partisans, say Bush is taking a big risk by dropping the compassionate conservative theme. "He was given the benefit of the doubt by the swing voters who decided the election in 2000," said Jim Jordan, who is helping to organize an anti-Bush advertising drive. "But after three-plus years of governing as a hard-right ideologue, that image is in tatters." Jordan predicts that 2004, like previous elections, "is going to be settled in the middle."
Bush advisers say loss of standing on the compassion measures is a byproduct of the emphasis on terrorism and foreign policy. "While there has been a lot of media attention focused on national security priorities, the fact is the president has delivered on his domestic agenda," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, citing Bush achievements on education, Medicare prescriptions, help for religious charities, homeownership and AIDS treatment.
Still, Bush has made gestures that appear to be aimed at his conservative supporters rather than moderates: a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, the recess appointments of conservative judges and ending the expiration of his tax cuts. Last week, 31 Senate Republicans broke with Bush and voted to increase child-care funding for welfare recipients. As a result of such White House positions, said Andrew Kohut, a pollster who directs the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, Bush's standing has slipped among independents and even moderate Republicans.
"The working assumption is that because things are polarized, there can't be a lot of people up for grabs," Kohut said, "but the middle is still swinging." Kohut thinks three in 10 voters could still change their minds -- and at the moment, they favor the Democrats on domestic issues.
Respondents to the Washington Post poll, conducted March 10 to 14 and confirmed in subsequent polling, supported this view.
"He's shown far less compassion than I thought he would," said Michael Adams, 48, a political independent who is disabled and lives in Kalamazoo, Mich. "He's for the rich and not for the poor or even for the average person. I expected him to be more compassionate. He's a disappointment. He's for the rich and nobody else."
Similarly, Barbara Wright, a 69-year-old West Virginian, said she is a registered Republican who supported Bush in 2000 but may not do so in 2004. "If he realized how the normal people lived, middle-class people live, if he had some sort of a clue, that would be better," she said. "But he doesn't." Wright hopes that Bush simply is unaware of the problems that people like her face. "I hope he doesn't know. I worry he doesn't care."
Some poll responses suggest Bush still appears to have an opportunity to regain the compassion issue. "I really think he's trying to help everyone, even if people don't see that," said Democrat Deborah Secord, 53, a vice president of a printing company who lives in Sutton, Mass. "I don't think he's just for one class of people. I think he's trying to do things for everybody."
But few expect Bush to rerun the compassion theme of 2000. The conservative National Review magazine is proclaiming "The Death of Compassionate Conservatism" in its April 5 issue. If Bush gains on his Democratic opponent, writes author Ramesh Ponnuru, "it will have little to do with compassionate conservatism and more to do with negative attacks on John Kerry's liberalism."
I'll be glad to have finally heard the end of that phrase.
All I've got to say about this is that one should never underestimate the American public's ability to comprehend the fact that white is, in fact, not black. As long as they've had four years to think about it, that is.