Clinton heads to Hill as Senate weighs his fate

Some lawmakers may be queasy about receiving President Clinton's State of the Union speech while they ponder his impeachment, but the subject of their qualms certainly has none: Clinton is eager to deliver this year's address.

By day, the Senate plans to be immersed in the details of the President's Oval Office assignations with Monica S. Lewinsky, but on this Tuesday night, Clinton is scheduled to spend more than an hour with millions of Americans, talking about their jobs, successful schools, retirement security, and the value of strong families. The White House wants the contrast to be striking.

Clinton has crafted his annual address in much the same way as he always does. The content will be largely familiar; it's the backdrop of 1998's wreckage that elevates the importance of the speech, and in a peculiar way, potentially works to the President's advantage.

"It has got to be the most dramatic State of the Union in modern times because of the circumstances," said J. Terry Edmonds, a former Clinton speechwriter. "It's going to be interesting to see, No. 1, what he says, and how it's received. The American people obviously think he's doing a great job, and he wants to keep doing that."

The White House usually counts on seeing a bounce in the President's job-approval ratings immediately after the State of the Union speech. A CNN-USA Today-Gallup Poll conducted Jan. 8-10 put Clinton's job-approval at 67 percent, which is a number that provides considerable comfort to the President and his political advisers.

Asked on Jan. 11 if Clinton was determined to give his remarks as scheduled on Jan. 19 because he wanted to boost his public opinion ratings, White House Press Secretary Joseph Lockhart quipped, "To get from 70 to 75?"

Although the public is not his problem right now, Clinton wants to break through the filter of 24-hour cable TV and a cloud of Washington punditry to talk to Americans about something other than scandal, apologies, and missed opportunities. The President, as always, will wield a catalog of policy initiatives as his rebuttal to both Republican policies and the GOP's hostile politics. The dominant domestic themes, not surprisingly, will be the opportunities provided by a robust economy, saving Social Security, and improving education and health care, according to senior White House officials.

Advisers this week were still debating how sweeping Clinton should be in his rhetoric on education--for instance, whether he should make something like "quality education for every child" the equivalent of John F. Kennedy's commitment to put a man on the moon.

Aides do not expect the President to mention his history-making House impeachment--there was nothing about it in the preliminary drafts. "What would he say?" one senior White House official asked rhetorically.

Even without the Lewinsky scandal, the questions in the Clinton White House in December and January are usually about what the President can get done. Planning for the speech and the concurrent need to make the resource decisions that go into the President's annual budget submission to Congress impose a much-needed discipline on the White House to map out a work plan for the year.

In 1994, the plan was to pass health care reform. In 1995, attempting to recover from the GOP takeover in Congress, Clinton used an 81-minute State of the Union address to defend his New Democrat vision of a government that empowers its citizens.

By 1996, the address had become a kickoff for Clinton's re-election campaign, and the same themes were reprised seven months later in his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention. In 1997, Clinton was searching for a vision for his second term, and settled on education. And last year, safeguarding a balanced budget and saving Social Security dominated the speech.

"For better or for worse, there's always been this drama, this sort of bar that's been set for him: `Are you relevant? What can you get done? Is it too partisan?' " said White House Deputy Chief of Staff Maria Echaveste. "If you didn't have the scandal, we'd be talking about, `Do you guys really think you will get anything done in [Clinton's] last two years? Isn't the 2000 election started already?' "

"Speeches are the core of the modern presidency," wrote Carol Gelderman, an English professor at the University of New Orleans, in her 1997 book about the bully pulpit. Gelderman argued that Clinton succeeded in reviving his flagging presidency after the Republican rout of 1994 by "regaining control of the agenda through speechmaking reinvention." The President learned to fit the nuts and bolts of policies and programs into thematic imperatives that the public could embrace, Gelderman wrote. Presidential speaking is governing, and before the Lewinsky scandal, Clinton's rhetoric helped him win a second term.

To those who tune in on Tuesday night, the question may be whether a President who seemed to lose his way whenever he opened his mouth in 1998 can begin to reclaim an agenda, his leadership-in short, his presidency-with talk.