Mr. Gore, himself

After spending a significant portion of his speech talking about himself and his upbringing, Vice President Al Gore Thursday reminded the public that “the presidency is more than a popularity contest, it’s a day-by-day fight for people.” The presidency is a fight for many things; the presidential campaign, the more immediate point of the speech, is in part a popularity contest, one in which Mr. Gore made a respectable showing this week.

The vice president arrived with examples. He talked about the values his parents instilled in him and about his parents’ lives. And looked around for people who embodied the ideas of his campaign. He found a mom who got off welfare and into a job when he discussed welfare reform. He had a senior who couldn’t afford both food and medicine when he talked about a prescription-drug benefit. And he had a family that had to fight an HMO to get care for their child when he backed “a real, enforceable patients’ bill of rights.” It was a stagy presentation, but it worked because the problems he presented have been debated and avoided in Congress.

He offered the occasional clunker. When Mr. Gore worked himself into heartfelt excitement about work barriers that stop the disabled, he said, “And hear me well: We will pass the Employment Non-Discrimination act,” thereby temporarily losing 90 percent of his audience. It was an awkward reference to an important issue, but that’s what the country would get with him as president – a person who knows the details of legislation, who wants to be involved in getting it right while at the same time getting it passed, even if few people understand its importance. If that’s not particularly inspiring, it is as least commendable for the effort required.

The vice president made much of having written the speech himself, and while there were plenty of sincere, insightful passages, there was also calculation. A section devoted to teachers, for instance, seemed like a response to the education lobby’s concern about his choice of running mate, Sen. Joseph Lieberman. His pledge to prevent Congress from touching the Social Security trust fund is a popular sentiment but not really meaningful considering how budgets are assembled.

The vice president could gain on Gov. George Bush on the question of tax cuts, which he discussed Thursday. Congress this year has supported several major cuts that disproportionately go to the wealthy and Gov. Bush has backed the idea of going even further in this direction. Mr. Gore, on the other hand, remains in favor of paying down the national debt, a Clinton administration policy that arguably has helped keep the current economic expansion alive. The public, too, seems willing to pay off the debt before passing tax breaks, perhaps because a large majority knows that the cuts being offered will not directly benefit them to any serious degree.

The vice president reportedly is behind in the polls and is facing a candidate in Gov. Bush who is proving to be more skilled than many had thought. It will be a tough climb back, certainly tougher than his regrouping in the primary against former Sen. Bill Bradley. Thursday’s speech gave Mr. Gore a solid base on which to launch the remainder of his campaign.