Bradley and McCain reshaped some political notions

Tuesday night's big victories by Vice President Al Gore and Gov. George W. Bush were signs that the end was near for the candidacies of Mr. Bradley and Mr. McCain. The outcome left political experts and exhausted campaign aides weighing the legacies and lessons of the insurgents.

For many, there was no surprise that two improbable quests ultimately failed. Mr. Gore is a sitting vice president in good economic times. And Mr. Bush amassed broad establishment backing before his campaign plane ever took off from Austin.

Others said the only surprise was how far each challenger actually got, especially the Arizona senator. But to the end, the Bradley and McCain camps argued that their aims were achievable, even as they fell short.

Mr. Bradley and Mr. McCain also hurt each other, the experts said. Both were reform-minded candidates trying to extract votes from independents and moderates at the political center.

"There was probably not room for two," said George Edwards, political science professor at Texas A&M University.

More problematic was that "the media can't handle more than one big story at a time," said GOP consultant Eddie Mahe. When Mr. McCain blasted off after winning the New Hampshire primary, Mr. Bradley's razor-thin loss to Mr. Gore was buried, he said.

Exposing flaws

Even as the two insurgents presented strikingly different personalities and campaigns, each reflected his respective front-runner's weakness, said California Democratic consultant Bill Carrick.

Mr. McCain's "freewheeling style and personality" only underscored Mr. Bush's more scripted nature, the consultant said. And the former New Jersey senator's appeal to those disgusted with politics as usual pointed out a weak spot for Mr. Gore, who was tainted in the 1996 fund-raising scandal.

The outsiders also had opposite effects on the party standard-bearers. "Al Gore is the better for having Bill Bradley in the race, and George Bush is worse off" because of Mr. McCain's challenge, said Democratic pollster Geoff Garin.

When Mr. Gore hit his toughest patch against Mr. Bradley last fall, the vice president retooled his campaign, moved it to Nashville, recast his message and even changed his wardrobe.

Mr. Bush's response to Mr. McCain was to tack right to consolidate the Republican base and win the pivotal South Carolina primary. For weeks, Mr. McCain aggressively sought to cast Mr. Bush as a captive of Christian conservatives - a mantle that even aides to Mr. Bush said would not help in November.

Money counted less than expected where the insurgents were concerned, the experts agreed, while message and personality had more sway.

In the final weeks, the two top Republicans had about the same amount of money to spend. On the Democratic side, Mr. Bradley was Mr. Gore's fund-raising equal from the beginning.

The Internet's role

It's no coincidence that both insurgents, and especially Mr. McCain, led the way on Internet donations. It maybe was a sign of things to come, said Mr. Edwards of Texas A&M.

"One of the interesting aspects of contemporary insurgency may be that it will be easier because there is better access to resources," he said.

At times, each insurgent found it difficult to be an "uncandidate" and a successful candidate at the same time, the experts agreed.

Mr. McCain emphasized ridding Washington of interest groups and likened himself to Luke Skywalker fighting his way out of the Death Star. Mr. Bradley promised "a new politics" and a "different kind of campaign." So when it came to raising money and fighting off attacks, they could not brandish some of the harsh but effective tools of modern politics - at least not without losing credibility.

"Once you start saying 'I'm a different kind of candidate,' you better be one," Mr. Carrick said. Drawing in new voters and party outsiders was not enough for either challenger. Each needed to cut deeper into his party's base.

Mr. McCain and Mr. Bradley said they knew coming in that the rules and the compressed primary calendar benefited the establishment candidates.

"I think there are changes that could be made that could make this more possible," Mr. Bradley said Sunday on ABC's This Week.

Mr. McCain was helped, for a time, by the unintended consequences of the many open Republican primaries, which let Democrats and independents participate. The change was designed to bring in "Reagan Democrats" to back Mr. Bush. Instead, the new voters flocked to the Arizona senator.

Democracy is the overarching beneficiary of having had two presidential insurgents, said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a political science professor at the Claremont Graduate University near Los Angeles.

"The most important thing of all is the heightened turnout" in the primaries, she said. "It belies all of those who moaned and said no one would participate. If people are given an opportunity to have a meaningful say in what happens, if there is a choice and some excitement, voters will move."