In another improbable achievement, Gore has even begun to remind people of Richard Nixon. Remember the question Nixon haters asked: Would you buy a used car from this man? It was the character, stupid. Gore's character has now become a factor that could decide the election, and probably not the way he and his supporters would prefer.

This election, in fact, resembles the 1960 race in other ways as well. It pits the charming but less-known challenger against the discomfiting, too well-known vice president. Nixon's problem was that the president-hero he served showed only lukewarm support for his heir. In a famous epiphany of the campaign, a reporter asked Dwight Eisenhower to supply an example showing why he thought Nixon would make a good president. His answer: If you give me a few moments I'm sure I can come up with one (or words to that effect).

Gore's problem is the obverse. Clinton supports Gore, but Gore can't take advantage of the support without having Clinton's negatives rub off on him. Clinton's approval rating as president is hovering around 60 percent. But his disapproval rating as a person is around 30. For Gore, it is a Hobson's choice.

Gore looked like he might have solved the problem by picking Joseph Lieberman as his running mate -- until that moment a man who had acquired a reputation for principle and moral character. But the association with Gore has transformed Lieberman into a pol who will jettison any principle to become vice president. In short, Lieberman managed to amplify the uneasiness voters already felt when contemplating a future administration headed by someone whose biggest campaign achievement was a kiss for his wife that briefly convinced voters he was a human being after all.

The present race has become like the 1960 race in another important respect. It is about America's leadership role in the world, and particularly its military policy. In 1960 these issues were injected into the race by John F. Kennedy's insistence that an unsteady foreign policy course had resulted in a loss of America's prestige in the world. An unwillingness to invest in defense technology had created a "missile gap" between our capabilities and our adversary's.

Similar issues have surfaced in the present campaign. This is, in part, a result of George W. Bush's choice of a running mate who was secretary of defense during the war in the Persian Gulf. They have also been thrust onto center stage by an oil shortage and a collapse of the peace process in the Middle East, both highlighting related failures of Clinton-Gore policy.

No one watching the Dick Cheney-Joe Lieberman debate could fail to be impressed by the authoritative tones in which the former secretary of defense expressed his concern over the decline of America's military capability as a result of the imprudent cuts of the Clinton-Gore regime. In fact, Cheney was far too mild in laying out the damage. The administration has systematically gutted the American military, which is now but a shadow of its former self.

Virtually every dollar of Gore's "reinventing government" cuts are cuts in the U.S. military. The current defense budget is $300 billion below the already downsized defense budget of 1993, which Clinton and Gore inherited. The Navy is half the size it was in 1993. America's bombers are older than the men who fly them. Overall, military spending is at its lowest level (as a percent of GNP) since before World War II.

As a result of the relentless cutting, year after year, by the Clinton-Gore White House, America's defense forces are now missing 709,000 regular (active duty) service personnel and 293,000 reserve troops. These include eight standing Army divisions, 20 Air Force and Navy air wings with 2,000 combat aircraft and 232 strategic bombers, 13 strategic ballistic missile submarines with 3,114 nuclear warheads, 500 ICBMs, four aircraft carriers, 121 surface combat ships and submarines, plus all the support bases, shipyards and logistical assets needed to sustain such a force.

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