The man who would be Hillary

As he campaigns for a trio of Democrats who might turn his red state blue, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh sharpens his own 2008 stump speech.

By Walter Shapiro

Read more: Hillary Rodham Clinton, Politics, News, Walter Shapiro, Barack Obama, 2008 election, 2006 Elections

AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson

Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind.

Oct. 31, 2006 | NEW ALBANY, Ind. -- Evan Bayh has stumped in 25 states this year on behalf of both Democratic candidates and his own White House ambitions. Last week the two-term Indiana senator brought his road show to New Hampshire, the first 2008 primary state. Then Bayh returned Thursday and Friday to the political environment that has helped shape his moderate persona -- socially conservative southern Indiana. Bayh campaigned for two potentially victorious House challengers, Brad Ellsworth in the 8th District and Baron Hill in the 9th, whose right-of-center views (like opposition to abortion) mirror their constituencies rather than Democratic orthodoxy.

Dressed in a blue blazer and an open-necked shirt, Bayh, who is handsome in an old-fashioned sitcom-dad way without being charismatic, declared to 150 activists at a Democratic rally here, "I can't begin to tell you how glad I am to be here in Floyd County rather than Washington, D.C. The gulf between our nation's capital and the people of our state and country has never been greater. Back there, it is constant gridlock, sniping partisanship and, I regret to say, too much corruption. In 12 short days, we have a chance to change all that by electing Baron Hill as our next congressman."

On the stump in Indiana, Bayh is friendly but not folksy, eagerly acknowledging half a dozen people in every audience (nods of recognition that may date from the reelection campaigns of his father, Sen. Birch Bayh) but never resorting to any of those heavy-handed ruralisms that were part of Al Gore's political repertoire. Bayh comes across in public like what he probably is in private -- a nice guy who has served two terms as governor and eight years in the U.S. Senate without letting his internal sense of self-importance swell to John Kerry-esque levels.

This trip with Bayh offered one of the last glimpses of the would-be presidential contender campaigning in his natural habitat. While he is not on the ballot this year, Bayh was investing his prestige, as the dominant Democrat in the state, in helping Hill and Ellsworth win House seats in a state that George W. Bush carried with 60 percent of the vote in 2004. (Bayh has also lent his luster to the strong Democratic House challenger in northern Indiana's second district, Joe Donnelly.) But judging from polls and political spending, Hill and Ellsworth were already well on their way. What is happening in these two southern Indiana districts is the same thing that is happening all along the Ohio River, where a solid swatch of Republican congressional territory in three states, Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana, is poised to go blue. The Democratic tide here and in the Northeast may be strong enough in and of itself to provide the 15 seats needed for the House to change control.

Until recently, through no fault of his own, Bayh had been a stealth presidential contender. The political press corps had crowned Mark Warner and Barack Obama as the "Hot New Faces of '06." But then early this month, former Virginia Gov. Warner made the stunning announcement that he would rather live a normal life than spend the next two years winning hearts and minds in Iowa. Suddenly, Bayh, another former red-state governor and political moderate, stepped out of the chorus to audition for what was supposed to be Warner's role as the alternative to Hillary Clinton.

Bayh's speeches were all part of that ongoing rhetorical experiment to create a stump speech that will inspire Iowa and nurture New Hampshire. A politician hones his stump speech the same way that a stand-up comic perfects his act -- through constant repetition and a close reading of audience reaction.

At a Democratic Party dinner in Clarksville Thursday night, Bayh pumped his right fist like a metronome as he declared, "We have had too much of the toxic politics of Washington, D.C., too much of the divide and conquer, too much of the appeal to people's baser instincts rather than their highest aspirations... The road to national greatness does not lie down the path of least resistance."

At this stage of the still inchoate presidential campaign, candidates are searching for that magic-bullet phrase, like Bill Clinton's constant talk about Americans "who work hard and play by the rules," or Bush's 2000 "compassionate conservatism." Never underestimate the potency of such political catchphrases. Jimmy Carter created a presidency out of his smiling promise to give American "a government as good as its people."

So it is with Bayh and "national greatness," a phrase that he dropped into virtually every Indiana speech. When I sat down with Bayh for an interview at Baron Hill's campaign headquarters in Jeffersonville, he freely acknowledged the importance of big themes rather than small-bore positions in erecting the framework for a presidential campaign. "You've got to have your positions well thought out and they have to add up," he said. "But that's not the most important thing ... I think it's about a greater sense of unity and togetherness. I think it's about a renewed sense of American idealism. And I think all this boils down to a commitment to renewed national greatness."

Talking about a presidential race, Bayh displayed the virtual certainty of a candidate who has moved beyond "maybes" and "ifs." As he put it to me, "You have to be able to look in the mirror and say, 'I'm prepared to do this.' Your family has to be supportive. And then the final step is to do all the practical things like raising money and building an organization. We're on those things, particularly in Iowa and New Hampshire."

In fact, in his appearances across Indiana, Bayh expressed an impatience with his current job that would be impolitic for a senator planning on running for reelection. "I loved being governor because you're making decisions, you're responsible for getting things done," he said in Clarksville. "Too often things in Washington are about giving speeches and casting symbolic votes."

While I was traveling with Bayh to get a sense of how his act might translate when it goes national, I was equally intrigued that three GOP-held House seats are in play in a state that has elected few Democrats not named Bayh to high office. "Indiana is kind of a microcosm of the larger story of this country," said James McCann, a political science professor at Purdue University. "There's Iraq, and Indiana has taken its share of hits. The economic decline across the industrial belt, you get that in Indiana too. And you also see increased competitiveness and a higher quality of candidates on the part of the Democrats this year."

Next page: Ellsworth is probably the closest thing the Democrats have this year to Gary Cooper