Instead, he’s the honored guest at an unexpected domestic cataclysm. He is a trouper about it, gamely enduring the hated rituals of polities; praying for rain. But nothing seems to work. The mad-dog attack style he affected after the Republican convention proved harsh, puerile, unpresidential, so Jim Baker put a lid on it; the more recent, halting ventures onto the high road lack sufficient political electricity to do much good.

The decision not to directly attack Bill Clinton as a draft dodger at the National Guard convention in Utah last week was a perfect example: Bush gave a subtle, forceful, touching speech about the strength of character needed to lead a nation into war, the agony of having to decide whether “our sons and daughters should knock early on death’s door.” The calculation was that Clinton, who changed his schedule to respond personally to Bush’s expected attack, would appear panicky, defensive and callow by contrast. Clinton did seem less commanding than the president: he gave an awkward, inelegant speech about the importance of the National Guard-but it didn’t matter. The great confrontation was played as a draw-and a fizzle–on the evening news. The best that could be said (and this may be all that Baker was hoping for) was that it put Clinton on the defensive for a couple of days.

It must be a season of surpassing frustration for George Bush. In 1988 everything he tried seem to work. He roared out of the Republican convention, traveling the low and the high roads simultaneously, alternately slashing the pathetic Michael Dukakis as someone who had spent “all his life on the left side of things” and waxing kinder and gentler, calling for “a new engagement in the pain of others,” especially the poor, lost children of the slums, “because here’s the funny thing: when we find those lost children, we will find ourselves.” Really. He said things like that. But then, in 1988, Bush had Lee Atwater and Peggy Noonan to guide him through the sewers and shopping malls of the American psyche-plus an a apathetic electorate and an opponent from Mars. This time, the vision comes from Foggy Bottom, the electorate is steamed and a collective decision seems to have been made: the president is a dud. He has nothing of interest to say on the one issue that counts, the economy. No matter what he promises, nothing will change.

So, with Clinton having decided to place his candidacy in hibernation for the moment, the campaign languishes. The polls haven’t moved in a while-it’s a 12-point race, more or less. The basic story-people want change, but aren’t quite sure about Clinton-has been static for months. Bush’s attempts to switch the focus (to family values, Hillary, the draft) smack of “politics,” the deadliest sin this year; his attempts to compete on the high ground of free-market economics draw a blank. Logic dictates that this dynamic soon will change: it’s a “weird” and “tumultuous” election year, remember? But what if it doesn’t change? What if the past two weeks turn out to be the calm before the calm? Then George Bush can only pray the American people will reach the conclusion-without any heavy-handed prodding from his campaign-that they like Bill Clinton even less than they like him. It’s not impossible; Clinton’s still a stranger. But that sort of image meltdown would require an intense, high-pressure jolt of exposure-the sort of exposure that only comes in a scandal … or a debate.

Which makes Jim Baker’s finagling over the debates so curious. The apparent reluctance to mix it up with Clinton certainly hasn’t helped his candidate. Or has it? By playing scared-arguing over format, pushing for a panel of reporters (suddenly they love us?) to ask the tough, personal questions Bush can’t-Baker lowers expectations. Clinton becomes Clarence Darrow; Bush is goofy old Gampy, not nearly, ah, slick enough to hold his own with a guy who has ,‘more statistics than there are problems," as the president said last week. In truth Bush is a very sly debater-in 1988, he murdered all comers-and Clinton can be rattled (during a debate, he said be didn’t inhale). Worse, Clinton can seem glib, a bit too smooth to be trusted. Indeed, George Bush’s last best hope may be that the debates, when they come, turn out to be Gampy vs. Snake Oil Slick. It’s a reach-but sometimes when you pray for rain, it rains.