Stepping into The Washington Whirl

THE SYMBOLISM, AT LEAST, IS UNMISTAKABLE: after defeating a President regarded by most voters as out of touch with the nation's problems, Bill Clinton is cutting a different figure. He went jogging one morning last week in Washington, stopped on the way back at a McDonald's two blocks from the White House, ordered a cup of coffee and started to chat up the locals. One homeless man explained that he had been out of work for three years. A woman said she prayed for him every night. "That's why I go ((to McDonald's)) at home," Clinton said later. "You see a reasonable range of people in there."

The theme of Clinton's Washington tour was "I'll keep in touch" -- with the plain folk who helped carry him into office, with the Democrats on Capitol Hill who have been out of favor for years, and even with the Republicans who now find themselves in a distinct minority. It won't be easy: upon Inauguration, Presidents-elect slip helplessly into the protective cocoon of White House and Secret Service agents whether they like it or not. But certainly the speed with which Clinton moved about the city indicates that he will be, if anything, an even more energetic President than the ever bustling Bush.

Perhaps the most surprising development came when Clinton and erstwhile rival George Bush met for 45 minutes more than their allotted one-hour meeting on Wednesday. Details of the Oval Office session, which was devoted largely to foreign policy, are sketchy. But within 24 hours, Clinton suggested that Bush's conciliatory posture toward China might not have been as counterproductive as he had once believed. A Clinton official denied that any reversal had occurred a day later. But the President-elect's back-and-forth maneuver, also a common tactic of Bush's, led an outgoing White House official to remark, "It all sounds eerily familiar."

The President-elect journeyed uptown to an all-black neighborhood that is combatting crime as well as recession. That pilgrimage perhaps took the sting off the two nights he spent at glittery parties in posher Georgetown. Clinton's trip to Capitol Hill on Thursday was what an aide to the Governor described as a "love shack." Latent intraparty disagreements over taxes, deficits, auto-fuel standards and a line-item veto were quietly shelved; starved for a leader after 12 years, the Democrats are all singing the same music. For now, anyway, happy days are here again. (See related story on page 28.)