GRAMM SCORNS CLINTON ECONOMIC PLAN

HOUSTON - Sen. Phil Gramm derided Bill Clinton's economic program Tuesday night as a "lemon for America," keynoting a vigorous Republican convention attack on President Bush's opponent and the Democratic Congress.

"Republicans stand for change," said Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson, "Democrats stand in the way."

Halfway through their four-day meeting, the GOP program featured a clatch of 1996 presidential possibilities and the Astrodome was dotted with signs that looked beyond the Bush era. "Bush `92, Kemp 96," for one, "Dan Quayle, Right For America" for another, and just plain "Gramm."

Bush was firmly focused on the present. He watched the proceedings in his hotel across town as Gramm, Cabinet officials and GOP governors used the podium to press, over and over again, for "four more years."

Commerce Secretary Barbara Franklin said Bush sees a second term as a chance to build the economy. Clinton, she charged, sees his election as a "chance to tax, tax, tax."

Michigan Gov. John Engler said Clinton's economic plan would ravage the automobile industry. Energy Secretary James Watkins declared Clinton's programs would lead to higher prices at the gasoline pump.

Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan declared Clinton's plan for health care would mean "huge tax increases to pay for it," as well as "waiting room gridlock."

The delegates filed from the Astrodome to the strains of country music as Clinton, campaigning in Atlanta, rebutted the Republican assault. "They haven't had anything positive to say about themselves ... And they're criticizing me," he said, rattling off a list of achievements in economic growth and welfare reform during his tenure as governor of Arkansas.

Rumors of a possible Cabinet shakeup rippled across the convention city, a consequence perhaps of the president's deficit in the polls. Campaign spokeswoman Torie Clark said, "In a second term, you can except a lot of changes. But beyond that, it's just speculation."

Gramm, a one-time Democrat and former economist at Texas A&M, hailed the president for leadership that "brought us victory" in the Cold War, and said Clinton sought to reduce the nation's defense to a level below what existed when the Japanese struck at Pearl Harbor in 1941.

He said Bush's attempts to deal with the economy would succeed - if only Congress would try them. Over and over, he declared, on legislation dealing with the economy, health care, crime and the deficit: "The Democrats said no."

The Democrats reacted sharply, unveiling two new television commercials - broadcast in Houston and Washington.

"And now a short break for the facts," the announcer said in one of them. "On Nov. 5, 1990, George Bush signed the second-biggest tax increase in American history. Under Bill Clinton, Arkansas has the second-lowest tax burden per person in the country.

Housing Secretary Jack Kemp recounted Bush's attempts to persuade Congress over the past three years to pass his economic proposals - never mentioning the president's signature on a 1990 tax increase that angers conservatives to this day.

Of the Democrats, Kemp said: "As the unemployment lines lengthen ... they stonewall our please for action - and then blame our president and our party for the economic decline."

The GOP worked to step up the energy level, dispatching young Republicans on a chanting tour of the media area and starting a human wave across the Astrodome. But the wave dissipated somewhere between South Carolina and New Mexico.

The first stirrings of the next GOP campaign weren't hard to discern. Supporters of Kemp, Gramm and Vice President Dan Quayle each had placards on the Astrodome floor.

Bush addressed the subject of Congress in a PBS interview, invoking the arm-twisting memory of a former president from Texas.

"I'm going to put more pressure on them. I'm going to go back to a little like Lyndon used to work," Bush said. Asked to elaborate, he said he would "expose individual members who talk duplicitously."

Even as Republicans made their case, the economy - the president's biggest political trouble spot - produced a fresh sign of decay. Housing starts for fell 2.8 percent in July despite the lowest mortgage rates in nearly two decades. Construction was off in every region but the South.

Bush's nomination for a second term was set for Wednesday night, and he and Quayle address the convention Thursday night. Conservatives pressed for a presidential call for sweeping tax cuts, but administration officials spread the word not to expect any dramatic proposals.

"It'll be a good speech," Bush promised as he stopped by Otto's Barbecue, an old haunt from his days here in the oil business. The president offered to pay for lunch, but the owner wouldn't hear of it.

Bush and Quayle made brief campaign forays in their convention city, underscoring their commitment to the war on drugs and legal reform, then ceded the intense media spotlight to the convention program.

Quayle sat for a CNN interview, and said he would be a new man.

"I had a bad campaign in 1988 personally and I am not going to repeat the same mistakes that I made in 1988, and 1992 is going to be an entirely different campaign," he said. "You are going to see a new Dan Quayle."