President cruises for votes on the NASCAR circuit

The throng packed in the grandstands roared its approval as the car engines growled to life and the Great American Race got underway.

With Air Force One parked at Daytona Beach International Airport and clearly visible to fans in the grandstands, Bush stuck around to see the beginning of the race, telling the event's broadcast team at one point, "It's great to get out of Washington -- believe me."

No questions about weapons of mass destruction or his National Guard service awaited Bush, who basked in the welcome offered by fans who make up a core part of the constituency he must carry in the November election.

Bush left for Tampa before the the midpoint of the race and is scheduled to visit a manufacturing plant outside that city today. It's Bush's 19th journey to the Sunshine State, underscoring its importance this fall.

His trip had less to do with the NASCAR point standings than it had with his political standing.

Democrats have pressed their advantage with "soccer moms," suburban women concerned about health care and education, and now Republicans like Bush are looking to lock up a segment of the electorate referred to as "NASCAR dads."

The term, coined by Democratic strategist Celinda Lake, refers to working-class white men, ages 35 to 55, who are not averse to voting for Democrats but lean toward pulling the lever for Republicans.

"They're all over the country," Lake said. "They're angry about cuts in veterans' benefits. They're angry about their jobs being sent overseas, and they're angry about spending $87 billion in Iraq."

Those feelings would seem to make NASCAR dads a natural constituency for Democrats, who have pressed for expanded benefits for veterans and who have been willing to oppose trade agreements they blame for job losses and to raise questions about the cost of rebuilding war-torn Iraq and Afghanistan.

But other factors make NASCAR dads a more natural constituency for Republicans. "They're socially conservative, particularly on the guns issue," Lake said.

Carl Harkleroad, a small-business owner from Jacksonville who watched the race with his son Zack, said he likes the stands that Bush has taken in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"He's standing up for us and being aggressive when he has to be aggressive," Harkleroad said.

Jack Ziegler, a developer from Orlando who watched the race with his son Billy, accurately predicted that Bush would get a warm reception at the event. "I think this crowd appreciates what President Bush has done," he said.

Despite the display of affinity for Bush, Lake said Democrats should not write off NASCAR dads.

"Democrats need to get some white men other than union members," she said. "It's an important cultural audience. It's an important constituency." That task will not be easy for Democrats. Presidential candidate Bill Clinton tried to impress a NASCAR audience in 1992 but did not get the reception he hoped for.

Despite being a Southerner from Arkansas, Clinton was booed by a NASCAR crowd in Darlington, S.C., as he made his first run for the White House in 1992.

"That was kind of embarrassing," veteran racer Terry Labonte recently told the Associated Press.

Even with Clinton's reception at Darlington, Democrats have continued to try their luck with the NASCAR crowd. The presidential campaign of Senator Bob Graham of Florida sponsored a race car, but the tactic did not help in the long run. Graham was the first Democrat to drop out of the contest.

Admirers of former Vermont governor Howard Dean also have tried to impress the racing crowd. But racing officials said a part-time driver who has expressed an interest in running a "Dean Machine" in NASCAR races has yet to try to qualify for a race.

The officials also said Brian Conz, a veteran NASCAR driver, tried on Friday but was unable to get a "Bush-Cheney" car to qualify for a Daytona 500 preliminary race on Saturday.

Susan MacManus, a political science professor at the University of South Florida, said she is not surprised politicians have focused so much on NASCAR.

Florida was crucial in the 2000 election, and it is likely to be as important this fall, MacManus said. It is no coincidence, she added, that Bush is traveling to a politically significant part of the state where NASCAR is popular: "He's going to the most important part of Florida, the I-4 corridor."

Bush won Florida by 537 votes in 2000, and the interstate corridor stretching from Daytona on the eastern coast of the state to Tampa in the west was crucial to that victory. Bush won seven of the 10 congressional districts along the corridor.