Shifting strategy is nod to surge in polls

Ignoring the former Vermont governor isn't the only change in Kerry's campaign since both men arrived in New Hampshire four days ago. The Massachusetts senator is now attending one or two "town hall meetings" a day, compared to the five or more in Iowa, where he would ask voters to drill him on any issue and stay until he had earned their support. His stump speech now clocks in at 10 minutes, usually leaving the audience wanting more, compared with 25 minutes of remarks in Iowa.

More of his daily schedule includes phone calls to fund-raisers, donors, and key Democrats with endorsements up for grabs. His staff entourage has doubled in size, and more than two dozen cameras now trail him at events, which now tend to be designed as photo opportunities (such as quick stops at a diner and a skating pond yesterday) rather than lengthy appeals to undecided voters (like the Iowa forums that lasted past many voters' bedtimes).

In ways small and significant, the Kerry campaign has begun taking on the trappings and confidence of a front-runner's bid, in spite of the candidate's abiding reluctance to hear "the F word," as his staff calls it, uttered in his presence.

"I came into New Hampshire the underdog, clearly," Kerry told reporters in an interview Thursday. "There wasn't one of you that wasn't writing that I wasn't 20 points behind somewhere. My attitude is that until the votes are cast Tuesday night, it's fight as hard as you know how.

"The way you campaign, there is an old saying in sports -- you play the way you practice," he added. "I'm going to show them every day what kind of president I'm going to be, which is a hard-fighting, full-time, on-the-job, fully engaged, take-nothing-for-granted, fight-for-the-people president."

With last night's Globe/WBZ-TV opinion poll showing him 20 percentage points ahead of Dean in New Hampshire, Kerry has been increasingly acting as a Democratic Party standard-bearer. On the campaign trail and at a televised candidates' forum Thursday night, Kerry single-mindedly pounded away at the Bush administration and one of the president's signature issues, national security.

And some campaign aides delighted in the attention Kerry received yesterday when the chairman of Republican National Committee, Ed Gillespie, singled out the senator as "out of synch" with voters. It gave the campaign a chance to look like the leading alternative to President Bush, political analysts said, and to issue a retort that "George Bush is the one who is out of touch with real Americans" on issues like civil rights and corporate tax breaks.

Kerry's advisers say he is hardly taking a New Hampshire victory for granted, noting that polls show about one-fifth of voters here remain undecided. During Kerry's visit to Maryanne's diner yesterday morning, voters like Joe Kelly, a semiretired tax adviser, expressed doubts about the senator's ability to attract a broad cross-section of Americans.

"I just don't think a wealthy Massachusetts liberal can win," Kelly said as he waited for his pancakes in a booth with two friends. "I'm supporting General [Wesley K.] Clark. We need a leader who can be tough with Americans, tell them what sacrifices we have to make to be safe. I get the feeling with Kerry that he tells people what he thinks they want to hear."

While he continued to cultivate undecided voters, Kerry also spent yesterday moving to build support among veterans, who played a key role for him in Iowa.

More than 200 veterans and others turned out for a noontime Kerry rally in Manchester, where the senator pledged to increase federal spending on veterans' benefits and medical care as president, while also basking in the adulation of other former soldiers sharing the stage and praising his courage under fire.

"He's been there, done that, and gotten a few holes in his T-shirt," said one, former senator Max Cleland of Georgia, a Vietnam veteran and triple amputee who has helped organize veterans in Iowa, New Hampshire, and the South to support Kerry.

Ernest "Fritz" Hollings, a seven-term senator from South Carolina and a decorated World War II veteran who attended the rally, took a shot at Clark, who has noted in the past that Kerry never rose beyond the rank of lieutenant while Clark rose to the rank of general over three decades of military service. "We're gonna teach that fella in South Carolina that there are more lieutenants than generals, I tell you that," Hollings said to applause.

Hollings also made an unusual remark about the Rev. Jesse Jackson, himself a two-time candidate for the Democratic nomination, as the senator railed against Vice President Dick Cheney for championing tax cuts and crafting national energy policy in secret.

"That fellow Cheney is the Jesse Jackson of the Republican Party. He wants it all. His time has come. He wants it more," Hollings said. Before attending a "chili feed" in Claremont last night, Kerry went to a skating rink in Newport and was preparing to lace up his size 10 1/2 skates when a CNN cameraman slipped to the ground and reportedly bruised several ribs. The cameraman, William Walker, was taken to a local hospital, and Kerry swung by to visit him for about 15 minutes and then headed to the chili feed. Patrick Healy can be reached by e-mail at phealy@globe.com.