COUNTDOWN TO NOVEMBER : DOLE FENDS OFF PRESIDENTIAL ATTACK ON `PRO-GROWTH' PLAN.

Byline: Stewart M. Powell Hearst Newspapers

Republican presidential aspirant Bob Dole defended his proposed 15 percent across-the-board federal tax cut from distant criticism Saturday by vacationing President Clinton.

Dole told several thousand supporters and fairgoers packed into the dirt-floor livestock pavilion at the Illinois State Fair that Clinton was ``trying to scare the American people about my pro-growth economic plan.''

Dole, a former senator from Kansas who came here to emphasize his ties with America's agricultural belt, said: ``The only people who are really scared - you can almost see it in their faces - are the Democrats in the White House.''

Dole said the Clintons ``just don't get it - that's why they're going to go back to Arkansas.''

The long-distance clash represented the first time since the GOP convention that Dole and Clinton have engaged on a campaign issue.

Clinton, in his weekly radio address delivered from Jackson, Wyo., said Dole's tax cut either would balloon the federal deficit or jeopardize federal support for programs like Medicare, the health care program that provides subsidies for nearly 40 million elderly Americans.

Clinton, referring to the rival election-year tax-cut proposals, declared: ``We can afford ours. We can't afford theirs.'' Clinton said his tax-cut plan, worth $110 billion, is paid for ``with specific, tough budget cuts consistent with the balanced-budget plan.''

Dole reiterated his promise to stimulate improved economic growth with a 15 percent across-the-board federal tax cut as a down payment on more far-reaching changes. Dole has said his $548 billion plan would be paid for through spending cuts and economic growth that he says the lower taxes would encourage.

``I don't want to stop there,'' he said to sustained cheers and applause.

``We will not be satisfied until we revise the entire tax code (and) make it fatter - flatter, fairer and simpler,'' Dole said. The candidate recovered quickly from his brief slip-up, quipping: ``It's fat enough right now.''

Dole devoted most of his first appearance in America's agricultural heartland since the GOP convention to emphasizing his ties with farmers. Abandoning his normal suit, shirt and tie to appear before the enthusiastic shirt-sleeve crowd in an open-neck shirt, Dole said that Clinton doesn't ``know agriculture from a bale of straw up here'' on the podium.

``I know what parity means, I know what set-asides mean,'' said Dole, referring to elements of federally subsidized farm programs that funnel some $300 million a year into Illinois.

``We're going to have a farm-family president in the White House to help rural America,'' said Dole.

Harvest-ready fields of yellow-tufted corn lined the road to the fairgrounds from the airfield where Dole landed before flying on to Buffalo, N.Y., the political base of his running mate, Jack Kemp.

Dole said he was counting upon voters in the farm belt and the industrial Midwest to help deliver victory.

``We're back in the heartland,'' Dole said, waxing eloquent about his quest for support among ``the farm towns and the factory towns, across the prairie and the plains.''

Dole added: ``I'm going to let the voters in the heartland make the decision on Nov. 5.''

Illinois, a diverse state of 11.8 million with 22 electoral votes, has voted Republican in six of the past seven presidential elections. It broke ranks in the three-way race in 1992 to deliver the state to Clinton with 49 percent of the popular vote.

Kemp, a buoyant former congressman and ex-professional quarterback, vowed to carry the campaign ``from sea to shining sea.'' He promised that a Dole-Kemp administration would lead the nation to a ``renewal of our culture, our values and our ideals.''

The Republicans piggy-backed their White House campaign rally onto the large, relaxed weekend crowds that were attending the annual agricultural show in traditionally Republican downstate Illinois, near the hometown of GOP icon Abraham Lincoln.

Corn dogs, ice cream on a stick and baseball caps were the order of the day for most of the farmers, factory workers and suburbanites who packed into the music-backed rally inside a small building on a rainy day.

Robert Pyne, 44, a trucker from Carlock, Ill., said he came inside from the fair's other exhibits to see the 1996 GOP ticket.

Dole is ``honest, he'll give us a tax cut and he'll get the economy moving,'' said Pyne, wearing a hat emblazoned with CCX, the abbreviation for his employer, Conway Central Express. ``What this country needs is stronger morals.''

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Photo

Photo: Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole, his wife,Elizabeth, and Brenda Edgar, wife of Illinois Governor Jim Edgar, greet a crowd at the state fair.

Associated Press