Clinton Comeback Off to Lackluster Start : Politics: President’s short speech to a small crowd is punctuated by remarks of four hecklers wearing Act Up T-shirts.

PHILADELPHIA —  In a lackluster speech before a middling crowd and a small but noisy group of AIDS demonstrators, President Clinton made an inauspicious start Friday on what he and aides hope will be a comeback trail.

“Last night, the House of Representatives gave the American people a victory of economic growth over gridlock,” Clinton told a crowd of roughly 2,000 people gathered in the courtyard of City Hall here. “Things are going in the right direction. Stay with us, fight with us, help to lift this country up.”

The visit was the start of an intensive campaign over the next few weeks that White House aides hope will produce enough momentum to help push the President’s budget through the Senate, where the fight over his $496-billion deficit reduction measure promises to be even tougher than in the House.

After his speech here, Clinton conducted a series of radio interviews with stations in Oklahoma, the home state of one of his key Senate adversaries, conservative Democrat David L. Boren. Clinton plans to travel to West Point today and Milwaukee on Tuesday.

Looking ahead, Clinton listed the principles he said he would insist on as the Senate does its work: that the “wealthy must pay their fair share,” a veiled reference to his proposed income tax increases for those with family incomes over $150,000; deficit reduction of nearly $500 billion over five years; “incentives for people to invest in our jobs and our cities,” and “incentives to move people from welfare to work,” a reference to his proposed increase in the earned income tax credit for the working poor.

Conspicuously absent from the list was his proposed energy tax, which aides have admitted will have to be severely compromised to win Senate approval of the deficit reduction plan.

On that subject, Clinton said only: “I want you to know exactly how it works and you’ve got to decide whether you think it’s worth it.”

The tax, Clinton said, would add $17 a month in increased costs to families with incomes under $100,000. Both the President and his aides repeatedly have used those figures, drawn from Treasury Department estimates, as they try to reassure the middle class that the burden of the President’s tax plan will fall mostly on wealthier Americans.

In Washington on Friday, White House and Senate sources said that Clinton has decided to abandon most elements of his proposed energy tax and accept an 8-cent-per-gallon gasoline tax increase in its place in order to win Senate approval.

While Clinton touched on most of the topics his advisers wanted him to emphasize, the speech notably lacked the zest he often exudes on the campaign trail. He ended the speech barely 16 minutes after he began--the length of time on a better day he might have devoted to his warm-up--and often seemed to wander from theme to theme. Before and after he delivered the brief address, however, he animatedly shook hands with well-wishers, displaying a more upbeat mood than he had recently.

As he spoke, four men wearing Act Up T-shirts loudly heckled the President for his policy of detaining Haitian immigrants infected with the AIDS virus.

The government has kept a small group of HIV-infected Haitian refugees interned at the military base in Guantanamo, Cuba, for months, although under a court order some of the most seriously ill have been admitted to the United States for treatment.

In addition, a bill including a ban on immigrants infected with AIDS won Senate passage Friday and was sent to Clinton. The President opposes the ban but is still expected to sign the bill.

Although the group of protesters was small, their chants of “HIV is not a crime, why are Haitians doing time?” reverberated off the walls of the courtyard--a space Clinton’s aides had chosen in part because it was small and easy to fill.

The size of the courtyard spared the White House from what could have been an even bigger embarrassment. Despite the fact that tickets were passed out to local unions and Democratic ward organizations, the lunchtime speech in this heavily Democratic city turned out a small crowd that did not fill the space allotted for it.

As it was, the hecklers often came close to drowning out Clinton’s words, and although he smiled as he verbally sparred with them, his tone was testy.

“My budget did more to fight AIDS than any in history, and we’re having to put up with this,” he said. “If you want to give a speech--go out there and raise your own crowd.”