Democrats raise bar for judging Bush
Military victory in Iraq should give President Bush a political boost, but it’s also likely to unify fractious Democrats around two issues — the war’s aftermath and the U.S. economy.
Polls indicate success in the war has increased national support for the conflict itself to around 75 percent. But Bush’s overall approval ratings have risen only into the mid-60s, well short of the 80s and 90s he registered after the September 2001 terrorist attacks and his father scored after the 1991 Gulf War.
An Ipsos/Cook Political Report poll published this week showed Bush’s approval rating on the economy at just 55 percent.
Forty-six percent of voters said they would definitely vote to re-elect Bush, while 31 percent said they’d definitely vote against him and 20 percent said they’d consider doing so.
Democratic Party pros see a parallel developing to Bush’s father, who lost the 1992 election because of a weak economy despite winning the Gulf War.
And almost all Democrats — those who supported the Iraq war and those who opposed it — are united in raising the bar that Bush has to jump before the Iraq enterprise can be judged a success. They say he has to secure the peace, preferably by internationalizing the post-war Iraqi reconstruction effort, repair torn relations with U.S. allies, refocus on Arab-Israeli diplomacy and pay attention to challenges presented by North Korea, Iran, Syria and terrorist groups.
The requirements are being laid down by Democratic presidential candidates and even by Congressional backbenchers such as the three leaders of a new Democratic Study Group on National Security. The three, Reps. Steve Israel (N.Y.), Adam Schiff (Calif.) and David Scott (Ga.), all support the war.
The study group, with the ranking members on the Armed Services, International Relations and Intelligence committees serving as advisers, will provide a forum for members not on those committees to learn about key foreign policy issues.
On Iraq, according to Scott, “We may have won the war basically alone, but we can’t rebuild the region without allies and friends and we’ve got to bring around countries that weren’t with us in the beginning.” He said that there should be a “role for France and Germany,” though “not at the head of the line.”
It’s almost unanimous among Democratic presidential candidates, too, that Bush needs to internationalize the postwar effort and avoid appearing as Iraq’s “occupier.”
Before and during the war, the candidates have been deeply at odds. Pro-war candidates like Sens. Joe Lieberman (Conn.) and John Edwards (N.C.) and Rep. Richard Gephardt (Mo.) have been subjected to catcalls from anti-war liberals.
Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean has made himself into a contender for the nomination by militantly opposing the war and jabbing at rivals, notably Sen. John Kerry (Mass.), who supported it in Congress but fudged on the campaign trail.
In late March, according to Republican pollster David Winston, Republicans had a huge edge over Democrats, 58 percent to 27 percent, as the party the public trusts to handle national defense and foreign policy.
To the extent that Democrats rely on the United Nations to determine U.S. foreign policy, those numbers are not likely to change. It would also help Democrats if, before challenging Bush to make Iraq into paradise, they heartily cheered the overthrow of one of the world’s most evil dictators.
(Morton Kondracke is executive editor of Roll Call, the newspaper of Capitol Hill.)