Iraq Around The Clock

Tom Daschle's Capitol conference room was jammed with reporters who wanted to question him about Iraq. But he insisted on starting "dugout" (his daily dose of inside baseball) with something much closer to home: the killer drought on the Great Plains. President Bush, he fumed, was refusing to support $5 billion in aid to farms and ranches turned to dust for lack of rain. Instead, he was obsessed with another desert region--the one inhabited by Saddam Hussein. So far, Daschle said, there was neither enough evidence nor enough allied support to warrant a Senate vote on attacking Iraq. But there was plenty of proof that his fellow South Dakotans needed help--and if they didn't get it, they might well punish the Republican candidate in the state's Senate race this November. "I'm mystified that the administration isn't more compassionate," the Senate's Democratic leader observed--dryly.

Which parched terrain do you care about more: America's or Iraq's? It's one way to summarize the emerging dynamics of the election season that starts in earnest this week. Washington is dominated by rumors of war: by the Bush administration's effort to make its case to Congress; by the president's personal diplomacy and sales pitch to the United Nations; by a military buildup in the Persian Gulf proceeding slowly but methodically. It's a story line--Iraq Around the Clock--that features Bush in his most popular role, as commander in chief. For Republicans it has the added benefit of obscuring a focus on the Democrats' strongest themes: domestic issues such as corporate evildoers, health care, Social Security and job losses. Democrats contend that the economy is shaky everywhere (not just in farm country) and insist that the pocketbook issues will predominate, especially since Bush isn't on the ballot. "What matters isn't what the candidates say, it's what voters listen to," says Democratic polltaker Harrison Hickman. "And right now that's domestic issues."

Rallying his troops last spring, Bush political consigliere Karl Rove said that Bush's standing as a war leader would draw the GOP base to the polls and help the party prosper in the fall elections. But these days the polls support the Democrats' view of the public's paramount concerns. In the most recent NEWSWEEK Poll, 63 percent of voters said their chief worry was "the economy and the job situation," compared with 19 percent who cited "the threat of another terrorist attack." And while Bush is highly regarded as a war leader, his worst ratings are for his handling of the economy: the approval margin is a highly equivocal 48-45 percent.

Still, with Congress closely divided, even the smallest tremor could shift the tectonic plates of politics. In the short run (through November), the Iraq issue appears to pose a greater risk to Democrats. Republicans have their doves, but the Democrats have been burdened since Vietnam with a reputation for reflexive opposition to the use of force. In 1991, 47 Senate Democrats (including Daschle) voted against authorizing President George H.W. Bush to attack Saddam for invading Kuwait; in the House, 179 Democrats voted against Bush the Elder. GOP strategists cite at least two Democratic no's from 11 years ago who now are in close Senate contests--and who might, as the saying goes, be "cross-pressured" if they face a vote on a similar resolution: Sen. Paul Wellstone of Minnesota and Sen. Tim Johnson, Daschle's ally in South Dakota.

Is the Iraq-a-thon a "wag the dog" strategy--war fever conveniently contracted in time for the anniversary of 9-11 or the fall campaign? Democrats in Congress privately wonder, even if they shy away from making the accusation publicly. "This certainly seems timely," says one Democratic senator. "We haven't found Osama, we haven't broken Al Qaeda and Afghanistan is a mess. So let's have a debate on Saddam." But Democrats are partly responsible for the programming change: all summer long their leaders demanded a congressional debate and vote. And all the war talk distracts Bush from efforts to protect his flank on the economy, health care and education. "I talked about all of that in my speech, too, but nobody reported it," says Rove.

Politically, wars tend to start well for presidents but do not always end that way. Whatever the short-term gain, the long-term risks for Bush in Iraq are substantial, and likely to surface by re-election time in 2004. Perhaps that explains why, after months of bellicose talk, the administration furiously dialed back, accepting the need for a congressional vote (indeed, insisting on it) and vowing to seek support from allies and perhaps a new resolution from the U.N. Security Council. By the end of last week, administration officials were even saying that they would support one more round of "coercive" U.N. inspections.

But even with lowered voices, the administration needs to do a better job of making the case that Saddam is dangerously armed with WMDs. In a private session with members of Congress, Bush mentioned an old photo of Saddam shooting an enemy of his regime--not the strongest evidence. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld infuriated senators with content-free answers in his own briefings.

After hearing complaints from GOP leaders, Bush hurriedly dispatched Vice President Dick Cheney and CIA Director George Tenet to the Hill. Ensconced in the "Tin Can"--a secure, metal-lined room in the attic of the Capitol--the two officials gave what one aide described as a "hyperclassified" briefing to the "Big Four" congressional leaders. There seems to have been some new evidence put on the table. Trent Lott, the Republican Senate leader, pronounced the contents of the 90-minute meeting "troubling"; even Daschle said he found the session "very useful." Said one of his aides: "Some of our questions were answered."

In the end, Bush is likely to win a resolution authorizing him, in general terms, to get rid of Saddam, whatever it takes. He may eventually win the backing of the U.N. Security Council; he begins making his case there this week. But skeptics will remain. One of them is likely to be Sen. John Kerry. As a onetime PT boat captain in Vietnam and prosecutor in Boston, he knows that information--or the lack of it--can kill. In 1991, his meticulousness (and his antiwar Massachusetts constituents) led him to oppose a resolution for war with Iraq. Sanctions, he said at the time, might be enough to topple Saddam. Battle plans weren't clear; risks hadn't been considered. "There is a rush to war here," he protested, "a rush to get this over with." In the end, George H.W. Bush presided over a surprisingly quick, politically popular--though unfinished--victory in the Persian Gulf.

Now the echoes of 1991 are everywhere. Kerry and his fellow Democrats are leery of another war by another Bush in Iraq. "The risks are too great to go it alone, or to go in without evidence that shows we have no other choice," says Kerry, a likely presidential contender in 2004. And once again, a Bush is ready to reap short-term political gain--and face long-term political dangers. History, said Mark Twain, doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes. Bush and the Democrats began composing the poem last week. The first stanza arrives this November, on Election Day.