Bush Urges G.O.P. Unity; Party Set to Focus on Security
Bush, as expected, has stepped forward to endorse McCain without naming him. And, with Romney leading the way, it is quite clear how the Republicans are going to play this.
Firstly, the war in Iraq is not a war with al Qaeda, who account for around 5% of the insurgents in that country, but it is quite clear that the Republicans are going to continue to play the Iraq war as a possible election winner, portraying the Democrats as weak on terror for seeking to end US involvement in that conflict.Beginning with Mitt Romney, who withdrew from the race on Thursday, warning that he would not abet “the surrender to terror,” Republicans, including Mr. McCain and Vice President Dick Cheney, have warned darkly that the Democrats were ill-suited and ill-equipped to protect the nation, the same theme that Mr. Bush struck in his successful 2004 re-election campaign.
On the first day as the likely nominee, a status he achieved when Mr. Romney withdrew, Mr. McCain on Friday turned his attacks toward the two Democratic candidates, Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, not his remaining major Republican challenger, Mike Huckabee.
“I guarantee you this: If we had announced a date for withdrawal from Iraq and withdrawn troops the way that Senator Obama and Senator Clinton want to do, Al Qaeda would be celebrating that they had defeated the United States of America and that we surrendered,” Mr. McCain said at a rally in Wichita. “I will never surrender.”
This is a simply extraordinary election campaign if one considers what American public opinion is on this subject.
Three in five Americans (61%) think US forces should get out of Iraq within a year, including 24 percent who favor immediate withdrawal and 37 percent who prefer a one year timetable.And, according to this morning's New York Times, this is a theme that Bush intends to run with as the election approaches.
For Mr. Bush, Friday’s speech presaged a role his aides said he would play all year: using the power of the presidency to shape the agenda, defend his own record and attack his Democratic critics on national security as relentlessly as he has since the 2002 midterm election.This is the quandary that McCain now finds himself in. With certain Republicans denouncing him, he needs the support of Bush to identify himself as conservative enough to please the Republican base. But, in getting this support from Bush, he is tying himself to a man with an historically low approval rating who to this day does not understand why his policies have been so rejected by the American electorate.
It's extraordinary, in an election in which every candidate appears to be promising change, that McCain now allows himself to be so tied, not only to the past, but to a past that has been so rejected by ordinary Americans.Mr. Bush strongly defended the parts of his record that critics and opponents view as his greatest liabilities: taxes, government spending, the handling of terrorist suspects and, especially, the war on Iraq.
“There’s another philosophy, and it’s advanced by decent people who see the world differently,” Mr. Bush said of the Democrats, returning to a refrain of speeches that have become increasingly partisan as the national campaigns intensified late last year.
“They tend to think Washington has the answers to our problems,” he went on. “They tend to believe our country only succeeds under the expansive federal government. They tend to be suspicious of America’s exercise of global leadership — unless, of course, we get a permission slip from international organizations.”
Mr. McCain acknowledged that he needed to work to unify the party, and the issues of national security and taxes appeared to be the means of doing that.National security is a metaphor for the fear tactics that Bush has used for the last seven years. So, in an election focussed on change, McCain will fight it promising more of the same. Good luck with that, John.
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