In the House that Reagan Built
SIMI VALLEY — For the record, any discussion of the “timetables” argument this evening between John McCain and Mitt Romney should start with the actual text of the Good Morning America Q&A with Mitt Romney, from April 2007:
Question: “Do you believe that there should be a timetable in withdrawing the troops?”
Romney: “Well, there’s no question that the President and Prime Minister (Nouri) al-Maliki have to have a series of timetables and milestones that they speak about. But those shouldn’t be for public pronouncement. You don’t want the enemy to understand how long they have to wait in the weeds until you’re going to be gone. You want to have a series of things you want to see accomplished in terms of the strength of the Iraqi military and the Iraqi police, and the leadership of the Iraqi government.”
Based on this quote, McCain attacked Romney in the closing days before the Florida primary for having supported a withdrawal timetable instead of the troop “surge.” Romney protested at that time — as he did again tonight — that McCain misrepresented his position. It began like this:
Question: Obviously, Iraq is still a major issue in this campaign, and over the last few days there’s been a real back-and-forth going on here. Senator McCain has said over and over again that you supported a timetable for a phased withdrawal from Iraq. Is that true?
Romney: Absolutely, unequivocably, absolutely no. I have never, ever supported a specific timetable for exit from Iraq. And it’s offensive to me that someone would suggest that I have. And I have noted that everyone from Time magazine to Bill Bennett over there to actually CNN’s own analysts, he said it was a lie and it’s absolutely wrong. I do not support that, never have. We’ve had — we’ve “ and Senator McCain pointed to an interview I had back in April with ABC, when I said that our president and their prime minister should have timetables and milestones. We have timetables and milestones for progress that we’re making together. But I never suggested a date specific to withdraw and, actually, she asked me a question and that question was: “If Congress were to give you a date specific for withdrawal, would you, Senator, veto it?” I said I’d veto it. I’m opposed to setting a specific date for withdrawal. By the way, we’ve had, since that time, 10-12 debates. Senator McCain never raised that question in any of those debates. If he ever wondered what my position was, he could have raised it. I instead have pointed out time and time again, and let me make it absolutely clear again tonight, I will not pull our troops out until we have brought success in Iraq, and that means, for me, that we do not have safe havens for Al Qaida or Hezbollah or anyone else, that our troops have secured the population from that kind of threat, that they will not have safe havens from which they could launch attacks against us. And if there’s any misunderstanding, those words should make it perfectly clear, as have every single debate that I’ve attended…
Question: Senator…
Romney: … 15 debates. I do not propose nor have I ever proposed a public or secret date for withdrawal. It’s just simply wrong. And by the way, raising it a few days before the Florida primary, when there was very little time for me to correct the record, when the question that was most frequently asked is, “Oh, you’re for a specific date of withdrawal,” sort of falls in the kind of dirty tricks that I think Ronald Reagan would have found to be reprehensible. (APPLAUSE)
Question: Senator McCain, tough words.
McCain: Well, of course, he said he wanted a timetable..
From there, things deteriorated. Readers can check the transcript if interested, but suffice it to say that it is unlikely that John McCain and Mitt Romney will wind up as running mates. McCain wants to keep the story line, at least for the next several days, on his steadfast views on the “surge,” and depict Romney as vacillating in his support; Romney wants to change the focus to his business savvy and skill as executive and governor.
McCain may enjoy some success in pushing this line, based on his reputation for “straight talk,” and based on Romney’s reputation for talk that is sometimes — well, not so straight. Although Romney in general spoke clearly and convincingly tonight, he does have a tendency to dodge questions in a less than artful way. For instance, the first question Anderson Cooper asked tonight was whether Americans were better off today than eight years ago. Romney responded by suggesting that it was only legitimate to ask how residents of Massachusetts felt after his four years as governor. Cooper then repeated his question, and Romney repeated his answer, before the sparring stopped and Romney finally switched into his “Washington is broken” riff on how things have deteriorated. Why not start the answer with that response instead of trying to reframe the question?
This debate was anyway more McCain-Romney fireworks than a balanced discussion between the three main remaining candidates. Mike Huckabee found himself on the far side of the panel, separated from the two leaders by the incongruous presence of Ron Paul, whose references to America behaving as an “empire” must have made the Reaganites present dyspeptic. There was little Huckabee could do beyond striking an occasional populist note or making a lofty reference to conservative principles.
Afterward, in the “spin room” set up in an adjacent building of the Reagan Library, the candidates’ campaign managers and advisers peddled their version of how things went and how they see their prospects in the 22 states with votes scheduled next Tuesday. Not surprisingly, Reagan’s so-called 11th Commandment — not to speak ill of fellow Republicans — continued to be broken. McCain and Huckabee advisers said Romney could only count on Massachusetts and Utah as sure bets, that Southern states like Georgia, Tennessee might well keep Huckabee’s candidacy alive. A Romney adviser suggested that his candidate would be counting on “earned media” — making news pages and newscasts — as much as any advertising blitz. Huckabee’s campaign manager said a national TV ad campaign would begin in several key states on Friday. One of McCain’s top advisers said he thought the campaign’s money problems were over. “We’ve raised more than a million dollars over the Internet since the Florida results came in,” he said.
So now the final days of frantic campaigning begin. Evoking the memory of Ronald Reagan by holding the debate surrounded by mementos of his presidency provided nostalgia and relief, but no one here was annointed as Reagan’s heir. In fact the Reagan era here seems like a museum specimen, pressed under glass, a relic. Today’s reality is a bit different, something I was reminded of earlier in the day. As staffers scurried to set up the media center, I spied some Spanish-speaking correspondents talking to one of the uniformed cleaning staff as he pushed a broom. “Are you a Republican or a Democrat?” they asked him in Spanish. “I’m neither,” he replied. “I’m Mexican.”