Election 2008

The media are awash with commentary after tonight’s Republican CNN/You Tube debate, most of it tactical parsing of what was said and who looked best saying it. To this observer, however, the real interest in this debate was the focus on illegal immigration. The first half-hour of the debate was devoted entirely to this one subject. Was New York a “sanctuary city?” Was Massachusetts home to six “sanctuary cities” — and a Governor’s mansion where illegals sometimes worked? Did Arkansas give “subsidies” to children of illegal aliens so they could go to college? Each of the top three Republican contenders had some explaining to do before a skeptical Republican audience. And the more each one — Giuliani, Romney, Huckabee — tried to depict his actions as vigorously against favoring illegals, the more chinks could be seen in his armor.

McCain, by contrast, defended his unpopular stand rather more convincingly. He said that he now realized that the borders had to be secured before the U.S. could offer illegal immigrants a deal. As an ally of the White House’s failed plan to offer illegals an accomodation, McCain was the only Republican tonight to mention President Bush favorably. At one point he said he was “saddened” by the tone of the other Republicans’ remarks. The illegals were also “God’s children,” he said.

What this should really tell us is that illegal immigration may be the trickiest issue of this campaign. Hillary got into trouble over her answer in Philadelphia on whether illegals should get drivers’ licenses; now it’s the Republicans’ turn to try to fashion a response that seems forthright without being jingoistic.

There is also the not small matter of how it plays in the Hispanic community — those whose documents now include voter registration cards. As Dan Schnur put it (quoted in last Sunday’s NYT), “a Republican who only talks border control or a Democrat who only talks about benefits and services for illegal immigrants are going to find themselves in a lot of trouble next fall.”

Duncan Hunter may vow to build 800 miles of border fence within six months of taking office, but no nominee will be able to base his immigration policy on simply keeping everyone out. Those 12 million immigrants who are here already, illegally, must either be integrated into society or sent home. How we handle this will tell us and the rest of the world what we are really like. A nation of immigrants — legal and equal — is the way it should be.

• Immigration It’s likely that the Senate won’t be passing any immigration legislation after this move today before the ‘08 election.  This leaves the wedge issue out for discussion among the candidates, some of whom (most recently Fred Thompson), already have come out with statements.
• Rs John McCain’s campaign released this ad, highlighting his remark at the Fox News debate this weekend about Clinton’s former support for the Woodstock museum in up-state New York.  His “I was tied up at the time” comment serves multiple purposes: not only does it allow his team to use colorful tied-eyed backgrounds in the ad, but it also highlights, yet again, his service and capture during Vietnam.
• Rs Mitt Romney released a new ad today, featuring his plans to bring change and spending accountability to Washington.  Per The Caucus, the campaign says it will air in South Carolina.
• Ds The folks at DailyKos are pushing for a stronger response from the Clinton campaign and Senate office re her stance on the FISA legislation.  This as Politico’s Ben Smith reports on possible threats to Clinton’s campaign from the left.

• Rs and Trade Romney proposes opening markets in his “Reagan Zone of Economic Freedom” plan. He suggests opening markets and helping American workers “succeed,” claiming it would be the largest free trade zone “ever.” By raising the trade issue, not only does Romney get policy points (which he may be in even more need of after this rough morning), but he would renew a dialogue about the issue in Republican circles. Democratic candidates have taken stances on NAFTA and Doha before, but broadened debate could propel this issue to the fore.
• Ds and FISA Obama and Clinton offered “conditional support” for filibustering the FISA bill, which has yet to make it through Committee. They join Dodd and Biden in their distaste for the measure, which liberal bloggers are touting as “defending the Constitution against George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.”
• Rs and Immigration Mark Krikorian over at The Corner is a fan of Fred Thompson’s recently announced platform on immigration.
• Endorsing Rs Mitt Romney lost an endorsement today from Pastor Don Wilton of South Carolina today, the pretty heavy-handed state Baptist Convention President. If nothing else, the loss of Wilton’s support signals the continued hesitation on the part of social conservatives to back the candidate. Does it all come down to his Mormon faith, or is there something more political going on here?
• Ads Bill Richardson (D) released this ad yesterday, highlighting his role in negotiating the release of hostages out of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in 1995. He has made his experience the focus of his spots in the past; this new ad drills down onto the finer points of his CV.

Yesterday’s Republican debate was another installment in their “Who’s the Best Conservative?” televised mini-series. This episode, brought to you by Fox News and the Florida Republican Party, played before an appreciative live audience in Orlando that warmly greeted the on-stage performers and loudly booed the absent villain – Hillary Clinton. She was, as Fred Thompson put it at one point, “always a good applause line (for us).”

This was the kind of audience Republicans yearn for. At one point, the boisterous group beat Mitt Romney to the punch. “Is Hillary Clinton fit to be commander in chief?” the moderator asked Romney. The transcript records:

“AUDIENCE: No!
ROMNEY: The audience — the audience is telling you the answer….”

The ex-governor of Massachusetts then digresses, his thespian’s timing a bit off, until the questioner lobs the softball once again across the plate:

“QUESTIONER: I asked you specifically is she fit to be commander in chief?”
ROMNEY:…I think you heard what they said. The answer is, absolute — anyone here want to vote for Hillary?
AUDIENCE: No!
ROMNEY: I agree with them.

This segue into foreign affairs topics came toward the end of the debate, and perhaps it was just as well. Iraq is a divisive issue among Republicans, immigration equally so. So in this red-belt section of Florida, the eight-man ensemble sparred with each other mainly on domestic policy – who cut taxes more, opposed abortion more, promoted family values better than others, who managed a business, state or city the best, who could best “fix” the health care system. When asked about his views on gay marriage, Rudy Giuliani had a chance to show off his own skillful timing. Marriage is not just a religious commitment, he said. After all, he had married 210 couples when he was Mayor of New York. Then, almost rolling his eyes, a theatrical pause:

“…They were all men and women.
(LAUGHTER)
I hope.
(LAUGHTER)
(APPLAUSE)
GIULIANI: You got to give me a little slack here. It was New York City, you know…”

If Hillary was the number one villain for this Republican gathering, then Vladimir Putin was – among foreign leaders – a kind of understudy for the role. John McCain pronounced him “a dangerous person” and, taking a jab at President Bush, said that “…when I looked into Mr. Putin’s eyes, I saw three letters: a K, a G and a B….The first thing I would do is make sure that we have a missile defense system in place in Czechoslovakia and Poland, and I don’t care what his objections are to it.”

(Disregard, for a moment, the fact that Czechoslovakia became two separate states – the Czech Republic and Slovakia – 15 years ago. The image of McCain — experienced, skeptical and patriotic – was probably what stuck with the audience.)

As you can see, the characters and their interaction are by now well established, and most are becoming well practiced at delivering a feisty quip, a barbed comment or a comic aside. It’s understandable that, after ten televised debates, each lasting 90 to 120 minutes, there’s no longer much news (or drama) made, but it’s excellent preparation for whomever finally becomes the Republican candidate. After all, less than a year from now, one of the players in this off-Broadway pilot will co-star in prime time TV debates with the nominee of the Democratic Party – and the results will be scrutinized like TV networks’ “sweeps week” ratings. The best sound bites will be broadcast again and again in the final days of the campaign, as millions of Americans may still be deciding who they’ll vote for. Timing – and sound bites – are everything.

On Thursday Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, while campaigning in South Carolina, announced his belief that the United Nations had been “an extraordinary failure of late,” and went on to call for a “coalition of free nations” to take its place (mult). His comments play to a distrust among some conservatives of the U.N. and international institutions in general, but also draws attention to his somewhat wanton—relatively speaking—foreign policy credentials.

These days, Romney is employing many tactics that cater to social and religious conservatives; disputing the need for a United Nations is only the most recent. Romney lags behind in polls among Republicans nationwide, although he stands in first place in South Carolina. Recently he’s won endorsements from key social and religious conservatives, including Bob Jones III, the grandson of the religious leader and former head of Bob Jones University. Romney barely edged out a victory in Saturday’s Family Research Council straw poll, in which he won a plurality among those present (at the Washington Hilton in D.C.), but received a sorry total of 99 votes online to Mike Huckabee’s 488. Romney has yet to become the darling of religious conservatives, but he certainly is trying.

On Thursday, Romney proposed that the U.S. lead a “coalition of the free nations of the world” in lieu of lending support to the United Nations, particularly to her human rights arm, the UN Human Rights Council. After his comments aired, a spokesman for the campaign clarified that the candidate was suggesting that the US pull financial support from the Council, from which the U.S., of course, already abstains (the Human Rights Council has made pointed comments about Israel in the past, and is also responsible for the review of members’ compliance with the Geneva Conventions and the Convention Against Torture, among others). Whether this was an error on the campaign’s part or simply a misspeak, is to be determined.

As one might have guessed, liberal internationalist voices were furious. FP’s Passport blog had these harsh words. Bloggers at UN Dispatch are glad that other candidates, namely Democrat Bill Richardson, have the experience to counter Romney (Richardson is a former ambassador to the U.N.). What these authors do not address, however, are the possible benefits Romney’s pronouncement can have to his campaign.

His opponents, mainly Giuliani and McCain, have prominent backgrounds in foreign affairs. Voters, especially Republican primary voters, know that it was Giuliani who was New York’s mayor in September of 2001 and that McCain was once a guest at the Hanoi Hilton. Mitt Romney’s foreign policy experience does not match up. As a former governor of Massachusetts, much of his international experience comes from his time as CEO of Bain Capital, a private equity firm, and from managing the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics. It’s likely that Romney’s comments were targeted to boost his appeal among conservatives, though foreign policy this election is a delicate arena. It would serve Romney to tread softly.

The news that Republican Presidential candidate Sam Brownback is withdrawing today from the race is a reminder that the phalanx of candidates on both sides is about to start thinning out. Like characters in an Agatha Christie murder mystery, both Republicans and Democrats will soon start disappearing from debate stages — slowly at first, then after the first primaries, quite rapidly. We will lose several colorful personalities who, for reasons of conviction or tactics, offered some of the more interesting policy choices and provocative comments. Regardless what you think about Ron Paul’s libertarianism or Dennis Kucinich’s social policy, both have made the campaign more interesting. (On foreign policy, their views even occasionally overlap — on Iraq, for instance, or warrantless wiretapping.) Whatever insights (or entertainment) these “second tier” candidates offer, they will be pressured to drop out early in the primary season if they can’t poll above single digits.

Sam Brownback’s problem was not that he was too colorful, but less so. His views on social policy were not far from Romney’s and his views on terrorism similar to Giuliani’s. If you enter the race without national name recognition or deep pockets, you have to cause a stir with your policies or the way you present them. The Senator from Kansas did neither.

Now the NYT’s David Brooks wants us to help a more engaging candidate, the other “Man from Hope (Ark.),” Mike Huckabee, to step into the limelight. However, he acknowledges that Huckabee’s foreign policy thinking is “thin.” Among other faults, Huckabee promises to make the United States energy independent within eight years. Statements like this will be challenged, and could nix the chances of a candidate until now best known for his weight loss. It’s a tough reality, but it doesn’t take much now for a candidate to get voted off the island and onto Brownback Mountain.