By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer
Friday May 4, 2007
WASHINGTON - Republicans in Congress are increasingly worried
that their stalwart support of President Bush's Iraq war policy
may cost them dearly in next year's elections. Should their
solidarity crack, it could boost Democrats' efforts to start
troop withdrawals.
GOP lawmakers have marched in virtual lockstep with Bush
so far, supporting his troop increase, an open-ended war
commitment and other policies that have grown increasingly
unpopular. Privately, some express fears that their loyalty
might lead them over a political cliff in 2008, when they
hope to reclaim the House and Senate majorities they lost
last year.
For now, there's little overt evidence of such wavering, and
many Republicans say it's too late to uncouple their party's
near-term fate from the war's outcome. When the House voted
May 2 to sustain Bush's veto of a bill that would have imposed
redeployment deadlines, only two of the chamber's 201 Republicans
abandoned the president.
Still, Rep. Jack Kingston (news, bio, voting record), a reliable
Bush supporter from Georgia, said that vote "could have
been the peak, possibly the last statement of House public
solidarity with the White House. As the war develops in the
next two crucial months, the political solidarity may change."
A question increasingly asked in the Capitol is: how big a
price might the party pay if the war continues to claim U.S.
casualties without quelling the anti-American insurgency?
"We have been very supportive" of the administration's
Iraq policy, Kingston said in an interview with The Associated
Press. But among GOP House members, he said, "there are
discussions on the floor: 'Hey, 30 members lost their seats
last year, and a lot of them lost because of the war.'"
It might not matter, said Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio. "As
a party, we are locked into being the party of the war in Iraq — right,
wrong or indifferent," he said. "The only salvation
for us is that it works."
Sen. Gordon Smith (news, bio, voting record) of Oregon, one
of two Senate Republicans to oppose the latest spending bill
for the conflict, said the war "is a problem because it's
defining our party to the American people, and the American
people have lost faith in this cause."
"Many Republican colleagues are simply waiting until
September," he said, citing the deadline Bush gave to
Army Gen. David Petraeus for a progress report on the war.
Unless there is a dramatic turnabout by then, Smith said, the
party's near-unanimity is almost certain to fracture.
Some Republican lawmakers report considerable support in their
states or districts for Bush's campaign against terrorism,
despite widespread frustration over the war's longevity and
casualty rates. But a number of conservative commentators recently
have said elected Republicans are becoming dangerously out
of step with mainstream public opinion, and at least one GOP
Senate aide has distributed copies of the articles as a warning
to colleagues.
"There's a lot of nervousness," said Rep. Ray H.
LaHood, R-Ill., who has backed Bush's war policies. He said
a fellow House member recently recounted visiting a coffee
shop full of Republicans in his home district and finding "none
of them supports what we're doing over there."
Some Republican leaders say their stand on Iraq is a matter
of principle, not politics, and they suggest they will accept
electoral setbacks if that is the cost.
"When you think about what Iraq means to our nation,
and what failure in Iraq will mean to our nation, it's really
far more important than any election," House Minority
Leader John Boehner (news, bio, voting record) of Ohio told
reporters Thursday. He later added that he expects to lose
no GOP seats over the issue in 2008, because "I'm planning
on victory in Iraq."
For many months, polls have found overwhelming opposition
to the president's war policies among Democratic voters. But
in a worrisome sign for Republicans, a large proportion of
self-identified independents now share that view.
In an April poll by AP-Ipsos, 61 percent of independents said
going to war in Iraq was a mistake, and 56 percent felt it
was a hopeless cause. By contrast, three-quarters of Republicans
called the war a worthy cause.
Because many GOP-held House districts are overwhelmingly conservative — just
as many Democratic-held districts are heavily liberal — there
is less concern about Iraq's political ramifications among
Republican House members than senators, who represent entire
states.
But among those watching the situation most anxiously are
GOP senators facing re-election next year in competitive states,
such as Smith of Oregon, John Warner (news, bio, voting record)
of Virginia, Susan Collins (news, bio, voting record) of Maine,
John Sununu (news, bio, voting record) of New Hampshire and
Norm Coleman (news, bio, voting record) of Minnesota.
Some Republicans, especially those from strongly conservative
House districts, say pollsters and commentators are overstating
the party's political peril.
"We're not in despair. We're not in isolation," said
Rep. Pete Sessions (news, bio, voting record), R-Texas.
While many Americans clearly want to withdraw from Iraq promptly, "the
far vaster group of people think Congress had better not stand
up our guys" in uniform, Sessions said.
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