Campaigning in Wartime

If there was ever any doubt that President Bush would run for re-election as the commander in chief of the war on terror, it will end when the Republican Party begins broadcasting its first campaign commercial on Mr. Bush's behalf. "Some are now attacking the president for attacking the terrorists," says the ad, as it shows film of Mr. Bush warning of the potential dangers ahead.

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The proper response:

In a classic expression of victim mentality, Republicans are claiming Mr. Bush (always call him Mr. Bush, never use the title) is being attacked for attacking the terrorists.

This is a lie. He is being attacked for ignoring the terrorists.

Democrats supported the war in Afghanistan, because that was where the terrorists were. Democrats supported Mr. Bush's Iraqi Adventures at first because we trusted him when he said he had proof of an Iraqi threat to the U.S.

Only to find out that not only was there no connection between Iraq and the terrorists that attacked us, but Bush's administration knew it.

Bush's choices have distracted the nation from the real threat, thrown an unstable region into greater chaos, tied up money and resources that could have been used to help Americans at home as well as to continue against real threats to our security and sent your neighbors, children and friends into a hostile environment wearing a target that says "Made in the USA" in fine, but still readable, print.

Bush's choices have shortchanged homeland security as well as our rights as citizens, thrown even your unborn children into debt, disrupted decades old alliances that were arranged as much for our defense as our allies', and convinced the world he is a Crusader…a Crusader in service, not of God, but of Oil… in service, not of prophecy but of profit.

The rest of the editorial follows.

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It was inevitable that Sept. 11 was going to wind up in the messy center of presidential politics. The war against terror is by its very nature a war with no conclusion, and Democrats who lined up behind the president after the World Trade Center was destroyed cannot be expected to give him a free pass into a second term. The Republicans, meanwhile, are bound to base their campaign on the public's natural reluctance to change chief executives in dangerous times.

The Democrats need to find ways to attack Mr. Bush's stewardship without attacking his character; most Americans remember the president's firm resolve after 9/11 with admiration and do not want those memories challenged. Mr. Bush has what may be the trickier task. He undoubtedly regards maintaining control of the White House for a second term as critical to winning the war on terror. Yet in order to maintain credibility while he runs for re-election, he must convince people that the decisions he makes are not just based on political self-preservation. On that front, so far, he has come up short.

The sight of the president in London last week, standing next to Prime Minister Tony Blair, was a study in contrasts. Mr. Blair has taken enormous political hits to support Mr. Bush, and he has done so because he believed the Iraqi invasion was in the best interests of both his own country and the rest of the world. Mr. Bush has undoubtedly been grateful in private. But in public he has failed to lend the prime minister any of his own political capital. The president, for instance, could have provided support on an issue of great concern to Europe by pressing to end Israel's suicidal expansion of its West Bank settlements. That would be good for Israel, aid the cause of Middle Eastern peace and greatly strengthen Mr. Blair's position. The fact that Mr. Bush has not made the effort suggests he is setting a higher priority on conservative Christian and Jewish lobbying groups in his own political base — groups whose support he is unlikely to lose under any circumstances, but whose enthusiasm could be helpful in both turning out the vote and collecting campaign contributions.

Political consultants have been mesmerized lately with the question of whether the undecided moderate voters who are supposed to turn the tide of any presidential election really exist. The country, some say, may be divided fairly equally between those red states and blue states, with victory going not to the man who mobilizes the middle but the one who energizes his own base. To us, it matters less which theory is true than that Mr. Bush chooses the path that is best for the country. He cannot successfully preside over a frustrating and painful struggle to change the Middle East and protect the homeland from terrorism if he always has one eye on appeasing his supporters on the right. We have gone too far down that road already, with Republicans ramming unaffordable tax cuts through Congress on the eve of the invasion of Iraq and the White House sending polarizing judicial nominees to the Senate.

One area in which the president has certainly damaged his image of a commander in chief above the fray is on the very delicate question of the treatment of the war dead. The White House, as is well known, has done everything in its power to keep the image of coffins and grieving families as far away from the TV screen as possible, and neither the president nor his representatives have attended the funerals of any of the fallen soldiers. One of the explanations given for this is the desire to leave the families to their private grief, but that could certainly be a decision left to the families themselves. Another is that the president and his chief lieutenants are too busy to attend so many memorials.

According to Public Citizen, which keeps exhaustive statistics on the topic, George Bush has attended 35 campaign fund-raisers since June 17 and is expected to attend at least 7 more by the end of the year. Vice President Dick Cheney has attended 31. That averages about three a week for the two men, most of them much farther away from the White House than Dover Air Force Base, where the bodies of the dead soldiers arrive back home.

We respectfully suggest that Mr. Bush change his priorities. If he wants to run for re-election as the leader in a time of war, he needs to behave like a president, not a politician. The public needs some reassurance that he is willing to sacrifice something himself to win the struggle to which he has committed us.