Newsweek:The Iraq Primary

[cal04]

It's been Bush's problem. But as the 2008 presidential election looms, contenders in both parties are sorting out their Iraq positions. What they'd do, and who they listen to.

For a moment, at least, John McCain and Hillary Clinton shared a common cause. It was one week after the midterm elections. They were back in the Senate, back in their seats on the Armed Services Committee, back to venting about Iraq. The target was Gen. John Abizaid, head of U.S. Central Command in the Mideast. McCain chafed at Abizaid's assertion that there were encouraging signs in the troubled conflict. Is "it encouraging," McCain wondered, "that people dressed in police uniforms are able to come in and kidnap 150 people and leave with them ... through checkpoints?" Clinton was also quick to pounce. "The situation in Iraq is not improving," she told Abizaid. "Hope is not a strategy."

Hope is no strategy: a lesson Clinton and other potential presidential candidates are quickly coming to learn. As the Bush presidency approaches its seventh year and the war continues, Iraq is no longer just George W. Bush's problem. Washington waits for a miracle pill from James Baker and Lee Hamilton's Iraq Study Group. But leaders in both parties know that a truly hap-py solution to the conflict is nowhere in sight—and may never be.

That could mean trouble for the 2008 front runners, Clinton and McCain. The Arizona senator stands apart from the political pack in calling for an increased U.S. presence in Iraq—arguing that the military should invest as many as 100,000 more troops on the ground to adequately secure the country. Clinton, meanwhile, has angered many in her party's antiwar wing by refusing to repudiate her initial vote to go to war—but has yet to fully articulate how exactly she would clean up the Iraq mess. Both senators were present at the conflict's creation and, if history is a guide, voters may well yearn for a fresh set of eyes to see it through to its conclusion. But, in the nascent presidential campaign, few would-be candidates have stepped forward with their own strategies for ending the war. Baker and Hamilton may offer contenders a road map to follow, but for now, candidates are still groping for a comfortable position on the way ahead in Iraq. A user's guide to the candidates' positions on the war, and who they talk to on the subject:

more
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15790605/site/newsweek/