Last update - 00:00 01/02/2008
U.S. primaries / The final Republican face-off before Super Tuesday
By Shmuel Rosner, Haaretz Correspondent
WASHINGTON - In the final Republican face-off before Super Tuesday, four presidential candidates sat in the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California.
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger stared at them from the first row. He had just announced his support for Republican candidate Sen. John McCain. Nancy Reagan sat beside him, basking in the glow of incessant references to her late husband - all of them good.
Mitt Romney, who mentioned Reagan all of 19 times, said, among other things, that had Reagan been president today, he would certainly say: "I'm not going to walk out of Iraq until we win in Iraq."
Perhaps, but in the early '80s he acted otherwise, when he pulled the Marines out of Lebanon after the fatal suicide bombing against them in Beirut. To obscure the impression that he had caved in, he wrote: "The Middle East is a complicated place. Well, not really a place, it's more a state of mind."
One way or another, Romney and McCain, both of whom "enlisted" Reagan in their campaign, sparred over several issues. McCain insisted Romney had espoused a public deadline to withdraw American troops from Iraq. President George W. Bush and McCain object to a deadline.
Romney said this was a lie and he had never supported a deadline.
McCain cited Romney's statement in an interview last April, in which he said Bush and Iraq's prime minister "had to have a series of timetables and milestones that they speak about. There's no question that the president and prime minister Nouri al-Maliki need timetables."
Romney accused him of distorting his meaning.
The debate became an open verbal clash on the test every Republican candidate has to face - is he for bolstering the troops in Iraq? Does he believe America should persist in Iraq until victory?
"We didn't raise the white flag and surrender in Iraq, as the Democrats wanted us to do and we would have done if we had set timetables for a withdrawal," McCain said.
The Republican frontrunners must convince the public that they support continuing the war without a hint of doubt, while Barack Obama is using Hillary Clinton's old Senate pro-war vote against her. Clinton responds with a commitment to start bringing home troops.
In the past, she took a much more flexible line regarding Iraq, explaining the complexity of a withdrawal and its possible consequences. No more. Romney's political motives could be doubted when he abstained from supporting beefing up the forces in Iraq a year ago, arguing that as governor he would not voice an opinion on a national defense issues. Since then, he has toed the party line and is now with McCain on this issue.
Whoever is elected, the Iraq war will be one of the main issues of debate between the two parties.
Those who wish to find out what Americans want in the public opinion polls may run into a few surprises. Who seeks withdrawal? The majority. Who thinks the war was worth it? Most people don't. The number of people who believe a Republican president would do a better job in Iraq (28 percent) is not dramatically lower than those who believe a Democrat (34 percent) would handle the situation better. The same number (20 percent) believe both parties have a similar chance of succeeding or failing - that is, they are still indecisive.
Almost 40 percent are already convinced that bolstering the troops in Iraq is helpful - less than those who believe it has made no difference (42 percent). But not that much less.
These figures enabled McCain to dig his way up from the grave. He believes they will also help him in the remaining months to sway public opinion a little more, and win the general elections. As amazing as this may sound: If it happens, it will be not despite Iraq but because of Iraq.
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