[Mb-civic] In Ohio, The War Matters Most - David S. Broder - Washington Post Op-Ed

[William Swiggard]

n Ohio, The War Matters Most

By David S. Broder
Sunday, November 6, 2005; Page B07

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A year after the close Ohio vote gave President Bush 
his second term in the White House, I came back to the capital of this 
battleground state last week as part of a team of Post reporters 
interviewing voters in various areas of the country.

Before heading to my precincts, I stopped by the office of a prominent 
Republican I had known for many years and asked him what he thought I 
would hear about Bush that afternoon. His answer was succinct: "It's 
lucky he's not on the ballot this year."

Public and private polls confirm that, as usual, Ohio is an accurate 
barometer of the national political trends. Bush has slumped badly here, 
as he has across the country. Ohio adds its own twists to the national 
story. Some sectors of the economy have shown improvement in the past 
year. But a series of financial scandals has hit the dominant GOP, and 
embattled Republican Gov. Bob Taft is suffering from pathetically low 
approval ratings after admitting that he was slow in reporting free golf 
outings and other favors from lobbyists. Democrats, who have lost every 
statewide contest in recent years, sense an opportunity for a comeback 
in next year's races for governor and senator.

But the dominant factor in the changed political climate -- identified 
by my Republican friend and confirmed by the voter interviews -- is the 
war in Iraq. He reminded me that nine Marines from a Columbus-based unit 
had been ambushed and killed in a single attack in August and that five 
other Marines from the Cleveland suburb of Brook Park had met a similar 
fate earlier that same week.

Those deaths are much more personal -- and the wounds much deeper -- 
than the damage to the president's support that has been caused by any 
of the more recent controversies roiling the waters in Washington. The 
ups and downs of Bush's various Supreme Court choices, John Roberts, 
Harriet Miers and Samuel Alito, have prompted little curiosity among the 
voters I met.

The plight of Hurricane Katrina's victims does stir their sympathy, but 
these voters have little patience for trying to sort out the 
responsibility for the mess in New Orleans among all the officials -- 
local, state and national -- involved.

As for the indictment of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President 
Cheney's main man, for allegedly lying to the grand jury investigating 
the "outing" of Valerie Plame, it might as well be happening on another 
planet. More often than not, voters say they know something of what has 
happened, but as they start to describe their reactions, they find 
themselves saying that they are not sure who was doing what -- or why. 
Except for an occasional Democratic partisan, I found no one who was 
upset with Bush for the actions in his official family -- or for the 
president's silence on the subject up through the time these interviews 
were being conducted.

But the war is something else. The Republican friend, who is a true Bush 
loyalist, said he feared that Iraq is splitting this country in a 
fashion all too familiar from the days of the Vietnam War.

"The opponents of the war are increasingly vocal," he said, "and they 
want the troops out now, and to hell with the consequences."

But, he said, "I'm also hearing more voices on the other side saying: 
Let's go in with guns blazing and win this thing, once and for all, so 
we can get out. People are saying, 'We've got to tell the Sunnis to 
clean out the insurgents -- or else.' I've heard people say we ought to 
surround those Sunni villages where the fighters are hiding, give them 
24 hours to get out and then level every building, so they can't come back."

"What people can't stand," he said, "is this unending story of two or 
three more Americans dying every day -- and nothing to show that the end 
is in sight."

Far more than anything else, the voices in Columbus suggest that the 
president's biggest problem -- and therefore the Republicans' biggest 
worry -- is the unresolved and uncertain struggle in Iraq. Bring it to 
some sort of satisfactory conclusion, and all the other issues 
confronting the administration at home and abroad probably become 
manageable. But let it drag on for another year of deaths and 
frustrations, and you are really tempting the fates.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/04/AR2005110401673.html
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