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Democrats end on a note of good cheer

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Times Staff Writers

A dozen days before Christmas, the six leading Democratic presidential contenders departed from weeks of attacks and instead filled a debate in Iowa on Thursday with cheerful mutual praise and statements that emphasized their agreement on trade and taxes.

Offstage, it was also a day of fence-mending. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York apologized to Illinois Sen. Barack Obama for remarks by her New Hampshire co-chairman that Obama’s youthful drug use might be exploited by Republicans in a general election campaign.

It had been among the harshest attacks of the Democratic campaign. Several hours after Clinton offered Obama the apology, at an airport on the way to Iowa, the New Hampshire campaign official, Bill Shaheen, announced that he was stepping down.

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“I made a mistake,” he said in his resignation statement.

The peacemaking onstage and off was a sign of the candidates’ ambivalence toward negative campaigning in a state that often seems averse to mudslinging, especially in such a close contest.

Clinton, Obama and former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina have for months been running neck-and-neck in Iowa polls, and the debate was the candidates’ last before the state’s Jan. 3 presidential nominating caucuses kick off the voting of 2008.

In several past debates, the Democratic candidates were more aggressive in challenging each other and drawing distinctions among their positions.

The Obama and Clinton campaigns of late have been trading increasingly barbed criticisms. In addition to the Shaheen comments about Obama’s admitted use of marijuana and cocaine as a youth, the Clinton campaign has referred to Obama’s kindergarten writings to show that his ambitions for the presidency started far earlier than he claims now. And Obama has pointedly challenged Clinton’s claim to governing experience while her husband was in the White House.

But standing side-by-side on the Des Moines stage, the candidates rarely mentioned each other -- except to offer agreement or praise.

When the moderator pressed Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware on his record of making indelicate statements, some of them on race, Obama -- an African American who was the subject of one such comment earlier this year -- offered gracious words. “Joe is on the right side of the issues and is fighting every day for America,” Obama said.

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When Obama was asked about several former aides to President Clinton who are now his advisors, Hillary Clinton laughed, and Obama responded: “Hillary, I’m looking forward to you advising me as well.”

The few barbs were pitched softly. Clinton took subtle digs at Obama’s campaign theme of hope and Edwards’ populism when she declared: “Well, everybody on this stage has an idea about how to get change. Some believe you get change by demanding it. Some believe you get it by hoping for it. I believe you get it by working hard for change. That’s what I’ve done my entire life. That’s what I will do as president.”

The low-key debate, sponsored by the Des Moines Register newspaper, was a fitting if anticlimactic event after long months in which the presidential contenders have traveled extensively throughout the first-voting state.

The candidates seemed worse for wear. Obama, showing muted energy, talked wistfully of having less than two hours to buy a Christmas tree and trim it with his two young daughters. He raised the question of whether the personal sacrifice of campaigning was worth it -- without answering his own query.

On policy, the Democrats kept to previous positions, suggesting that they would repeal President Bush’s tax cuts for wealthier Americans and take a harder line on trade, particularly with respect to China.

Clinton and Edwards said they would raise taxes on wealthy individuals and corporations, and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut boasted that he was the only candidate to propose a carbon tax on corporations.

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Pressed on whether they would balance the budget in their first year in office, the Democrats said they hoped to reduce the deficit, but none pledged to do it in one year.

“We’re not going to be able to dig ourselves out of that hole in one or two years,” Obama said.

Clinton and Obama argued for changes in the North American Free Trade Agreement, which Bill Clinton championed as president. And several candidates said the U.S. should pursue trade sanctions against human rights violators, with New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson suggesting such sanctions be considered for China.

“What we need to do is impose trade sanctions when a country violates human rights and doesn’t hold elections, as we should be doing and we’re doing in Burma, as we’re doing in Sudan, as we probably should consider doing with China,” Richardson said.

Edwards echoed that comment. “Look at what America got: Big corporations made a lot of money, are continuing to make a lot of money in China,” he said. “But what did America get in return? We got millions of dangerous Chinese toys. We lost millions of jobs.”

Dodd went further, calling the relationship between China and the U.S. an “adversarial” one. The candidates’ stances mark a break with more than two decades of American policy, which has emphasized China’s role as both a partner and competitor.

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But the candidates did not speak about world affairs nearly as much as they did the parochial concerns of the Iowa voters who may decide their fate in three weeks.

Edwards discussed the closure of Maytag headquarters in Newton. Obama touted wind turbine production in Keokuk. And Richardson, given 30 seconds to say whatever was on his mind, thanked “the people of Iowa for putting us through this very good process,” which forces the candidates and their staffers to work long hours in the Iowa winter cold, right through the holidays.

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janet.hook@latimes.com

joe.mathews@latimes.com

Times staff writer Peter Nicholas contributed to this report.

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On latimes.com

For a complete transcript of Thursday’s debate, go to latimes.com/iowadebate

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