Political Peril Aplenty if Congress Gets to Vote

Not two weeks ago, the administration publicly concluded it didn’t need to ask Congress’ permission to attack Iraq. Now, President Bush is poised to pop the question.

Capitol Hill should be pleased. For weeks, lawmakers insisted, loudly, that they expect to be part of any decision about Saddam Hussein’s future. Sen. John W. Warner of Virginia decried “an information gap” with the White House and said that “Congress has to be a partner” to the president. Rep. Jim Nussle of Iowa said that “by skirting Congress, the president risks another Vietnam.” And those are just the Republicans.

Democrats have been less circumspect. Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle’s spokeswoman said, “The issue is whether the president should seek to obtain the full support of the American people and their elected representatives before sending U.S. troops into combat in Iraq.” Added Washington Rep. Rick Larsen: “Based on what the administration has shared with Congress, I’d say the administration is far short of being able to count on Congress’ support for any action.”

But Capitol Hill should be careful about what it wishes for. “There is,” said former Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey, “political risk all around.”

If Bush goes to Congress in the next few weeks, he’s almost sure to come out a winner. One high-level congressional aide explained: “I think it would be useful for the president to say, ‘Look, here’s the deal: I need this authority, here’s the resolution I want you to vote on.’ It can’t have the breadth of Gulf of Tonkin, but it’ll have to be broad enough to give him the leeway he needs.”

Most observers concede that this type of resolution would pass. Lee H. Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman and now director of the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, said: “The Congress will give him the authority. There will be some debate, I imagine, but he’ll win the vote. I can’t remember when a president has not prevailed, at least in the short term, in a national security debate with Congress.”

For members of Congress, however, voting on an Iraq resolution poses a number of political problems. The overwhelming majority of Republicans in Congress would grant Bush any authorization he asks for, yet a vote might give the few remaining members of the party’s isolationist wing an opportunity to embarrass the GOP leadership.

As they showed with the Balkans during the Clinton administration, some Republicans, notably Iowa Rep. James A. Leach and Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts, would prefer to keep American troops home for anything but self-defense. “I am very apprehensive about U.S. military intervention against Iraq absent a direct attack of Iraq on another country or against us,” Leach said.

Other Republicans, such as Kansas Reps. Jim Ryun and Jerry Moran and Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, want to explore alternatives--economic sanctions and arms inspections--first. If force proves necessary, they want to exercise it within the framework of an international coalition.

But the bigger political problems fall to Democrats. With midterm elections in November, a vote on going to war with Iraq now could come back to haunt members in close races. “The dilemma for every Democrat is, ‘Do you side with your lefty base, or side with the commander in chief in a time of war?’ ” said the Hudson Institute’s Marshall Wittmann.

There are divisive pressures building in the party, and the dynamic could produce a split. For example, Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, who wants to take back the House in November, has staked out a pro-war position, while up-and-comer Minority Whip Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, who wants to be the next House leader, hints that she’ll oppose an assault on Iraq.

Worse, the Democrats don’t want to be perceived as the party of appeasement. In a closed-door meeting before Congress recessed in August, Ohio Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich tried to get House Democrats to agree to take a unified stand against the war. He failed, but many of his fellow Democrats are with him. One Democratic congressional aide predicts, “You’ll have a fairly vocal and reactionary peace wing in the House.”

Perhaps in the Senate too. The Philadelphia Inquirer recently reported that Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, made the Chamberlain-esque argument that attacking Iraq might actually incite Hussein to use his weapons of mass destruction.

In 1991, 45 of the 55 Democratic senators and 179 of the 265 Democratic representatives voted against the Gulf War. Another showing like that, so close to an election, could be bad news for the party. “It exposes [Democrats’] Achilles’ heel--national security,” said Wittmann.

“I think [a vote] is going to embarrass anyone who’s not on the right side of liberating Iraq,” said Kerrey. “Those who vote for it are going to be glad they did, and those who don’t are going to have to carry that vote around for the rest of their lives.”

Democratic consultant John Weaver doesn’t envision another big rift: “You’re going to have the usual people, both on the far left and on the isolationist right, who will be against it, but mostly you’ll see relative unanimity. People learned their lesson in ‘91--on both sides.”

Even a unanimous vote has a potential downside for Democrats, though. “If there’s unanimity,” explained Weaver, “it sucks up the oxygen and makes it hard to talk about domestic issues.”

There’s a special group of Democrats who will be particularly exposed by a vote: those with presidential aspirations. William Galston, a senior advisor to former President Clinton, notes, “It would be a very consequential vote for Democrats who are running for president.... Those of us with memories remember that the vote on the Gulf War provided a defining moment for Democrats with national ambitions.”

A vote on war with Iraq might also affect the current crop of presidential aspirants. According to Dan McKivergan, a former aide to Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, “A vote could be an opportunity for a Democrat to buck the party, stand up and lead and resurrect the [Henry] ‘Scoop’ Jackson wing of the party.” Or, it could be an unrecoverable mistake, like former Sen. Sam Nunn’s “no” vote in 1991 that ended his presidential hopes. Connecticut Democratic Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, for one, has decided to walk shoulder to shoulder with Bush, saying, “I think the president is headed in the right direction.” Already viewed with suspicion by the party’s left wing, Lieberman’s vote could hurt him in the Democratic primaries but help him in the general election if he got the presidential nomination.

Other candidates-in-waiting are having a harder time sorting out where they want to be. “I think people will be very supportive of whatever action is necessary,” North Carolina Democratic Sen. John Edwards said.

The timing of a vote on war with Iraq isn’t lost on these men. Lamenting how the president avoided going to Congress all summer and is heading there now, weeks before the midterms, an advisor to one presidential hopeful said with a sigh, “This is the type of thing--mixing the policy with pure politics--that drives my guy crazy.”

When the primaries are in full swing, nothing Edwards, Lieberman and House members with eyes on the presidency have said, no matter how thoughtful or eloquent, will matter. They will be tied to their vote. Today they insist they must be consulted on war with Iraq. Should a vote occur soon, they’ll be envying presidential hopefuls Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and Al Gore because they weren’t.