Saunders: "Giuliani Would Make the Tough Decisions"

February 15, 2007
Giuliani Would Make the Tough Decisions
By Debra Saunders

"What we pay people in Washington for is to make decisions," former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani told the audience at the California GOP convention in Sacramento Saturday.

Meanwhile, back in Washington, members of Congress have been acting as if they were sent to Washington to make non-decisions. Witness the nonbinding House resolution being debated this week in which members profess to support U.S. troops in Iraq, but, "Congress disapproves of the decision of President George W. Bush announced on Jan. 10, 2007, to deploy more than 20,000 additional U.S. combat troops to Iraq."

The Senate couldn't even manage to pass a meaningless Iraq resolution when it tried earlier this month -- a non-accomplishment for which the senators, over time, may be glad.

What are Americans to think of the House resolution?

Politicians say they support the troops, then they undercut the efforts of Gen. David Petraeus, the new military commander in Iraq, to assemble the soldiers he believes he needs to win. Last year, war critics bashed Bush for not listening to Gen. Eric Shinseki, who wanted the administration to send more troops to Iraq. Now, they are supporting resolutions against more troops.

As Giuliani noted: "What I don't get is the nonbinding resolution. I don't get that. In the business world, two weeks spent on a nonbinding resolution would be considered nonproductive." He also called it "a comment without making a decision."

It felt good to see a politician looking at a run for the White House without first reconfiguring his platform to reflect polls that show Americans souring on the war in Iraq.

The latest USA Today/Gallup poll shows that 60 percent of voters disapprove of the Bush troop surge. Some 56 percent say that going to war was a mistake. But Giuliani didn't run from the war in his remarks, because it is too late to turn back.

Granted, Giuliani was speaking to Republicans, but the pack of journalists in the back of the room guaranteed that his words would be passed on to the general public.

Still, Giuliani had no problem comparing Bush's situation today with that of President Abraham Lincoln during the dark days of the Civil War. Giuliani noted that naysayers dismissed Lincoln as a dimwitted incompetent during the 1863 draft riots in New York and the crushing military defeats that occurred before Lincoln found the right general in Ulysses S. Grant. Because Lincoln did not give in to defeat, the Union prevailed and slavery died.

Giuliani added, "In time of war, you don't talk about pulling out."

Except in time of elections in time of war, when politicians do talk about pulling out. Some Democrats argue that Bush should end the war to show that he has heard the message voters sent in November 2006. Never mind that, now in power, the Democrats remain afraid to cut off war funding lest they be blamed if events in Iraq blow up in their faces. So they stick to nonbinding resolutions.

On the campaign trail, Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., distanced herself from her vote in favor of the war resolution, when she said, "Knowing what we know now, I would never have voted for it."

Clinton's plan for Iraq seems poll tested and poll approved: She wants to put a cap on the number of U.S. troops in Iraq (the Gallup poll shows 57 percent approve), but she does not want the Senate to cut off funding for the war (58 percent of those polled are with her).

Among other Democratic candidates, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., says he never would have voted for the war; former Sen. John Edwards now says that his vote for the war was a mistake and he wants to bring all American troops home within 18 months.

Who will win in 2008? The Republicans clearly could lose even more in 2008 than they lost in 2006. But if it were certain that supporting the Iraq war is the political kiss of death, Democrats and antiwar Republicans would move to cut off funding, instead of debating nonbinding resolutions.

When Giuliani addressed Republicans, he had a message of hope. Giuliani showed that he was willing to stick to an unpopular position, which suggests there are some things he would not do to win an election.

If either Clinton or Edwards is the Democratic presidential nominee, what are they going to say? That they are really smart Democrats who somehow were gulled by the lightweight Bush? Please.

dsaunders@sfchronicle.com