White House Week
Democrats Gleefully Sail Into the Arab Port Deal
House and Senate leadership officials appeared to have at week's end more than enough votes to override a threatened presidential veto of legislation halting the deal to turn over the leases on several American shipping port terminals to a United Arab Emirates-controlled firm. However, a last-minute arrangement to delay the deal seemed to give the president time to turn some of those votes, congressional aides say. A key reason for the Republican revolt: Leadership aides say that efforts by Democrats like Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Edward Kennedy to question the port deal as a security threat to U.S. borders are the first sign that the GOP domination of security issues is being threatened. "Rank-and-file members are very frustrated because they are losing the terror issue here," says a Republican strategist.
Gentlemen, Start Your Whispers
Republican Party activists who dominate the nomination process are increasingly wondering if Sen. John McCain of Arizona, thought to be the early front-runner, is really conservative enough to satisfy them. There is already a whispering campaign underway to revive criticisms that McCain is short-tempered and a loose cannon. Many conservatives are still unhappy with McCain's past criticisms of Christian conservative leaders and his maverick ways on campaign finance reform and other issues. Still, McCain generally is at or near the top of the pack in early polls for the GOP presidential nomination.
Post-Iraq, Bigfoot's Shrinking Footprint
Leaders of the U.S. Central Command have ordered its Air Force, Army, and Navy components to look at how America will reposture its military forces in the Middle East after the war in Iraq and conflict in Afghanistan. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the Centcom deputy director of plans and strategy, tells U.S. News it is important for America to begin to think about what size force will be needed to fight "the long war" against Islamic extremism after the United States leaves Iraq. "We do not believe we want to follow the same strategy post-Iraq and Afghanistan that we followed post-World War II," Kimmitt says. "We are not going to garrison the Middle East the way we garrisoned western Europe." Currently, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait--and aboard U.S. naval vessels--there are roughly 200,000 troops in the region. "We would like it to be a small fraction [of 200,000], but it is hard to put a number on it: if it is one tenth, one fifth," Kimmitt says. "But I think we are talking that level of reduction."
Too Many Cooks, and So Far No Broth
Infighting is plaguing revision of the administration's three-year-old National Strategy for Combating Terrorism. An implementation plan now under debate calls for heavy emphasis on waging an ideological war against radical Islam, promoting democracy, and stopping weapons of mass destruction. But the plan is bogged down, mired in interagency squabbling over turf and tasking, sources say. "There are just too many chefs," says one observer. At least the participants have agreed on one key change: Worried that they will offend Muslims, they've replaced the word "jihadist" with "extremist."
White House Moment: 3:54 p.m., February 22, The White House East Room
While the president squirmed last week over a deal allowing a United Arab Emirates company to run terminals at U.S. ports, Vice President Dick Cheney seemed to have survived his previous week's hunting accident. Here, the two participated in an event celebrating African-American History Month.
With With Paul Bedard, David E. Kaplan, Kenneth T. Walsh and Julian E. Barnes
This story appears in the March 6, 2006 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.
advertisement
