Morning Political Note: Knots

W A S H I N G T O N, April 1 -- For some reasons we can put our fingers on, and others we can't, the conflict in the Middle East doesn't seem like an issue on the verge of becoming political, or a political problem, for President Bush.

News Summary

Even as the papers say the president is coming "under growing pressure" (the Los Angeles Times ) and facing a "quandary" (the New York Times ), this pressure doesn't seem to be coming from Democrats, making this story atypically nonpolitical, even as it's likely to be the dominant Washington story all week.

Maybe this is because:

1) Both parties are, and always have been, split over the Mideast, with many Republicans as well as Democrats being staunchly pro-Israel, and others within each party not so much. As a result, there's no clear line of sight for an attack on the president, making this unlikely to become a partisan debate — unless it evolves into a question of competence.

Which, arguably, it could — we'll leave it to foreign policy experts and Bush national security team watchers to better explain why — but we'd suggest that the chances that a popular wartime president could be considered incompetent on an issue that has been boiling for lifetimes are pretty slim. Leading us to …

2) This possibly being yet another demonstration of Bush's wartime untouchability. His national security team has gotten so many plaudits for their handling of the war against terror, right down that that Vanity Fair spread, that any charges that they might have mishandled the Mideast aren't likely to resonate in any way that would result in electoral harm to the president or his party.

And/or 3) the images coming out of the Mideast — that bloody restaurant floor from the Passover bombing, for instance — are simply too grim for any lawmaker to feel like taking the risk of making this into a political issue.

As one sage New York Jewish Democrat noted to us Friday evening over a Sabbath meal of Vietnamese food, almost no Americans will vote according this issue. So to extrapolate from that, if you're serving in public office, why chance making it a political issue?

We'd venture to say that increased US involvement in the Mideast might even have some positive, if indirect impact on Bush, and possibly the GOP heading into the 2002 elections. It doesn't take a cynic assigning political motives to realize that the effect of increased Administration involvement in the Mideast, especially if US troops are sent in to keep the peace, is to draw Americans' attention to yet another war right about when the fighting in Afghanistan is falling off the front pages.( http://www.washtimes.com/national/20020401-11797806.htm

Still, as one smart, clear-eyed long-time Bush watcher points out: "One of the things, in addition to his comments, that struck me about Bush is the slovenly body language during that presser at Crawford (over the weekend). It all suggested a lack of serious purpose, a detachment, almost a bored indifference to the issue. I know the White House attitude is essentially, 'We don't want to look too seriously identified with all of this because then … we run the risk of a deeper involvement that could fail.' But that pose is looking un-presidential. This is the time that Bush/Rove/Hughes are getting truly exposed for the highly political nature of their foreign policy. It also exposes their naiveté in believing — perhaps still believing — that the Middle East can be spun the way, say, the South Carolina primary was."

Offering a complementary take, another close observer points out, "Bush has no one to blame for the fecklessness and shortsightedness of this policy but himself. Rove and Hughes are simply not players on this stuff. Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice and Powell (in descending order of hawkishness) are. The sad thing is it's not politics driving this debacle; it's considered (or ill-considered) policy."

"The lack of seriousness in Bush's demeanor is, I believe, also a cover for deep insecurity. This is a subject mastery of which cannot be faked, and which is not susceptible to bald platitudes and simple categories. You have to know stuff to get the Middle East right. Bush doesn't. It makes him overly reliant on advisers (who disagree among themselves, resulting in what Zbig Brzezinski called 'strategic incoherence'), and arrogantly insouciant about his own inadequacies."

None of this necessarily means the president's heart is in the wrong place — just that no one seems happy with the status quo, or can say when the status quo will change, either through US leadership or turns of events beyond US control.

The Los Angeles Times ' Robin Wright notes Bush's relative quiet: "Unlike the many world leaders who weighed in on the mounting crisis, Bush was silent Sunday. His only public appearance was at Easter services at a Baptist church near his Texas ranch, and aides said he made no calls to Mideast leaders."( http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-000023358apr01.story )?coll=la%2Dheadlines )%2Dfrontpage )

We are sticking to our brief and focusing on the politics of all of this — not in a cynical way, but showing how our democracy is responding to it all (or not responding) — but some of the national political press corps' sharper minds are going to look at this issue this week. The Los Angeles Times ' Ron Brownstein gets the ball rolling.( http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-000023386apr01.column?coll=la%2Dnews%2Da%5Fsection ) )

The latest on the Mideast from ABCNEWS's London Bureau: Israeli tanks have moved into two Palestinian towns in the West Bank, hours after Prime Minister Sharon declared war on what he called Arafat's "terrorist infrastructure." Israeli forces are now in control of Qalqilya, close to the Israeli cities of Tel Aviv and Netanya, both of which have been targeted by Palestinian suicide bombers. Earlier this morning, Israeli tanks and troops entered Bethlehem, but later withdrew to the outskirts of the town.

In Qalqilya, the Israeli military said it is conducting searches for militants and weapons. Power and water supplies were cut off as at least 60 tanks took up position, and some exchanges of fire were reported. In Ramallah, Arafat remains stranded at his office for a fourth day.

In the West Bank, Palestinian gunmen have killed 11 men suspected of collaborating with Israel. The dead include eight who were taken by militants from a temporary jail and shot in the streets in Tulkarem. The others were killed in Bethlehem and Qalqilya.

Retreating to our forte, domestic political tangles, we're now into April, and political strategists in both major political parties are feeling enough election day heat to get a little bit panicky and loopy.

Clearly, the consensus is true: Democrats ARE in worse shape nationally at this point, although some party strategists argue that they can and will win the cycle race by race, without the need for, or benefit of, a big dynamic.

Still, as we've written for weeks, the Democrats are in search of an election message, with the traditional advantages of momentum and issues that the party not occupying the White House normally has in the midterm elections seemingly absent.

There have been some news stories and news analyses along those lines in the last few weeks, but New York Times columnist Frank Rich, writing for Saturday as much in sadness as in mockdom, went further and better along these lines than anyone else has. We'll excerpt a bit, but if you are interested in politics and/or the Democratic party, read the whole thing. ( http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/30/opinion/30RICH.html )

"If the Democrats stand for anything in a time of rapidly expanding war, it's not clear what it is. Hours before the Passover massacre in Netanya, President Bush could assert that the latest diplomatic foray by Gen. Anthony Zinni was 'making very good progress' with little worry that any Democratic leader would challenge him. The incoherence and indolence of the Bush 'policy' in the Middle East … has been more forcefully dissected by conservatives like George Will than anyone in the administration's opposition. At home, the Democrats can't even offer a serious alternative to the Bush budget for the simple reason that they helped give away the store by abetting the administration's mammoth tax cut last summer and made no legislative push for even partial rollbacks after the fiscal world changed on Sept. 11."

"The explanations for this fecklessness start, of course, with the president's poll numbers. Democrats are so intimidated by them that a recent open memo co-written by James Carville found hope that Mr. Bush was 'falling back to earth' in a survey showing that his approval rating had tumbled from 82 percent in December to a March low of . . . 75."