GOP hopefuls set selves apart from Bush in Iowa clash
DES MOINES -- Republican presidential candidates Sunday wrangled over abortion rights and distanced themselves from President Bush on foreign policy — and Vice President Cheney's power — in their first debate from the critical state of Iowa.
The 90-minute forum, hosted by ABC's This Week With George Stephanopoulos, came six days before a GOP straw poll in Ames, Iowa, that in the past has winnowed the field of lagging candidates.
The debate's exchanges at Drake University were a bit sharper and pricklier than in this year's previous Republican debates. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, who leads in Iowa polls, was a target of his rivals. Second-tier contenders made appeals aimed at rallying conservative Christians, an important part of GOP politics here.
And on some issues, the candidates were more than willing to discuss their differences with Bush.
"I can tell you I'm not a carbon copy of Bush, and there are things I would do that would be done differently," Romney said when asked about Bush's commitment to spread democracy around the world through elections.
"In some cases maybe going to elections so quickly is a mistake," former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani said.
On the Iraq war, none of the major GOP candidates drew distinctions between themselves and Bush, though long shot Rep. Ron Paul of Texas repeated his call that U.S. troops should "just come home." Arizona Sen. John McCain made a plea to sustain the increase in U.S. forces in Iraq that he said was showing military progress.
"The challenge of the 21st century is the struggle against radical Islamic extremism," McCain said.
Still, when asked about the role Vice President Cheney has played in the Bush administration, McCain said pointedly that if he were elected, "I would be very careful that everybody understood that there's only one president."
"Dick Cheney came in with a lot of experience … on defense, foreign policy issues," Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback said. "And I think the president overrelied on that."
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