THE RISING EAST
Foreign, domestic issues mesh in 2004 election
By Richard Halloran
For the first time since the divisive Vietnam era, foreign policy and national security will most likely dominate the U.S. presidential election campaign this year, especially since the line between issues abroad and politics at home has become more blurred than ever.
Advertiser Library Photo • June 1, 2003
Consider the mixture of foreign and domestic policies in recent days on issues that are part of the political debate:
President Bush and other world leaders dealt with trade issues at the Group of Eight summit last June in France. From left: U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan; Brazilian President Luiz In‡cio Lula da Silva; Chinese President Hu Jintao; Swiss Confederation President Pascal Couchepin; and Jean Chretien, then prime minister of Canada.
• President Bush, on his visit to Mexico, announced revisions in U.S. immigration policy to improve the lot of migrant Mexican workers. Hispanic voters applauded; labor unions criticized.
• The Supreme Court permitted the Bush administration to detain terrorist suspects, mostly foreign Muslim men, in secret. Conservatives approved; liberals protested.
• Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill contended that Bush planned from the beginning of his term to have Saddam Hussein overthrown. The president's supporters cringed; opponents of the war cheered.
• The U.S. agency responsible for airline security proposed more stringent investigations of passengers because foreign terrorists continue to threaten. Some airlines and passengers approved; privacy advocates opposed.
• An unofficial American delegation made an inconclusive visit to North Korea seeking to ease tensions with the United States over Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions. Advocates of dialogue will be hopeful; hardliners will be skeptical.
Further pushing foreign affairs to the fore is the relative absence of domestic issues. The economy is surging ahead, unemployment is just over a politically acceptable 5 percent, and interest rates on home mortgages remain low.
The Big Five issues confronting Bush and whoever will be his Democratic opponent are: the war
on terror, the occupation of Iraq, hostility between Arabs and Israelis, the menace of North Korea, and uncertainty arising from an emerging China. A dozen other issues crowd the political arena, but those five are the likely centers of debate.
Even though the United States and its allies have defeated the Taliban in Afghanistan, al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden is still at large and active. Saddam has been toppled, but American soldiers are being killed each day by insurgents in Iraq.
As with every U.S. president for a half-century, peace between Israelis and Palestinians has eluded Bush. Negotiations with Pyongyang through the North Korea news agency and diplomats in Beijing and New York have yet to produce any tangible sign of agreement.
As the election campaign becomes more intense, Bush and his Democratic adversary will undoubtedly tangle on those issues. The rise of China, however, will provide presidential and congressional candidates with a tempting and potentially explosive issue.
Sino-American relations revolve around at least three questions: Taiwan, trade and technology.
President Chen Shui-bian of Taiwan, who is standing for re-election in March, is edging ever closer to declaring formal independence. China, which claims the island, has responded with renewed threats of military action.
In trade, the United States is running an annual deficit of $120 billion with China, far larger than the deficit with Japan a decade ago that generated much "Japan bashing."
American labor and management charge that China is stealing jobs with low wages.
In technology, U.S. business executives have begun complaining of unfair Chinese competition in high-tech products.
Against this backdrop, Secretary of State Colin Powell, writing in the current issue of Foreign Affairs, has defended the administration's foreign policy. He asserts the policy is sound but concedes that the administration "can't get people to acknowledge or understand it."
Powell argues that "the distortion of U.S. foreign-policy strategy requires repair" as it "contributes to irrational partisanship." He vigorously denies claims that the policy is "unilateralist," "imbalanced in favor of military methods" or "biased toward preemptive war."
"Partnership is the watchword of U.S. strategy in this administration," Powell contends. "Partnership is not about deferring to others; it is about working with them." He adds: "Beyond partnership comes principle" in human dignity, limits on power, freedom of speech and religion, and respect for women.
In a refreshing moment of candor rare in American politics, Powell says: "It would be churlish to claim that the Bush administration's foreign policy has been error-free from the start. We are human beings. We all make mistakes. But we have always pursued the enlightened self-interest of the American people, and in our purposes and our principles there are no mistakes."
Afterthought: If Bush wants to secure his re-election, he might do well to ease aside Vice President Richard Cheney, a contentious politician, and replace him with Powell, who may just be the most popular U.S. political figure today.
Richard Halloran is a former New York Times correspondent in Asia.
