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Russert predicts election will turn on Iraq, economy
By DONNA BUDNIEWSKI
Reporter Assistant Editor
If Americans feel anxious about Iraq and the economy in November, John Kerry very likely will win the presidential election, veteran newsman and political analyst Tim Russert predicted last night during the final lecture of this year's Distinguished Speaker Series.
If, however, Americans feel secure and see that Iraq is stabilized and the economy has rebounded, Russert said, President Bush has a good chance of being re-elected.
With only 18 truly undecided states left, only 10 percent of the people in those swing states will decide the next election, he said.
Personality won't be much of a factor in the race this time around and candidates won't be able to force their own issues on the American people, said the South Buffalo native and moderator of NBC's "Meet the Press." Rather, the candidates' stand on three major issues—Iraq, the economy and weapons of mass destruction (WMD)—will decide the 2004 election.
The issue of WMD—the rationale used by Bush for going to war—transcends party lines and represents a colossal failure of intelligence, not just in the U.S. but in Germany, France and England, Russert said, adding that all three countries believed in the existence of those weapons, regardless of their stand on the war.
Three fourths of the House of Representatives and three fourths of the Senate voted to go to war, and about 87 percent of the American people wanted the U.S. to go to war, based, he said, on what was believed at the time to be "iron-clad" information.
With American credibility on this and future foreign policy issues at stake, Russert said, "we owe it to ourselves as a people and as a democracy" to set aside partisan differences and find out why the intelligence was wrong.
And while the issue of WMD likely will be a theme of upcoming candidate debates, the results of any reports from the 9/11 commission won't have a profound effect on the election, said Russert.
"There's more than enough blame to go around for all of us. We were all asleep," he added. "The issue of terrorism was raised only twice in the last presidential debates."
The remnants of political and societal solidarity and common ground generated by the terrorist attacks against the Pentagon and World Trade Center are all but gone, Russert said. The country, he noted, has become a "50/50 nation" of people who are deeply divided on the war.
Speaking about Buffalo's economic woes, Russert said that after the backbone of the city collapsed with the disappearance of companies like Bethlehem Steel, the city has had to turn to "boutique industries" like Geico Insurance Co. Moreover, Buffalo is a blue-collar town with a university (UB) as its largest employer.
"I have faith in the resilience of Western New York," said Russert.
Dwindling Social Security reserves, children living in poverty and Medicare are the issues that should frame political debate among the candidates, but that isn't likely to happen, Russert pointed out.
"The correlation between poverty, guns, gangs and death is overwhelming," he said. "Twelve children a day are shot dead" and children born to 18-year-old unwed mothers have an "80 percent chance of growing up in poverty," he added.