The Presidency: Deepening Questions

By George Friedman

Readers know that we have been tracking one
issue almost above all others since last fall: the strength of the Bush
presidency. The question that emerged following Hurricane Katrina was
whether the administration would become a classic failed presidency or
whether, having flirted with disaster, it would recover. Last week, the
first indicator (apart from routine approval polls) came in: Congress, in
essence, blocked a deal that would have put a state-run company from the
United Arab Emirates (UAE) in charge of several U.S.
ports.

Far more important than the ports issue or congressional
assertiveness over the deal was the fact that the revolt was led by
Republicans. Democratic opposition was predictable and uninteresting, but
the open rebellion among Republicans was far less predictable and highly
significant. In fact, it was of extraordinary importance.

In our
view, the business deal in question -- the acquisition by Dubai Ports World
of a British company that has managed the ports up to now -- does not
increase the threat to U.S. national security, which is substantial
regardless of who manages the ports. In the broadest sense, whether the UAE
gets a contract to run the ports is neither here nor there. If they got it,
it would mean little; if they were denied it, U.S. relations with the
Islamic world would not get much worse. It is not an important
issue.

What is a vitally important issue is whether President George
W. Bush has the ability to govern. Presidents, unlike prime ministers, do
not leave office when they lose the confidence
of voters; the Framers did not want a parliamentary system. What happens,
rather, is that a president can lose the ability to govern -- either because
he cannot get needed legislation passed, or because Congress blocks his
initiatives. Congress controls the purse strings and can, by withholding
funds, shut down presidential initiatives. That is how the Vietnam War
ended: Congress cut off all military aid to South Vietnam, and it collapsed.
The idea that a president can continue to govern without congressional
support, because of the inherent powers of the presidency, simply isn't
true. You wind up with a paralyzed government.

Consider that Bush
recently returned from India with a series of agreements on U.S.-Indian
nuclear cooperation. It is far from certain that Bush will be able to muster
the two-thirds vote needed in the Senate in order to get a treaty passed;
there is substantial unease in Congress about U.S. acquiescence to any
nuclear proliferation, and there is not a powerful pro-Indian lobby on the
Hill. Now, it also is possible that Bush will be able to get the votes. But
the problem that is emerging is that the president no longer has the ability
to negotiate with full confidence. Any foreign leader in negotiations will be
aware that the president's word is not final and there will have to be
dealings with Congress as well. Since reaching an agreement with the U.S.
president, and then having it repudiated by Congress, is more than a little
embarrassing for foreign leaders, they will be much more careful in making
agreements with Bush -- and much less susceptible to any threats he might
issue, since it would not be clear that he has the backing to carry them
out.

Context of the Controversy

As we have previously
discussed, Bush is not the first president to face political paralysis; most
who did encountered it over foreign policy issues. Wilson collapsed over the
League of Nations, Truman over Korea. Johnson collapsed over Vietnam, and
Nixon had Watergate with a touch of Vietnam. Carter was done in by the
Iranian hostage situation. But there is one difference between these and the
current president: Bush is only one year into his second term. He has just
reached a critical low in approval ratings and Republicans have begun
distancing themselves. If he doesn't recover, it will be one of the longest
failed presidencies in history. There would be three years in which foreign
powers would operate with diminished concern for U.S. wishes and responses.
Three years is a very long time.

It is important to understand why
this has happened. The ports deal does not stand alone. It was preceded by
what, in retrospect, is appearing to have had a substantial effect: the
Danish
cartoon controversy. That affair had a startling effect in the West and
the United States that is still reverberating.

Western views of the
Muslim world appear to have been divided into two camps. One camp holds that
radical Islamists and jihadists are a marginal force in the Muslim world,
which is dominated by a moderate mainstream. The other holds that Islam is
an inherently intolerant and violent religion, and that the idea of a
moderate tendency within Islam amounts to self-delusion. Those who took the
first view argued that the extreme response the United States has taken to
al Qaeda has weakened moderates in the Muslim world, played into the hands
of the radicals and increased the danger of terrorism. Those who took the
second view argued that a state of war exists, not between the United States
and al Qaeda, but between the West and Islam.

The cartoon affair
weakened the first school of thought and strengthened the second. The
publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed generated a massive
outpouring of anger from the Muslim world. Some very publicly called for the
death of the cartoonists, Danes, Scandinavians and so on, and even moderate
Muslims argued that the West was insensitive to their religious feelings.
This Muslim response ran directly counter to the Western view, which holds
freedom of expression above all values. Moreover, the idea that Muslims have
a right not to be offended struck many as outrageous. Since Muslims do not
believe that everyone has a right to publicly express negative opinions when
it comes to God and his prophet, the collision was absolute.

In the
context of the United States, the cartoon controversy should have
strengthened Bush politically, by strengthening his support base among
national-security conservatives. But Bush did not reach out with an effort
to draw those who were offended by the Muslim response into his coalition.
Instead of defending the right to free speech regardless of who is offended,
Bush tried to reach out to Muslims, expressing regret over the pain the
cartoons had caused. In other words, rather than capitalizing on the event
to broaden his political base, he left his own supporters wondering what he
was talking about. Some of these supporters saw the Islamic response to the
cartoons as vindication of their view that all Muslims are potentially
dangerous and enemies. Thus, while Bush was reaching out to the Islamic
world, a key part of his coalition was becoming even more
radical.

The GOP Mutiny

In the wake of the cartoon
affair, this faction saw the transfer of U.S. ports to Arab hands as
completely unacceptable under any circumstances. They didn't care if the UAE
had cooperated with the United States against jihadists or not. They recalled
that at least one of the Sept. 11 operatives was a UAE citizen, and they
viewed UAE citizens the same way they tended to view all Muslim moderates --
as appearing to be moderate but ultimately falling on the side of the
radicals. Whatever the truth might be, this faction was not prepared to
collaborate when it came to the ports.

Democrats, like Sen. Charles
Schumer, saw an opening and went for it. That's to be expected, it's what
the opposition does. But the response among Republican national-security
conservatives was visceral and explosive. Even if Republican senators and
congressman did not agree with the views held by their constituents, the
pressure they were under still would have been enormous. Thus, they broke
with Bush in the face of his early threat to veto any legislation blocking
the ports deal. By the end, the president was in retreat, very publicly
unable to get his way.

This has not happened before. The president's
Social Security initiative died a sort of death, but an outright repudiation
of Bush led by Republicans is unprecedented. This likely would not have
happened if Bush had not slipped in the polls as he did -- but on the other
hand, a lot of his slippage has come from within his coalition. Of late, it
was the Republicans who were bolting. Within the party, Bush has held the
support of the social conservatives, and he continues to hold the economic
conservatives and business interests. But the national security
conservatives splintered, and it is not clear that they will come back
aboard.

Iraq, Investigations and Fatigue

It is
significant that the White House overlooked the political opportunity
presented by the cartoon affair and then blundered with the handling of the
ports issue. The White House under Bush has had its defects, but these kinds
of mistakes have not been common. When one also considers the way Vice
President Dick Cheney's hunting accident was handled, the crisp cadences
that marked the old Bush White House seem to be gone. We are not talking
here about policy matters, but simply the mechanics of running the White
House -- of knowing that the UAE deal was about to break.

The core
problem for the administration is, of course, Iraq. No matter how much
progress one thinks is being made, the fact is that the progress is far from
solid, and from the standpoint of American voters, it doesn't seem
particularly persuasive. Bush has burned through a huge amount of political
capital because of the war. In the end, it is not the cartoons or the ports
that did this to Bush, but above all else, his inability to devise an end
game in Iraq.

But there are other important, if lesser,
considerations. One factor, which we have mentioned before, is that Bush's
staff is exhausted. There is no one very important around him who hasn't
been there from the beginning. Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld,
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove, Chief
of Staff Andrew Card -- all have been on the job for five years. Not only is
there burnout, but they have made their share of mistakes. The president's
unusual resistance to bringing in fresh blood is clearly damaging his
ability to operate the political system.

We suspect that this
situation is compounded by two ongoing investigations. One, concerning the
Plame
affair, has already resulted in an indictment for Cheney's chief of
staff, Lewis Libby, who is obviously under heavy pressure from the
prosecutor to name other names. Rumors (not worthy of the name intelligence)
say that Rove is well in the prosecutor's sights now, and that he is trying
to gather evidence against Cheney as well. Lobbyist Jack Abramoff is another
concern; in a recent article in Vanity Fair, Abramoff asserted that plenty of
senior Republicans knew what he was doing and had no problem with it. While
Libby might remain loyal to the administration, Abramoff, it seems, is going
to look out for Abramoff. He is clearly talking, and we wonder how much the
White House is preoccupied with those investigations. Something is on their
minds aside from governing.

The Geopolitical
Implications

Whatever is going on, there could be profound
geopolitical consequences. The United States is the center of gravity of the
international system. When a failed presidency is on the table, the world
begins to operate in a different way. The North Koreans and the Chinese, for
example, wouldn't negotiate seriously with the United States while Truman was
president; they waited for Eisenhower. The North Vietnamese waited for Nixon.
Not only did they not want to negotiate with a president who couldn't
guarantee agreements, but in fact, the feeling was that time was on their
side after Watergate crippled Nixon. The fact that Nixon no longer had any
military options that wouldn't be blocked by Congress certainly contributed
to the final collapse of Saigon. And the Iranians wouldn't negotiate with
Carter over the hostages; they waited for Reagan.

The United States
has some crucial negotiations under way. In Iraq, it is trying to broker a
deal between the Shia and Sunnis. Its ability to do so, however, depends to
a great degree on the perception by both parties that Bush can deliver on
both threats and promises. Further complicating matters, the British have
announced plans for a drawdown in Iraq, even mentioning a timetable. There
are broad implications here. First, if Bush no longer is able to provide
guarantees for what is said at the bargaining table, Iraq will suddenly take
a dramatically different course. Second, if the Iranians know that Bush
doesn't have military options in Iraq and cannot engage in covert
negotiations authoritatively, that entire dynamic is changed. Similarly, if
the Pakistanis conclude they have nothing to fear from Bush, then that
changes everything for Islamabad. Go through the list, from Russia to China,
and we see easily what it could mean.

Now, can Bush recover from this
weakened position? It is possible, but the historical record for such
recoveries is not good. Most presidents who have sunk to such low approval
ratings and have a rebellion within their party never recover. The reason is
that a psychological barrier has been broken -- and a political one as well.
In the GOP, everyone is looking at the 2006 elections. Congress members have
to run for re-election; the president doesn't. Bush and Cheney have terrible
ratings. It is unlikely, then, that campaign swings into contested areas by
either of them will aid the party's chances. At the moment, staying far away
from both officials is the most rational strategy for congressional
candidates. And to do that, senators and congressmen have to publicly show
their independence.

Bush needs a win as badly as Truman, Johnson,
Nixon and Carter did. The Koreans, Vietnamese and Iranians made certain
those presidents didn't get one. The difference here, the chief wild card,
is that those presidents measured their remaining time in terms of a year or
so (though Nixon didn't know how short his time actually would be). Bush has
three years left in office.

If the Koreans had to face three years
of Truman after negotiations started, they might have acted differently. In
Iraq, it could be that American weakness compels the Sunnis and the Shia to
sort things out themselves.