Washington watch

Colin Powell's new best friend
October 19, 2003

Karl Rove and the war in Iraq
The Iraqi resistance means that Colin Powell is currently ahead on points in his war with the neocons. Powell laughed out loud when he heard that respected Congressman Dave Obey, top Democrat on the house appropriations committee, had called for the resignation of Rumsfeld and his deputy Paul Wolfowitz. "Funny," Powell joked, "Only Republicans want my resignation." Powell and his weightlifting deputy Dick Armitage, fresh from easing neocon hardliner John Bolton out of the North Korea talks, have also been censuring Bolton on Iran. Armitage found out that Bolton was planning to brief the European allies with a list of talking points that said Iran was about to go nuclear and that its missiles were aimed at Rome, Berlin, Paris and London. Armitage rewrote Bolton's brief himself-and followed up with his own calls to Europe to check that Bolton had followed the new script. After months of sniping from the neocons at the Pentagon, Powell and Armitage reckon it's payback time-in part because they believe they have a crucial new ally in Karl Rove, Bush's top political adviser. According to them, Karl Rove wants out of Iraq yesterday.

Cost of the war
After getting Congress to vote $79bn in March for the Iraq war, Bush's new demand for another $87bn takes the cost so far to $166bn. Adjusted for inflation, Yale University economist William D Nordhaus says this is more than the costs of the revolutionary war, the war of 1812, the Mexican war, the civil war, the Spanish-American war and the first Gulf war combined. In fact, it's getting uncomfortably close to the amount the US spent on the first world war-$191bn in 2003 dollars. It's still a long way short of the $494bn (in current money) cost of the Vietnam war.

Democrats and the trade unions
With Bush looking increasingly beatable in next year's elections, the real battle among the various Democratic presidential candidates is taking place behind the scenes at the labour unions. After decades of devoted service, former Democratic leader in the House of Representatives Dick Gephardt ought to have the endorsement of the AFL-CIO, the American version of the TUC, sewn up. The teamsters have already endorsed him, and the AFL-CIO leaders are sympathetic. Given the 2.5m manufacturing jobs lost on Bush's watch, the unions think Gephardt has a point when he says that big states like New York and California are going to vote Democrat anyway, and that he is the only candidate who can beat Bush in the industrial midwest. But Andrew Stern, who runs the 1.6m Service Employees International Union, the largest and fastest growing union in the country, is backing Howard Dean. The former Vermont governor brought a crowd of 1,500 SEIU delegates to their feet at a recent Washington event by claiming every dollar going to Iraq is a dollar taken from healthcare and schools. As we reported last month, the key to the AFL-CIO will be Gerald McEntee, a political veteran from Philadelphia, who runs the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, as well as the AFL-CIO's political shop. Last time, McEntee was the Democratic party's biggest bankroller. He wants to pick a winner, as he did with Bill Clinton in 1992.

Dean versus Lieberman
Another battle for Jewish campaign funds is under way. Former vice-presidential candidate Joe Lieberman (still the leading Democrat in nationwide polls) jumped on Howard Dean's statement that "it's not our place to take sides" between Israel and Palestine and has deluged Jewish donors with a brisk letter. "If this is a well thought out position, it's a mistake, and a major break from a half a century of American foreign policy," Lieberman writes. "If it's not, it's very important for Howard Dean, as a candidate for president, to think before he talks." Dean backtracked-saying that of course he stood by Israel, only that the US had to be seen to be an honest broker in the peace process-but the damage has been done. Lieberman claimed to the Miami Herald that Dean's loose tongue is getting him into a pattern of flip-flops. He compares Dean's shifting language on Israel to his manoeuvres on Cuba: Dean moved from opposing the trade embargo to supporting it.

Kennedy conspiracy theory
Bush's new press secretary Scott McClellan is stonewalling questions about the curious new book that his father Barr is about to publish under the title Blood, Money and Power: How LBJ Killed JFK. This innovative addition to the conspiracy theories of the Kennedy assassination claims that LBJ put out the contract because he feared being dropped as vice-president. But it isn't helping the McClellan family. Scott's brother Mark is commissioner of the food and drug administration and is getting fed up with people asking what his dad has been smoking. Their mother Carole Strayhorn-who married Barr McClellan when he was a player in Texas law and politics, working with LBJ's personal lawyer Ed Clark-is even more embarrassed. Having served three terms as mayor of Austin, she was planning a run for the governorship. But getting involved in charging the only Texan president (until this one) with conspiracy to murder won't help.