That night, Elaine and I invited several close friends to help celebrate my election over dinner at the Caucus Room. I felt nothing less than an enormous sense of gratification and an utter thrill that it had, finally, happened. After so many years of preparing for this role, I was ready for the challenge, no matter how great that challenge appeared. We were in the last two years of Bush’s presidency and had just lost the majority, due in large part to opposition to the war in Iraq. My job was to support the president in the waning days of his presidency and get as much done as we could as a diminished group.
Little did I know just how challenging this would be.
Immediately after the election, the resistance to the war expressed during the midterm elections seemed to infuse the air of the Capitol. And Bush knew it as well. In assessing the strategy in Iraq, Bush made several important decisions to immediately change course. Just one day after the elections, he replaced Don Rumsfeld as secretary of defense with former CIA chief Bob Gates and named General David Petraeus as the new commanding general, Multi-National Force–Iraq. In January, just as our session began, in a nationally televised address, the president announced the Petraeus plan, or the so-called surge. It was an entirely different approach to fighting the war that entailed committing more than twenty thousand additional troops to Iraq to clear and secure the city of Baghdad and Anbar Province, and to protect its population.
The announcement created an immediate firestorm. The Democrats’ promise to get us out of Iraq had helped propel them to the majority in both houses, and Bush responded by announcing a plan to do the very opposite—to put more troops in. It seemed to many like watching a football game in which your team is losing, and it starts the second half by running the exact same dismal play it had been using, hoping that this time it was actually going to work.
Immediately after Bush’s announcement, Harry Reid and many Democrats called on Congress to reject the surge. But the president and Petraeus were convinced that this was our last, best chance at success, and they asked members of Congress and the American public to give their plan a chance—to support our troops in the field, and those on their way. Bush needed someone to carry it across the finish line. As the newly elected leader of my party, I was determined that was going to be me.
That meant, first and foremost, convincing every member of my own Republican conference to support an idea many Americans were dead set against. In February, the House passed a resolution disapproving of the decision to send additional troops to Iraq, but I was able to ensure a similar measure did not pass the Senate. Over the next few months, as thousands of additional troops prepared to deploy, the majority to Baghdad and others to Diyala Province, while four thousand marines in Anbar Province had their tour extended, we were on Iraq almost constantly. The Democrats introduced more than twenty resolutions to force departure from Iraq. Bush was absolutely resolute in his refusal to sign any measure or proposal that set a deadline for withdrawal—a position I strongly supported—and it was my job to keep those bills from landing on his desk.
I relied heavily on Tom Hawkins, my national security adviser, who is also a former marine. He was crucial to this difficult task. Many of our members wanted out. Anyone expressing support for the surge was getting hammered by Democrats and the powerful antiwar left. Every week, I held a meeting of our entire conference where I tried to build unity by making sure my members knew what was at stake, and to create a forum in which they could ask questions and express their concerns. My job here was not only to speak but to listen, and what I was hearing was that many members were wavering in their support. To better address this, I decided to bring in the best person to make the case about why we needed to stick together on this issue: General Petraeus.
I invited General Petraeus to come to the US Capitol to meet with Senate Republicans, especially those who were expressing concerns or were unclear on the strategy. Petraeus agreed, and in my conference room in the leader’s office, he sat across from the members and, one by one, patiently explained to them how deeply he believed in this strategy. This was, admittedly, somewhat risky because US officers must walk a fine line to get the funding they need to be successful, while never appearing partisan. Petraeus was convincing. He laid out the facts. What he was after followed a clear logic: There could be no political reforms in Iraq without basic security. And under his plan to bring that security, a greater peace would unfold.
We needed to stick together, to present as a unified minority, because we not only had to block the Democrats’ effort to force withdrawal, but also needed to pass an emergency supplemental spending bill to fund the surge. This was by far the heaviest lift, as refusing to fund the surge was the Democrats’ best path to stopping it. The most credible opponents were Democrats Jack Murtha, a former Marine Corps officer who served on the House Appropriations Committee, and Jim Webb, the former navy secretary, who served on the Senate Armed Services Committee. With a deep familiarity with the military, they introduced bills that could cause the surge to fail while still appearing reasonable—like stipulating funds only if certain conditions were met, when those conditions were impossible to meet with a military already stretched to its limits.
It was a grueling, constant, day-to-day fight. But it was also where the rubber hit the road. This was about protecting the United States and making sure our troops had what they needed to be successful and safe. Thinking they held the high ground, the Democrats seemed to relish the fight. In April, Harry Reid made the very public statement that the war was lost. Once again, Harry had done it. But of all the insensitive and regrettable things that have come out of Harry’s mouth, this has to be at the top of the list. Saying the war was lost—when we had thousands of troops in the field, fighting every day for our country—only conveyed the impression that he was pulling for us to lose. As the Democratic leader, he should have chosen his words more carefully. When we heard Reid make this comment, we pounced on it. Someone on my staff pulled the audio and sent it to a reporter. That story quickly got picked up by the Drudge Report, where, within a half hour, it was the lead story.
It was, sadly, hardly shocking. Under Reid’s leadership, Democrats were doing little other than giving in to the radical left, to organizations like MoveOn, the Out of Iraq Coalition, and others, many of whom are funded by the unions or George Soros or a combination of the two. And it pulled them very much in that direction, believing that we were supposed to just give up and come home.
The most incensing moment of this struggle was the morning I opened the New York Times to see a full-page ad, paid for by MoveOn.org, labeling General Petraeus as “General Betray Us.” It was so far out of line. General Petraeus had an astounding record of service. He’d spent four years deployed away from his home and family, with nearly three years of service in Iraq. He led the 101st Airborne with distinction in northern Iraq early in the fight and later improved the way we trained Iraqi security forces after early mistakes by the Coalition Provisional Authority. And he’d served as commander of the US Army Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth, where he developed the army’s doctrine on counterinsurgency. He literally wrote the book. He’d proved his devotion to this country, and any suggestion to the contrary, at that time, was totally absurd and demonstrably untrue.
I deeply resented the MoveOn ad, paid for by people sitting comfortably in their air-conditioned offices, thousands of miles away from the firefights and the roadside bombs, trying their Washington best to impugn his name, questioning the character of a four-star general who had the respect and admiration of the more than 150,000 brave men and women serving under his command. This childish tactic was an insult to everyone fighting for our freedom in Iraq. General Petraeus had been honest and forthcoming, telling us that his plan would take time to yield results. He had committed to provide us with periodic updates on his progress and his needs, and he had upheld his end of the bargain.
The morning the ad appeared, I bro
ught it to my office. I wanted everyone on my staff to understand that we were not going to allow this. I called in Brian and Stew. “This is classic, liberal overreach,” I said, slamming the paper down on my desk where it would stay, in plain sight, for the next few years. “Democrats have allowed their judgment to be clouded by these people. They are looking the other way while this stuff happens. None of us can lose sight of this. And we need to make an issue out of it. Right now.” My staff went to work, and when I spoke on the Senate floor fifteen minutes later, I was prepared. “This is what we’re up against,” I said of the ad. “This is why we need to stick together.”
Impossibly, we did it. We stuck together and got enough Democrats on our side so that of the several dozen votes that came to the Senate to defund the surge or compel withdrawal, only one vote was lost. On April 26, 2007, we approved a bill ordering troops to begin coming home from Iraq by October 1. It was an impractical date Democrats pulled out of the air, tied to no circumstances on the ground. As our troops fought on the ground, we participated in a political charade, sending the president a bill we knew he wouldn’t sign. This was just the latest example of the Senate under Harry Reid and the Democratic majority—holding votes they knew wouldn’t mean anything in order to make a political point. I’m not saying Republicans never staged a show-vote when we were in the majority or that I don’t enjoy a good messaging vote from time to time. But under Reid, it had become much too routine. And not only did that diminish the Senate, but when it had to do with questions of war and the safety and support of our men and women in the field, it was particularly vexatious.
A month later, in May, we passed a $120 billion measure to fund the strategy that included eighteen benchmarks that the Iraqis had to meet for us to continue the funding. Within two months, the buildup was complete and operations began. In September, Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the US ambassador to Iraq, appeared before Congress to report on the progress of the surge, and they came with good news. Since the implementation of the Petraeus plan, the security situation in and around Baghdad had changed dramatically. Attacks on US troops were down. Civilian casualties in Baghdad were down 75 percent. Iraqi refugees were streaming back over the borders to return to their homes. Outside the cities, local leaders were forging agreements among themselves and with US forces to ensure even greater security, and the surge had allowed Sunni tribes to collaborate with American forces to stand up to al-Qaeda. By the end of the year, US–Iraqi coalition forces would be conducting sweeps through once-violent Sunni neighborhoods with little resistance.
There was simply no question that on the military and tactical levels, the Petraeus plan had been a tremendous success, and as we headed into 2008, US service members were beginning to return home with a sense of achievement—no thanks to the politicians and journalists who had attempted to sabotage President Bush’s plans.
Not long after, I called my staff together for our last meeting before breaking for the holidays. “I finally feel after thirty years I’ve found a job that fits my skill set,” I said. It was true. Despite the extreme challenges of my first year as the leader of my party, I ended the year feeling optimistic. We’d held together on funding the surge, and at the end of the session, the Senate passed our version of the energy bill and another relating to the alternative minimum tax. When I stepped into the job, the party’s morale was down, but by year’s end, I think everyone in my conference felt more hopeful than we had after the disappointing midterm elections. The appreciation my colleagues showed me in this regard meant a lot. During our last policy luncheon the Tuesday before we broke for Christmas recess, I expected everyone to rush out the door. Typically, these sessions end with people in a bad mood because we’ve stayed too long. Instead, I received a standing ovation.
What I’d learned during this first year was that dealing with senators sometimes requires a strong voice, at other times a delicate touch. In a roomful of former class presidents, there are certainly a lot of egos involved, and it’s not exactly easy to keep that many senators in agreement on anything. I think of it in terms of the old 80/20 rule, which applies to how men choose their ties, or women their jewelry. Of all the ties or pieces of jewelry you own, you’re likely to choose the same 20 percent 80 percent of the time. That rule certainly applied to the time I spent with my Republican conference. I spent 80 percent of my time with 20 percent of my members and, conversely, only 20 percent of my time with the other 80 percent.
Why? Because some of my colleagues are, let’s say, more needful of attention than others. Those who are inclined to be team players frequently resent the attention focused on those who create the problems. Every once in a while, people I long considered team players would become cantankerous, and I always knew that part of the reason was that they were feeling taken for granted. Their sudden stubbornness was a cry for attention. I understood this dynamic, and I respected it. But I had no respect or tolerance for people who had not, it seemed, learned the simple lesson my mother had taught me as a child: never try to make yourself look good or more important by making others look bad. As a Republican, short of setting yourself on fire, there is no better way to draw attention to yourself than to criticize fellow Republicans. Bad-mouthing a Republican administration or Republican leadership in the House or Senate basically guarantees that even a backbench lawmaker will be relevant in the eyes of the press.
This is why a guy like Chuck Hagel, my Republican colleague from Nebraska, was being anointed by some in the press as a potential presidential contender in 2008 after his frequent Bush-bashing sessions with absolutely no prayer of garnering any Republican primary votes. I told my Republican colleagues during the Bush years that if you have a problem you need to talk to Karl Rove, President Bush’s right-hand man, not Carl Hulse, the New York Times’s senior congressional reporter.
But while there have always been a few senators willing to throw members of their own party under the bus for some press recognition, Senator Jim DeMint from South Carolina took the practice of shooting inside the tent to another level. As a rank-and-file congressman with a relatively moderate record for the conservative South Carolina district he represented, he was regarded as thoughtful enough to make a good Senate candidate in 2004 when the seat opened. I had invited him to Louisville for a big fund-raiser supporting his campaign and found him personable and someone I thought was grounded enough to be a successful senator. For the first four years, he was.
But then DeMint or his staff, I could never figure out which, became something of an innovator in Republican-on-Republican violence. He figured out how to capitalize on criticizing his colleagues not just with the press, but the American people as well. Of course, Jim wouldn’t dream of actually confronting a colleague. He was almost submissive in our weekly lunches, preferring to eat in silence rather than inject his point of view. But outside the doors of the Mansfield Room, where we ate, it was another story. Almost daily he would complain to the press about the insufficiently conservative views of his colleagues. In all the years I worked with Jim, I can’t remember him ever initiating a confrontational conversation with them. He rarely if ever attempted to persuade a single senator of anything. But he wouldn’t blink at the opportunity to bad-mouth them behind their backs to the press.
I dealt with Jim the same way I dealt with the other frustrating parts of being Republican leader, applying what I had learned by studying those who had come before me—party leaders like Mike Mansfield. Remain composed and focused on what really matters. One of the things that really mattered at this moment was that we were headed into an important election year, a presidential one, and the year I’d be running for reelection of my own, to my fifth term in the Senate. I knew we were going to have another disgruntled electorate. The question was, Who were they going to be discontent with? The Democratic majority had set itself up to be the issue in the election. Historically, a new majority can sometimes misinterpret its mandate and overreach, creating a kind of buyer
’s remorse on the part of the electorate. Going into 2008 I thought there was an outside chance things might just swing our way. Our biggest hurdle remained the situation in Iraq, but Iraq was improving.
And then the financial crisis hit.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Bad News
A quiet settled over Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s conference room as all eight of us seated around the table stared at Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, seated beside Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson.
“Let me say it one more time,” Bernanke said. “If we don’t act now, we won’t have an economy by Monday.”
It was September 18, 2008, at seven o’clock in the evening, and this meeting of the congressional leadership had been called at the president’s request. Like my colleagues in the room—Speaker Pelosi, Barney Frank, Chuck Schumer, Chris Dodd, Harry Reid, John Boehner, Richard Shelby, and a few of our key staff members—I was stunned. They weren’t kidding around. “It’s bad news, and we need Congress’s help,” Bernanke continued. “Immediately.”
At the core of what he was speaking about was the urgent and unprecedented financial crisis facing our nation. As a result of lax lending practices earlier in the decade, millions of Americans now found themselves either delinquent or unable to cover their mortgages. If this were the only problem, we could have addressed it individually by helping those who were victims of fraud and letting those who made bad judgments or who lied on loan applications pay for their mistakes. But what began as a problem in the subprime mortgage market had spread throughout the entire economy. And the crisis had hit home.
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