After half a dozen presidential candidate debates and thousands of words spoken, one word towers over all the rest.
It’s an “I” word. But it’s not Iraq (nor, this time around, Israel or Ireland). Yes, Iraq as a topic has taken center stage at the debates. Candidates, though, have seized on a particular word to score rhetorical points.
It’s the word “if.” As in, if the presidential debates reveal anything, it’s that candidates love saying if. Conditional sentences rule the day.
Here’s what the presidential candidates — both parties — have been iffy about during the debates.
We might as well start with Iraq.
• Hillary Clinton: “If George Bush had allowed the inspectors to finish the job they started, we would have known that Saddam Hussein did not have WMD and we would not have gone and invaded Iraq.”
• Clinton again: “If I knew then what I now know, I would not have voted that way.”
• John McCain: “If we could bring around — about stability in the neighborhoods in Iraq and have the Maliki government govern, you are going to succeed.”
• McCain again: “If we fail in Iraq, we will see Iraq become a center for al Qaeda, chaos, genocide in the region, and they’ll follow us home.”
• Mike Gravel: “If we weren’t squandering our treasure on this terrible war that we didn’t have to start, we would have 4 million housing units available, and a good portion of them could go to Katrina residents.”
• Mitt Romney: “If we leave in the wrong way, the Iranians could grab the Shi’a South, or al Qaeda could play a dominant role among the Sunnis.”
And lots of Iraq-related if’s from Rudy Giuliani: “If we can bring along the Middle East, if we can bring along those countries that are presently our enemies and get them to see the values of these ideals, if we have the moral strength to be able to explain it to them in the way Ronald Reagan was able to do with Communism, then we can — we can end up having the peace that we want.”
The rest of the world gets the “if” treatment, too.
• John Edwards: “If you lived in Iran, you know that the Iranian people actually rallied for America on the streets of Tehran, after September the 11th.”
• Dennis Kucinich: “If Darfur had a large supply of oil, this administration would be occupying it right now.”
• Ron Paul: “If the goal of government is to be the policeman of the world, you lose liberty. And if the goal is to promote liberty, you can unify all segments.”
Immigration — already a lightning rod “I” word — meets its match with “if.”
• Duncan Hunter: “If we have border enforcement, we will be able at that point to start to regulate the internal problem that we’ve got.”
• Hunter again: “If they get across my fence, we sign them up for the Olympics immediately.”
• Paul: “If we had a truly free market economy, the illegal immigrants would not be the scapegoat.”
How about domestic issues? Lots of ifs, to go with your and’s and but’s.
• Bill Richardson: “If we grow the economy 1.8 percent instead of the 1.3, the solvency of Social Security in the year 2045 would be resolved.”
• Giuliani: “If you can lower spending in New York City, Washington is easier than New York City to deal with.”
• Clinton: “If HIV/AIDS were the leading cause of death of white women between the ages of 25 and 34, there would be an outraged outcry in this country.”
With if’s, there’s a little bit of this, but a lot of that.
• Hunter: “If we’re able to do that, we’re going to bring down the cost of health insurance.”
• Tommy Thompson: “If you do that, you’re going to be able to save billions of dollars. If you just go paperless, ladies and gentlemen, you will save 10 percent of the cost of health care.”
Some if’s defy categorization:
• Romney: “If you ever bought a suit and you look at it and you can’t tell if it’s blue or black, that’s how blue Massachusetts is.”
• Romney again: “If you wanted to have a president that just followed the polls, all we’d need to do is plug in our TVs and have them run the country.”
• Giuliani: “If you don’t measure success, you have failure.”
Then there’s Edwards, who served up this if: “If the question is, Brian, whether I live a privileged and blessed lifestyle now, the answer to that’s yes.” Don’t tell that to Tevye from “Fiddler On The Roof,” who once lyrically lamented: “If I were a rich man.”
The fact is, ifs have been around politics for a while. In his second Inaugural Address, President Reagan channeled the great rabbi Hillel by asking: “If not us, who? And if not now, when?”
Of course, not every use of “if” conjures up happy images. The scarecrow in “Wizard of Oz” sang out, “If I only had a brain.” And Rudyard Kipling suggested, “If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you….”
Will presidential candidates take heed and caution?
As if.
