Candidates square off on college campus

The eight Democratic presidential candidates discussed Iraq, health care in Des Moines, Iowa.

By Jacob Barker

Published Aug. 21, 2007

DES MOINES, IOWA — It's not often that hundreds of college students are moving around a college campus at 7 a.m. on a Sunday. But at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, on Sunday morning, the campus streets were lined with students cheering on different candidates before the first Iowa Democratic Presidential Debate, which began at 8 a.m.

All eight Democratic Presidential candidates — Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn.; Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y.; former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C.; Gov. Bill Richardson, D-N.M.; Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del.; Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio; former Sen. Mike Gravel, D-Alaska; and Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. — were present for the debate.

Coming into the debate, Obama was ahead of the other candidates in Iowa at 27 percent, with Clinton and Edwards right behind at 26 percent each, according to an ABC News poll released immediately before the debate began.

The candidates discussed issues such as prayer and Pakistan, and, despite some baiting and direct questions about other candidates' qualifications, they were respectful to each other and avoided attacking each other directly.

ABC News's Chief Washington Correspondent George Stephanopoulos, who moderated the debate, began the morning by asking whether Obama is ready to lead and whether Clinton can unite the country and bring about the change all the candidates say is needed, two questions Stephanopoulos said have dominated the race.

Clinton, Dodd and Biden all carefully sidestepped attacking Obama's foreign-policy experience while highlighting their own and stressing the imminent danger facing America in the next few years.

"I think the next president will face some of the most difficult international dangerous threats and challenges that any president has faced in a very long time," Clinton said.

Obama responded by stressing that America's foreign policy must change to become transparent for the American people and more diplomatic because "the other way" did not work.

"It is my belief that we need a fundamental change if we're going to dig ourselves out of the hole that George Bush has placed us in," Obama said. "And that's going to require the kind of aggressive diplomacy — preparation, yes, but aggressive diplomacy, the personal diplomacy of the next president — to transform how the world sees us."

The candidates were then asked about Clinton and if they thought she was too much of a political insider and whether she would weigh down lesser candidates.

Obama and Edwards respectfully avoided attacking Clinton, instead sticking to discussing the "politics of change." Edwards then shifted the conversation to government corruption, discussing the problem of Washington lobbyists and commending Obama on not accepting lobbyist campaign funds. Edwards said Clinton had done a terrific job as first lady and as a senator, but he took a slight jab at her in regards to lobbyist reform.

"Why don't we all make an absolutely clear statement that we are the Democratic Party, we're the party of the people," Edwards said. "We are not the party of Washington insiders, and we can say it, clearly and unequivocally, by saying we will never take another dime from a Washington lobbyist. I've asked the other candidates to join me in that. And at least, until now, Senator Clinton's not done it."

Clinton pointed out her record of fighting big business and the insurance companies, especially in the healthcare push in the early '90s. Although she did not directly answer Edwards's challenge to not take any money from lobbyists, she made a crowd-pleasing statement about reforming the campaign finance process.

"I think we can do a much better job if we say we have got to move toward public financing, get the money out of American politics, because it's the people who employ the lobbyists who are behind all the money in American politics," she said.

The conversation then shifted to healthcare, with Edwards commending Clinton on her work in the '90s healthcare push and warning of the power of insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

Kucinich highlighted a bill he co-authored that would establish a not-for-profit healthcare system and said that all the other candidates' health care plans would keep private insurers in charge.

Iraq was the next topic. Each candidate agreed that the war must be ended, but each candidate's plans for withdrawal differed slightly.

Richardson said peace cannot be built until all U.S. forces are out of Iraq, but disagreed with Biden on how long a withdrawal would take.

Biden's plan, which most other candidates said they felt was more realistic, would require a year, but Richardson said that it could be completed in six to eight months. All candidates agreed careful plans were required in order for a stable pullout.

"If we leave Iraq and we leave it in chaos, there'll be regional war," Biden said. "The regional war will engulf us for a generation."

But Sen. Gravel disagreed with everyone on the timetable and said that America needs to pull everyone out and work with other powers in the region to stabilize Iraq.

"Pull everybody out and turn to the Iranians, who helped us defeat the Taliban initially," he said. "It was the Iranians. So if we don't bring the Iranians to help us, or the Syrians, or Saudi Arabia, of course it's going to be a disaster."

When Obama's turn came around to address the Iraq question, he said Biden's time estimate was right, but added that there are no good options for this issue.

He then scored points with the audience by pointing out other candidates' authorization of the war in the first place.

"The thing I wish had happened was that all the people on this stage had asked these questions before they authorized us getting in," Obama said. "And I make that point because earlier on we were talking about the issue of experience. Nobody had more experience than Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney and many of the people on this stage that authorized this war."

The candidates were then asked about their spiritual faith and the power of prayer, all of them making careful responses about the freedom to pray and their own religious background. But Gravel made a possibly inflammatory remark.

"I was always persuaded or struck by the fact that many people who pray are the ones who want to go to war, who want to kill fellow human beings," he said. "That disturbs me."

A question from an Iowa farmer was fielded next, asking how candidates would help small farms compete with the large ones that are taking over. Each candidate touched on antitrust law and foreign-trade agreements that need to be changed to help small enterprises in the country.

"What we've got to have is a Justice Department that starts dealing with some of the antitrust issues in our country," Dodd said. "It just doesn't cover agriculture, but also a variety of other things, including media concentration here."

Talking about education, all the candidates expressed a desire to scrap the No Child Left Behind Act, with Clinton and Kucinich describing a plan for universal pre-school and Richardson a proposal for a minimum teachers' wage.

After the debate, Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said the candidates discussed the three most important issues: Iraq, government corruption and healthcare.

But more importantly, he said, the candidates were thoughtful, unified and respectful of each other.

"That means a lot to me," Dean said.