News analysis: Fred Thompson... President?

The Watergate lawyer-turned-senator-turned TV idol may run, but there are many questions that will have to be answered

Email | Print By Ken Whitehouse

Fred D. Thompson

With actor and former U.S. Senator Fred Thompson saying over the weekend that he is "considering a run" for President of the United States, it seems that Tennessee will continue its tradition of having one if its own on the national ticket.

Thompson is being pushed by none other than his political patriarch Howard Baker, a former member of the Senate, White House Chief of Staff and diplomat, and briefly a candidate for president in 1980.

The Thompson announcement is just more evidence that Republicans, both nationally and locally, are at loss over what to do next.

George W. Bush is now a liability to the GOP. Between his handling of the "war on terror," the Scooter Libby verdict, the scandal surrounding Walter Reed Hospital and other issues, his days of unquestioned leadership are over. It could be argued that they were over as soon as the words, "You're doing a heckuva job, Brownie" fell from Bush's lips after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast.

Bush doesn't really have a knife in his back as much as he has a fork in him; he's done.

This assessment is not meant to be a partisan statement — just a harsh take on political reality. As former Gov. Ned McWherter used to say: "When you find you are riding a dead horse, dismount." Many Republicans have heeded that advice and are now on foot, looking for a new steed.

The move to "bring Fred back" will be curious if it gets any legs, starting with how it plays in Tennessee.

Tennessee's social conservatives have had to take a back seat to the Rockefeller wing of the Republican Party and have been growing increasingly restless.

When Thompson announced in 2002 that he was leaving the Senate, he did so very late in the game. This move was planned and tactical, giving his old colleague from when he worked for Baker in Washington, Lamar Alexander, a monumental advantage in the Republican primary over West Tennessee Republican Congressman Ed Bryant.

Across the state, social conservatives grumbled that the edge given to Lamar was unfair. Lamar was out of touch with their issues and not "one of them." He talked the talk, but wasn't a true believer.

While they had a social conservative in Van Hilleary running for governor, they felt at a loss because they saw the Rockefeller wing of their party quietly backing Democrat Phil Bredesen in that race.

In the primary Bryant lost to Alexander. In the general election, Hilleary lost to Bredesen. Social conservatives went 0 for 2 in '02.

Fast forward to this past election. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist honored his pledge to serve only two terms — becoming one of the few lawmakers originally elected in 1994 to do so.

But instead of applause for keeping the pledge, Frist was already keeping a low profile in elections across the nation, including Tennessee, largely due to missteps as the Republican leader of the U.S. Senate.

As one of the most identifiable Bush allies in Washington, Frist's popularity was inexorably tied to Bush. When Frist did try to put some distance between himself and Bush, he chose the issue of stem cells research, a non-negotiable policy agenda item among social conservatives. Frist picked the wrong side in their eyes.

There seemed to be a real opportunity at hand for Tennessee's social conservatives. While never launching a broadside on their dissatisfaction with the good doctor Frist, they had a chance to put one of their own on the national stage, until a Van crashed their party.

The 2006 GOP primary for the U.S. Senate was one of the most contentious battles in years.

Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker, perceived to be of the school of Rockefeller, was going to face off for the heart and soul of the Tennessee Republican party against well-credentialed social conservative Ed Bryant. But then Van showed up.

Van Hilleary opted against a re-match with the now much more popular Bredesen in the Governor's race and launched a bid for the U.S. Senate. The jibe in Tennessee political circles was that it was because he had nothing better to do.

During the primary season, social conservatives grumbled that Frist and Alexander were backing Corker and that they were stuck with two of their own splitting their votes. Corker ended up with 48 percent of the GOP primary vote, with Bryant and Hilleary splitting the remaining 51 percent and change.

A strong case could be made that had Hilleary not made the GOP Senate primary a three way race, Bryant would have won the Republican nomination for Frist's seat.

In the general election, Alexander dispatched his political guru Tom Ingram to salvage a foundering Corker campaign, as well as getting his old buddy Fred Thompson to cut campaign ads for protégé Corker.

Meanwhile, social conservatives sat on their hands.

Corker did win a much closer race than most media outlets expected over Congressman Harold Ford, Jr., but the real losers that day were in the social conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Two of its most prominent figures at the national level, both said to be presidential contenders, went down to defeat: U.S. Sens. George Allen of Virginia and Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania.

In the aftershocks of the November midterm elections, both political parties have been looking for direction and seeking to anoint a candidate sooner rather than later to succeed Bush.

While the Democratic heavyweights, Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, have engaged in a bit of verbal sparring as of late, no one will be surprised if the Democratic field remains muddled for the next year. Disorganization is a trait of the Democratic Party.

What is interesting, however, is the Republican field.

The current frontrunners for the top office are former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, U.S. Sen. John McCain of Arizona, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, and the yet-to-announce former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.

Let's get personal for a moment. Rudy, McCain, and Newt have 8 marriages between them. Add Fred Thompson to that mix, and four of the five top GOP candidates for president have 10 marriages between them. That is a big morning-after pill for social conservatives to swallow.

While Romney has only been married once, his flip-flop on abortion and gay marriage issues, as well to his adherence to the Mormon faith, are issues that have caused trepidation among the right flank of the Republican party.

The twice-married Thompson may get a pass on the marriage issue, unlike McCain and Gingrich who have as of late been groveling at the feet of the self-appointed American popes James Dobson and Jerry Falwell for absolution, but he will still have other music to face.

For starters, Tennessee's social conservatives will have to either ignore or forgive his handling of his "retirement" that damaged the career of one of their own, Ed Bryant.

Secondly, they will have to grapple with his support of the convicted Scooter Libby. Thompson was on the fundraising committee that paid for the unsuccessful defense of Vice President Dick Cheney's former Chief of Staff, convicted last week for lying to federal investigators. On "Fox News Sunday" yesterday, Thompson said he would pardon Libby.

Also, Thompson, in a split with his old colleague Alexander, has stated that he supports Bush's escalation of troops in Iraq.

This view puts him not only in Bush's favor, not necessarily a good place to be politically right now, but also in the "Neocon," or neo-conservative camp, a faction of the Republican Party that many social conservatives feel has betrayed their ideology.

Thompson is also a "fellow" at the neocon American Enterprise Institute think-tank, as is Newt Gingrich. An AEI report titled "Choosing Victory: A Plan for Success in Iraq," reportedly had a very strong influence on the White House in crafting its "surge" idea for Iraq. The main author of that plan was AEI fellow Frederick Kagan.

Also of interest in the social conservative movement's assessment of Thompson will be how its adherents view a career that has been more memorable for appearing alongside Tom Cruise in "Days of Thunder" and on the TV show "Law and Order" than for any political accomplishments.

Early in Thompson's political career, he was an inspiring maverick.

He led the investigation of the Tennessee Parole Board in 1977 that brought down Tennessee Gov. Ray Blanton, and he played himself in the acclaimed Sissy Spacek movie "Marie" on the subject.

As Baker's legal counsel at the 1973 Watergate hearings that brought down President Richard Nixon, Thompson was the one that asked the pivotal question: "Mr. Butterfield, were you aware of the existence of any listening devices in the Oval Office of the President?"

This question led to the public revelation of the Nixon taping system, as well as Baker's own famous query: "What did the President know and when did he know it?"

Arguably, no one else but Thompson can rightfully claim to have helped bring down a corrupt president and governor. But in the 30 years that have passed since he helped bring Blanton down, his political résumé has little that social conservatives can cling to and say, "Thompson has been there for us."

And for those who say that Thompson has a lot in common with former President Ronald Reagan, the similarities only go as far as the cutting room floor.

While both men have been in the movies, Reagan was a two-term Governor of California and ran for president in 1976 before he became president. Reagan's runs were planned; Thompson's appears to be almost a knee-jerk reaction to the current GOP field.

While Reagan is still enormously popular with the GOP faithful, remember that the highly influential 1990's social conservative group the Christian Coalition was founded out of televangelist Pat Robertson's failed 1988 Presidential bid.

At the time, social conservatives were complaining that the Reagan White House only gave them lip service. They didn't want to be used for votes again without having a seat at the table when policy was made.

Thompson was a beneficiary of the social conservative movement and the Christian Coalition's landslide year of 1994 when he defeated Congressman Jim Cooper to finish the unexpired Senate term of then Vice President Al Gore.

He came back on the national stage with their unqualified support, but after eight years in the Senate, and without taking any real leadership role on any issue important to the movement that put him in office, Thompson opted to return to the private sector and his acting career. Many social conservatives were left wondering: "What did he do for us?"

In the world of politics, that question is paramount.

If Thompson does make the run, these are just a few of the questions he will have to answer.