Last update: October 12, 2006 – 7:07 AM
Kline hasn't wavered in support of Bush, Iraq war
As he seeks a third term in Congress, John Kline is running hard, and has been steadfast in backing the president's domestic and foreignpolicy actions.

Kevin Diaz, Star Tribune
On Labor Day weekend, the traditional start of the fall election season, the hunt for votes took Rep. John Kline to the Elko Speedway in the heart of his district on the southern edge of the Twin Cities.

An intermittent drizzle left most of the bleachers empty. But Kline, a retired Marine helicopter pilot, felt at home with the NASCAR drivers, mingling amid the scent of wet pavement, rubber and racing fuel.

"We're pretty red, white and blue," said Tom Ryan, a construction contractor who owns the track. "John does well out here."

Kline, a Republican with a strong record of support for President Bush, is seeking his third term in Congress. Although he should have an edge in a district that Bush won with 54 percent of the vote, he's leaving nothing to chance.

In a year forecast to be a tough one for Republicans, Kline faces Coleen Rowley, who became famous for her role in disclosing FBI intelligence failures before 9/11.

Far from adopting the typical incumbent's "rose garden" strategy of ignoring a rookie challenger, Kline has aggressively attacked Rowley in direct mail pieces designed to portray her as a fringe liberal out of touch with a bucolic district of farms and new suburbs.

Democrats call it a negative campaign meant to distract from what they hope will be Kline's biggest weakness: His staunch support for the war in Iraq at a time when polls show it is becoming increasingly unpopular with a growing number of Americans.

Congressional analysts generally rate Kline a safe bet for reelection. But Minnesota DFLers say Kline has a real race on his hands.

It wouldn't be his first. He won his seat in 2002 after three tries against incumbent Democrat Bill Luther.

Unlike some other Republicans in Congress, Kline has not tried to distance himself from Bush, whose approval ratings have plummeted this year. The retired Marine colonel and military aide to Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan also makes no bones about his support for the U.S. military intervention in Iraq, where his son was deployed as a Blackhawk helicopter pilot.

"Ultimately, we have to win," he said. "And win means an Iraq that is self-governing, sustainable, and capable of defending itself."

Like Bush, Kline defines Iraq as a central front in the war on terror, a formulation opposed by Rowley, who argues that the U.S. invasion was a strategic blunder unrelated to the larger war on terrorism.

Kline also runs as a "strong fiscal conservative" committed to cutting the federal deficit through spending restraint, not tax increases. As a member of the Conservative Study Committee, Kline is one of 110 House Republicans promoting an aggressive agenda of budget cuts, often pressing for deeper cuts than those the Republican-controlled House has been willing to pass.

On immigration, he has taken a more hard-line position than the White House, opposing Senate proposals for a guest-worker program, which he sees as a form of amnesty.

Kline has voted for measures to restrict federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, back a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage and grant the federal courts jurisdiction in the Terri Schiavo life-support dispute in Florida.

Closer to home, he was a key player in a congressional compromise on this year's pension legislation, which gave Northwest Airlines more time to save its defined-benefit program, which is underfunded by almost $4 billion.

Critics saw it as a favor to Northwest, which has about 10,000 employees in his district. Kline argued that it was "almost the opposite" of a bailout, as the alternative would have meant letting the bankrupt airline dump its pension obligations on taxpayers.

But the place where he has made his biggest mark on the national stage is as a member of the Armed Services Committee, where he enjoys close ties to the Pentagon.

In that role, Kline has cast himself as the counterweight to a better-known Marine-politician, Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., who has turned against the war.

The two sparred publicly this year over revelations of an alleged Marine massacre of Iraqi civilians in Haditha.

The controversy led to a rare public stumble. Kline was compelled to apologize for comments that some construed as pre-judging the Marines' guilt. His intention, he said, had been to assure the public that the Marine Corps took the charges seriously and would not cover them up.

Kline also sided with the Bush administration's efforts to redefine U.S. obligations under the Geneva Conventions, giving the CIA more latitude in interrogating terrorism suspects.

Kline's military background (serving 25 years in the Marines, including service in Vietnam and Somalia, and carrying the nuclear football for Carter and Reagan) is playing a central role in his reelection campaign.

Rowley was forced to apologize this year when a supporter posted a doctored photo of Kline on her website depicting him as Col. Klink from "Hogan's Heroes."

The two have been feuding ever since, with Rowley questioning Kline's support for veterans, and Kline questioning Rowley's support for the U.S. military.

Indeed, anything that hints of disrespect for the military doesn't go over well at the Elko Speedway, where race-car owners like Mark Tuma couldn't imagine voting for Rowley, or any other Democrat for that matter.

"I always vote Republican," said Tuma, who doesn't follow politics much but had Kline sponsor one of his cars. "That's just the way it is."

Kevin Diaz is a correspondent in the Star Tribune Washington Bureau.

Kevin Diaz • kdiaz@startribune.com

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