http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070606/ap_on_an/republicans_debate_analysis;_ylt=AleLJKotvAr2H1R157cUanHMWM0FGOP candidates shy away from Bush
By GLEN JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer Wed Jun 6, 3:28 AM ET
MANCHESTER, N.H. -
President Bush won't be on the ballot in November 2008, but the Republicans who want to be clearly believe their best chance comes by distancing themselves from their party leader.
The 10 candidates yielded Bush no quarter during a spirited two-hour debate Tuesday night, as they contrasted their positions on a host of issues with those of the unpopular president.
"It's a typical Washington mess," former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani said of the immigration bill Bush wants Congress to approve.
"I think we were underprepared and underplanned for what came after we knocked down Saddam Hussein," former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney said on the topic of
Iraq.
"The president ran as a conservative and governed as a liberal," said Rep. Tom Tancredo of Colorado. "That is what has really been the basis, I think, of the distrust that has developed among the Republican base. It's well founded."
The criticism was all the more pronounced because it was leveled as Bush traveled overseas for an economic summit in Germany, where he already has encountered protesters equally critical of his governance.
"I never heard such a piling on of a sitting president who's of the same party," said Linda Fowler, a government professor at Dartmouth College. "They were as tough on him as the Democrats were."more...