Economy, financial crisis crowd out other issues

[October 14, 2008]  WASHINGTON (AP) -- It wasn't long ago that illegal immigration was supposed to be a top issue in the 2008 presidential campaign. Terrorism and the Iraq war, which drove the 2004 contest between President Bush and Democrat John Kerry, were expected to be important again this time.

Social issues like gay marriage and abortion also were going to claim a role in the dialogue, particularly with ballot initiatives barring gay unions predicted to drive up conservative voter turnout in several states.

No more.

With the historic collapse of U.S. financial markets overwhelming the presidential contest, a host of otherwise top-tier issues have been pushed aside. That's forced frustrated advocacy groups to seek new ways to press their agendas, even as they acknowledge the unprecedented scope of the financial crisis has relegated nearly everything else to the sidelines.

"The economic crisis is so worrisome, voters are pretty panicked and have a singular focus on what our system is supposed to do about it," said Jeffrey Bosworth, a political science professor at Mansfield University in Pennsylvania. "It comes down to which one of these guys do we think will do a better job navigating economic policy. And it puts absolutely everything else on the back burner."

The meltdown has unmistakably hurt Republican John McCain. Polls show voters now overwhelmingly trust Democrats to be better stewards of the economy. Barack Obama has opened up a clear lead in many national and battleground state polls since the financial shock began to take hold in mid-September.

What's more, the crisis has pushed aside national security matters and battles over hot-button social and cultural issues that have typically benefited GOP candidates in recent elections.

Wednesday night's final presidential debate is slated to cover domestic issues; if the prior two debates are any indication, the financial crisis may well take up much of the oxygen.

Illegal immigration, a major issue during the primary season, is getting little visibility now.

In the GOP primary contest, Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney dueled over which candidate took a tougher line on illegal immigration. Meanwhile, McCain, an Arizona senator, was vilified by many conservatives for steering comprehensive immigration reform legislation that included a controversial guest worker program many decried as amnesty.

McCain later distanced himself from the legislation, saying U.S. borders needed to be strengthened first.

On the Democratic side, longtime front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton saw her fortunes begin to collapse when at a primary debate she appeared to waver on whether she supported granting driver's licenses to illegal immigrants.

Obama favors the idea, which is law in several states but wildly unpopular among most voters, according to several polls.

McCain's advisers once hoped his leadership on immigration in defiance of Republican orthodoxy would bolster his standing among Hispanics and attract some independent voters. At the same time, they hoped to paint Obama as out of the mainstream on the matter because of his support for the driver's license issue.

Bob Dane, a spokesman for the anti-illegal immigration group FAIR, acknowledged the issue is no longer the pressing concern it once was on the campaign trail. So his organization has tried to link immigration to the financial crisis, arguing that cheap illegal labor will only make a poor job market worse.

"As our economy continues to deteriorate, immigration should emerge as a tool in the toolbox to cure our economy," Dane said. "The candidates have been silent on the issue but there remains an undercurrent of frustration."

Social issues like abortion rights and gay marriage also have merited scant discussion on the campaign trail, but not for lack of trying by interest groups on both sides.

Elizabeth Shipp, political director of NARAL, the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League, said the organization has flooded 11 battleground states with e-mail and direct mail appeals to independent and Republican women who favor abortion rights.

Shipp said that with so little discussion of the issue on the campaign trail, many voters may not know that Obama is an abortion rights supporter while McCain and running mate Sarah Palin oppose legal abortion.

"Choice is not the number one issue right now among the general electorate," Shipp said. "But while they're concerned about the economy, they are also concerned about women's right to choose."

Abortion rights opponents are also doing what they can to bring the matter to the forefront, and they have found a willing messenger in Sarah Palin.

Palin criticized Obama at a rally Saturday for voting as an Illinois senator against legislation that would provide medical care to any fetus "born alive" after an abortion.

"A vote for Barack Obama would give the ultimate power over the issue of life to a politician who has never once done anything to protect the unborn," Palin told the crowd.

Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, said her organization will continue trying to boost voter awareness of Obama's history on the "born alive" issue.

"There's been an overall disappointment that there hasn't been much attention paid to family and social issues, things people really do care about," Wright said.

Concerned Women for America also is actively campaigning for three anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives in California, Arizona and Florida, a major presidential battleground state. Obama opposes all three and McCain supports them, but neither candidate has made much of an issue of same-sex unions in general.

The topic of gay marriage has come up only briefly in the campaign.

Eleven states had anti-gay marriage initiatives on the ballot in 2004, boosting conservative turnout in several states that helped President Bush win re-election by a narrow margin over Democrat John Kerry.

Even foreign policy, the top issue early in the primary campaign as both parties' candidates tangled over the Iraq war, has been largely eclipsed by the market crisis. That includes international terrorism, which experts believe remains a critical issue in need of U.S. leadership.

"The issue definitely hasn't gotten the attention people would have expected four years ago," said Paul Pillar, a retired CIA analyst who now teaches at Georgetown University. "We sure haven't heard much on the topic from the candidates except the standard stuff -- how we turned attention away from Osama bin Laden and how that has factored into our approach to Iraq and Afghanistan.

The candidates have battled over the so-called troop "surge" in Iraq, which McCain strongly pushed and Obama resisted. The infusion of 30,000 combat troops in the country has helped quash the violence there, and McCain has offered his prescience on that strategy as evidence he would be the better commander in chief.

But the success of the surge has also ramped down national attention on Iraq, particularly amid the nation's financial turmoil.

Indeed, a host of pressing national security matters have remained largely unaddressed, including the growing strength of China and the political turbulence in Pakistan, which possesses nuclear weapons and is a central front in the war on terror.

[Associated Press; By BETH FOUHY]

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.