http://www.nytimes.com

September 18, 2006
McCain, in New Hampshire, Gets an Earful From the Right
By ADAM NAGOURNEY
CONCORD, N.H., Sept. 17 — Senator John McCain, who is battling with the White House over the interrogation and trial of terrorism suspects, on Sunday flew to New Hampshire — and right into a blistering editorial from the conservative Manchester Union-Leader that assailed him for standing up to President Bush on the issue.

Mr. McCain, Republican of Arizona, responded with a spirited defense, invoking his experience as a prisoner of war as he vowed to block the White House effort.

“This issue is not them — this issue is about us,” he said of terrorists, facing an audience sipping cocktails on a lush lawn next to a pool. “The United States has always been better than our enemies. I’ll tell you right now: one of the things in prison, in North Vietnam, that kept us strong was that we knew we were not like our enemies. That we came from a better nation, with better values, with better standards.”

After months of orchestrated peace, the battle with Mr. Bush over the administration’s effort to reinterpret the Geneva Conventions has put Mr. McCain back into a familiar position: bucking the White House and at odds again with some conservatives, who had already been wary of his ideological views.

The dispute is shaping up as an early chapter in a shift of influence in the Republican Party away from Mr. Bush as he approaches the final two years of his administration, and toward its presidential nominee of 2008. And it is spotlighting divisions in the party as prospective presidential candidates jockey for support from the conservative wing.

One of them, Governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, said in an interview that he disagreed with Mr. McCain, and offered a forceful endorsement of Mr. Bush.

“I am foursquare behind the president on this,” Mr. Romney said. “I believe that we should do everything possible to support those people at the front line who are responsible for enforcing the war on terrorism.”

Mr. McCain said Sunday that he was acting out of conscience, not political calculation, to reinforce an image of independence that has been questioned in recent months as he has supported Mr. Bush on issues like the war in Iraq. Still, he said his office had been deluged with critical phone calls, and that he had picked up enough buzz from conservative radio talk stations to conclude that he might have once again rattled his support among conservatives.

“I would imagine so,” he said, riding in a helicopter rumbling over the New Hampshire hills as it took him to a Nascar race at the New Hampshire International Speedway. “The radio talk show hosts have already been very critical.”

Mr. McCain appears to be in a strong position politically as he takes on this battle. He has methodically been signing up supporters in crucial states in preparation for a 2008 campaign, part of a strategy to create a stampede to his candidacy. Although Mr. Bush has sharply challenged Mr. McCain and the other senators supporting him in the debate on interrogation tactics, the president and his aides have taken care not to attack Mr. McCain, in clear deference to his position in the party.

“There is no acrimony with the White House,” Mr. McCain said. “I certainly consider him a friend. And I hope he considers me as one. We just have a disagreement.”

Dan Bartlett, the White House communications director, said, “We would agree and believe the close working relationship and constant communication has kept it strictly to a difference over substance, and nothing more.”

Conservatives are another matter. Senator John E. Sununu, Republican of New Hampshire, said conservatives would judge Mr. McCain on many issues, and that they did not expect to agree with a political leader on every issue — a reality he said Mr. McCain appreciated.

Still, many conservatives have criticized Mr. McCain for his support for campaign finance legislation, his backing of what they believe are permissive immigration laws, and now this. “The question is being asked: in the midst of the most difficult and challenging war we have ever faced, can the nation afford a President McCain?” The Union-Leader — the largest newspaper in the state, which holds the nation’s first presidential primary — asked in a front-page editorial on Saturday. It was one of two editorials it published this weekend attacking Mr. McCain’s views.

Mr. Romney has been making an increasingly vigorous challenge for conservative votes and is viewed by many Republicans as the strongest challenger to Mr. McCain, at least for now. He saw the interrogation debate as an opportunity to draw contrasts with Mr. McCain among conservative voters.

Asked if this was his sharpest difference with Mr. McCain, Mr. Romney said: “No. There are a number of things. We have different views on McCain-Feingold, differing views on immigration policy, differing views on the interrogation of terrorists. There are also many other areas where we see eye to eye.”

Told about Governor Romney’s position on the treatment of terrorism suspects, Mr. McCain noted tartly, “He doesn’t have a vote.”

Mr. McCain said he was not overly concerned about the criticism. When an aide offered him a copy of the editorial as he rode in a car to the cocktail party here, he at first refused it, but a second later took it back and read it. And at the reception, he aggressively raised the issue, to decidedly light applause.

“We do not believe we should change the Geneva Conventions that we have adhered to for 57 years,” he said. “I hold no brief for Al Qaeda. No.”

“What is this all about?” he continued. “It’s all about the United States of America and what is going to happen to Americans who are taken prisoner in future wars.”

Mr. McCain’s efforts have complicated one political component of the White House’s strategy: trying to bait Democrats into a battle that might allow Republicans to portray them as weak on terrorism. But Mr. McCain said he had not heard any objection from the White House, on political grounds, about what he was trying to do.

“They know better than that,” he said.