BILLINGS, Mont. – Beyond the mountains of this big sky state where a bruising political campaign nears an end, the contest between Republican Sen. Conrad Burns and Democratic rival Jon Tester will help determine far more than who represents Montana in Washington.
It will help decide which party controls the Senate for the remaining two years of George W. Bush's presidency.
President Bush, fighting to help Burns and thus avert the loss of GOP control of the Senate, campaigned here yesterday at the start of a tour that will carry him from Colorado to Florida before Election Day.
The president is stumping in these states that he carried with his re-election in 2004 hoping that his appearances can stir the Republican Party's most faithful base of voters to make the differences in close races – including the Senate race in Montana and another close Senate contest for a GOP-held seat in Missouri.
Bush is spelling out the stakes of this contest, as he perceives them: Preserving the tax cuts he has won, waging a “winning” war in Iraq and upholding the conservative values that he vows to protect with his appointments to federal courts – with the Senate holding the power of confirmation for his nominees.
“When the people of Montana cast their vote on Tuesday, your vote will determine more than who represents you,” Bush told a few thousand supporters assembled yesterday inside a chilly arena in Billings. “It will also determine what kind of federal judges sit on courts all across the United States.”
With more than 50 vacancies on federal benches, the president told his audience that it's essential Republicans maintain control of the Senate. Citing his two appointees to the Supreme Court, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, Bush recalled the resistance that Democrats posed to Roberts' nomination. “If the people of Montana want good judges, judges who won't legislative from the bench, judges like John Roberts and Sam Alito,” he said, “you vote for Conrad Burns for the United States Senate.”
Bush and his advisers are campaigning with a confidence that they can stem a Democratic takeover of the Senate – as well as avert a 15-seat loss of House seats that would turn control of the House to the Democrats.
“I smell victory in the crisp Montana air,” Karl Rove, the president's chief political adviser, said before the rally in Billings.
Pollsters sense something else in their surveys: a potential loss of this, one of six Senate seats that Republicans are fighting to save Tuesday.
The Billings Gazette, endorsing Burns' rival in an editorial this week, suggested that Tester – president of the state Senate, a farmer and music teacher – offers a “welcome change” in the U.S. Senate.
Beyond praising Burns, the newspaper cited the senator's involvement in a scandal that rocked Washington this year, with his acceptance of campaign contributions from disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
Burns' supporters have rallied to his defense, as Tammy Hall did at a rally here.
“I am ashamed of the attacks,” she told the crowd, reminding everyone that this is still a state “where we're not afraid to say, 'One nation under God.' ” She added: “I can tell you, I feel good that I have a president who gets down on his knees every single day.”
It's a sense of bedrock values that Dallas Eidem cites when asked about how he perceives the contest between Tester and Burns. Eidem manages apartments in Hardin, about 45 miles from here.
“I'm sort of a big-picture guy,” Eidem said, and this is the picture he sees when he ponders a Democratic takeover of the Senate. “I start picturing gays getting married everywhere, more abortion rights, kids not needing parental consent for things. I think of the world falling apart – morally, just a downward spiral.
“I think of giving in to the terrorists,” Eidem added with a knowing glance from beneath the brim of his blue cap. “You know they're all voting Democratic. They know they won't fight as hard.”
Bush will campaign in Iowa and Missouri today, Colorado tomorrow, Kansas and Nebraska on Sunday, and Arkansas, Florida and Texas on Monday – before returning to his ranch in Crawford, Texas.
