Christopher Dodd: Demo sees hope in Utah

Dodd disagrees with Sen. Hillary Clinton and former Sen. John Edwards' idea of limiting the number of Democratic candidates in presidential debates now being held across the country.

"What I object to — find insulting — is that we are limited to 30-second sound bites" on important issues, like the genocide in Darfur. "It is like throwing bumper stickers at each other."

Dodd said his support is building in Iowa and New Hampshire, where he doesn't have to win but just have a good showing to keep his presidential campaign alive.

And every state in the party nomination race is important, including Utah, he added.

Localizing his idea of a national service program for younger and older Americans, Dodd said as president he would accept an LDS missionary's two-year church service as part of his broad, comprehensive American volunteer program.

All high school students would be expected to donate at least 100 hours of community service before they graduate; he would increase the current AmeriCorp program from 150,000 to 1 million people, double the size of the Peace Corps by 2011, and start new and aggressive volunteer programs for all walks of American life.

While President Bush "wasted" the opportunity to bring Americans together, among themselves and in the greater world, following 9/11, Dodd said his large volunteer program would bring back a feeling of "shared experience" to the country.

"The ground is shifting" under Congress concerning the Iraq war, he said. "The American people are way out in front of Congress" in demanding that the troops come home and that Iraqis settle their problems themselves.

Doesn't he worry that the Iraqi situation would get worse if American troops left soon?

"How could it get any worse? More chaotic? How? We may get better results" with Americans gone from the war-torn nation, Dodd said. He said he will offer an amendment during next week's Pentagon-funding debate that would cut off troop funds in Iraq by next March, and he believes a number of Democratic and Republican senators will vote for it.

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