Fred Thompson on Fox News Sunday

A few weeks ago I saw GOP Senator and presidential candidate Sam Brownback interviewed by Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday and thought he self-destructed on the spot. Chris can be a tough interviewer for members of both parties.

Today former Senator Fred Thompson was on the show and Chris spent much of the time talking about a possible presidential run. Thompson was very, very good, and this interview could help kick start a move to get him in the race. If he got in, he would be the most solidly conservative (and consistently conservative) candidate in the field and would be a very strong candidate. Here are some excerpts from the interview:

WALLACE: Question: Are you considering running for president in 2008?

THOMPSON: I'm giving some thought to it. Going to leave the door open.

WALLACE: Well, you say leaving the door open. What's going to go into your decision-making process, what factors? Why would you do it? And what do you see — do you see some holes in the current Republican field?

THOMPSON: It's not really a reflection on the current field at all. As you know, some of them are very good friends of mine. I'm going to wait and see how it pans out, see how they do, how it develops.

A lot of people think it's late already. I don't really think it is, although the rules of the game have changed somewhat.

Part of it is internal, a little self-examination on my part. Adlai Stevenson, I guess it was, said, you know, the trick is to do what's necessary to be president and become president and still deserve to be president. And that's serious consideration.

I'm concerned about what's going on in the country, in our world, always have been. Just the fact that I left the Senate did not negate that in any way. I've been involved in national security issues and things of that nature since I've been out of the Senate.

I think we're going into one of the most perilous times that our country has been in. I think that there are great opportunities out there.

But it's not preordained that we're going to remain the strongest and freest nation in the history of the world. We've got to do some things well. We've got to do some things differently.
...
WALLACE: As we said, perhaps the main reason that people are talking about you is this uneasy feeling among conservatives that there is not one of their own, a true conservative, in the field.

So let's do a lightning round — quick questions, quick answers, a variety of issues — to see where Fred Thompson stands.

THOMPSON: Um hmm.

WALLACE: Abortion.

THOMPSON: Pro-life.

...

WALLACE: Do you want to overturn Roe vs. Wade?

THOMPSON: I think Roe vs. Wade was bad law and bad medical science. And the way to address that is through good judges. I don't think the court ought to wake up one day and make new social policy for the country. It's contrary to what it's been the past 200 years.

We have a process in this country to do that. Judges shouldn't be doing that. That's what happened in that case. I think it was wrong.

WALLACE: Gay rights.

THOMPSON: Gay rights? I think that we ought to be a tolerant nation. I think we ought to be tolerant people. But we shouldn't set up special categories for anybody.

And I'm for the rights of everybody, including gays, but not any special rights.

WALLACE: So, gay marriage? You're against.

THOMPSON: Yes. You know, marriage is between a man and a woman, and I don't believe judges ought to come along and change that.

WALLACE: What about civil unions?

THOMPSON: I think that that ought to be left up to the states. I personally do not think that that is a good idea, but I believe in many of these cases where there's real dispute in the country, these things are not going to be ever resolved.

People are going to have different ideas. That's why we have states. We ought to give great leeway to states and not have the federal government and not have the Supreme Court of the United States making social policy that's contrary to the traditions of this country and changing that overnight. And that's what's happened in a lot of these areas.

WALLACE: Gun control.

THOMPSON: Well, I'm against gun control generally. You know, you check my record. You'll find I'm pretty consistent on that issue.

WALLACE: So this federal court — appeals court ruling this last week, I guess Friday, in the case of D.C. — you'd be perfectly happy to have people have handguns in their homes?

THOMPSON: Yes. Absolutely. The court basically said the Constitution means what it says, and I agree with that.

...

WALLACE: What would you do now in Iraq?

THOMPSON: I would do essentially what the president's doing. I know it's not popular right now, but I think we have to look down the road and consider the consequences of where we are.

We're the leader of the free world whether we like it or not. People are looking to us to test our resolve and see what we're willing to do in resolving the situation that we have there. People think that if we hadn't gone down there, things would have been lovely.

If Saddam Hussein was still around today with his sons looking at Iran developing a nuclear capability, he undoubtedly would have reconstituted his nuclear capability. Things would be worse than what they are today.

We've got to rectify the mistakes that we've made. We went in there too light, wrong rules of engagement, wrong strategy, placed too much emphasis on just holding things in place while we built up the Iraqi army, took longer than we figured.

Wars are full of mistakes. You rectify things. I think we're doing that now. We're coming in with good people. We're coming in with a lot of different people. I know General Petraeus from when he was in Tennessee at Fort Campbell. He believes in the plan. He's convinced me that they can do the job.

Why would we not take any chance, even though there's certainly no guarantees, to not be run out of that place? I mean, we've got to take that opportunity and give it a chance to work.

...

WALLACE: You are on the steering committee of the Scooter Libby Defense Fund.

THOMPSON: That's right.

WALLACE: And you helped raise millions of dollars for his extraordinary legal expenses. Would President Thompson — you like the sound of that probably. Would President Thompson pardon Libby now or would you wait until all of his legal appeals are exhausted?

THOMPSON: I'd do it now.

WALLACE: Because?

THOMPSON: I'd do it now. This is a trial that never would have been brought in any other part of the world. This is a miscarriage of justice.

Thompson also addressed some issues where he has differed with conservatives, such as voting for the McCain-Feingold nonsense and his views on immigration reform. You can read his comments on those issues here. I didn't hear anything that would concern me very much.

I think Thompson could be a force to be reckoned with if he decides to get in the race.

I saw an item mentioned at a site (that I can't locate right now) which said this about the '08 race: "Democrats are nominating a presidential candidate. Republicans are nominating a president." Guys like Thompson and Giuliani are presidential. People like Edwards, Obama, Clinton and the rest of the Dems are little more than pretenders.