PROVIDENCE -- In this year of voter frustration with gas prices, the war in Iraq and a befuddling new Medicare prescription-drug program, Lincoln D. Chafee didn't have to look far for a new slogan for his campaign bumper stickers.

He resurrected the "Keep Chafee" motto that his late father -- longtime U.S. Sen. John H. Chafee -- used when he was running for reelection as governor in 1964 and feared "he'd be caught up in the anti-Goldwater wave and be voted out."

Barry Goldwater was the Arizona Republican running for president who has been credited with sparking the resurgence of the American conservative movement. Goldwater's landslide loss dragged down many longtime Republican candidates that year, but not the elder Chafee, who had voiced concerns about Goldwater's extremism.

Forty-two years later, the son is taking a page out of his father's political playbook.

He is a Republican running against what he sometimes calls the "divisive" agenda of the far-right flank of his own party, a social moderate who favors abortion rights and embryonic stem-cell research, an opponent of tax cuts amid mounting federal deficits, the only Republican who voted against the war in Iraq, one of only three Republican votes against a proposed constitutional amendment to ban flag burning, and a swing voter who, from time to time, helps outnumbered Democrats win the day.

Running for his second full term in the Senate after being appointed to his father's seat in 1999, Chafee figures he has cast 2,213 votes by which to judge his record.

Last fall, for example, he sided with the Democrats on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee to kill -- on a tie vote -- an oil-refinery siting bill.

The bill had been hailed by its backers as a way to reduce dependence on foreign oil. But groups such as the Sierra Club said it would weaken environmental protections and give "subsidies and handouts to the polluting oil industry."

The way Chafee remembers it: "When the gas price spiked, there was this 'let's get rid of all these environmental laws that make it difficult to site refineries.' " Chafee subsequently won the Sierra Club's endorsement: he was the only Republican senator to do so. The Sierra Club got flak from some of its members for endorsing a Republican who would probably support less environmentally friendly Republicans for positions of leadership if the GOP retains control of the U.S. Senate.

Sierra Club spokesman David Willett's response: "We are very interested in supporting moderate Republicans who are protecting the environment . . . because if they don't get support from us, then they have very little incentive to do the right thing politically."

Chafee is also the only Senate Republican endorsed by both the Sierra Club and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, despite having one of the two lowest scores -- 67 percent -- of any Republican on the national business advocacy group's scorecard.

His votes against Alaska oil exploration, for a $2.10 increase in the federal minimum wage and against legislation to exempt gunmakers from lawsuits ran contrary to the chamber's positions.

But he was with them in supporting free-trade agreements and "lawsuit-abuse reforms." His opposition to a temporary

windfall-profits tax on crude oil also won him points.

Of winning "the strong support of both environmental and business leaders," Chafee has said: "I think it says something about the power of governing from the center."

But Chafee's brand of Republicanism has often put him at odds with his own party leaders.

He has publicly criticized them for forcing election-year votes on such divisive issues as abortion and flag burning.

"When we have so many important issues, I think, facing us -- health care, energy, what's happening around the world -- to be distracted with these political stunts was unfortunate, particularly for me," Chafee said. "It's not helpful to have these votes in a Republican primary."

Chafee has also taken to using the word "vindicated."

Commenting on GOP challenger Stephen P. Laffey's call for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Chafee said during a recent debate: "I guess by saying that [it's] not going well in Iraq and Secretary Rumsfeld should step down, that vindicates my vote against the war in Iraq -- the only Republican to vote against the war Iraq."

ON SEPT. 14, 2001, Chafee voted for military action in Afghanistan; on Oct. 11, 2002, against giving the Bush administration authorization to go to war in Iraq and on June 22, 2006, against setting a July 2007 deadline for troop withdrawal.

Chafee noted that the Afghanistan vote was three days after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"Right away I thought, we've got to be smart here. It's such a terrible event, so unprecedented in its horror and so visible on the TV cameras, we have to be careful. Even the president's speech concerned me right after 9/11, the with-me-or-against-me . . . This is a complex world. Its not that simple."

But, "they attacked us. We needed to pursue them. . . . I knew we had to give the president some powers," Chafee said. "I don't regret that."

Chafee said the Iraq war resolution a year later was premised on there being weapons of mass destruction, but there was not "legitimate enough evidence. . . . And no connection to al-Qaida."

Chafee said he nonetheless could not support Massachusetts Democrat John Kerry's call in June for a binding timetable for withdrawal: "I voted against the war, but I didn't want to jeopardize any chance of success now that we are there."

Chafee won't answer the question: Has the war been been worth it? "I don't like to look back."

As for what should happen now, Chafee says: "We should be engaging the six countries that surround Iraq: Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iran."

With the four that are allies, Chafee envisions "funding or training of troops or other types of aid to create progress in Iraq."

Even with "the most extreme country, Iran," he suggests, there are "areas of common interest," such as: "It is far better for that country to have a peaceful, moderate neighbor than it was to have Saddam Hussein in power.

"There have been offers to have a dialogue between Iranian officials and our ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad. . . . We should pursue those discussions."

In his first TV debate with Laffey last month, Chafee said he would consider a timetable for withdrawal if this diplomacy failed. But he did not say when or under what circumstances.

Asked recently why he thinks he alone went to the CIA, by his own account, to ask to see evidence of weapons of mass destruction before voting on the Iraq war resolution, Chafee said: "I toss and turn over that -- that 100 Senators are elected to make these important decisions.

"Sometimes I wish we worked harder at making good decisions," he said recently.

He said something similar about the new Medicare Part-D prescription-drug benefit after two administrators at the Woonsocket Senior Center recited its many shortcomings to him during a campaign stop there.

"Folks are spending more," said Lillian Golotto, a community information specialist at the center that day..

"Despite this big benefit, despite the hundred or so billion we're spending . . . still?" asked Chafee, who voted against the drug-benefit program.

FOUR RADIO and television debates have revealed some of Chafee's differences with Laffey.

Chafee supports legislation that would have allowed federal financing for embryonic stem-cell research. Laffey said he would have opposed the bill, not on moral grounds but because he did not view it as promising.

The two also differ on how to handle the nation's nearly 12 million illegal immigrants.

Chafee voted for a bill that would establish a lengthy path to citizenship for illegal immigrants who pay fines and learn English. He opposes a competing House immigration bill that would make illegal immigrants felons. Laffey said he hasn't read the House bill, but favors enforcement over what he calls "amnesty."

On a home-state issue, Chafee said he plans to vote against the proposed constitutional amendment to allow the Harrah's-Narragansett Indian casino in West Warwick. He said he is uncomfortable with "the whole idea of changing the Constitution" and didn't see "a cooperative effort with the governor."

But Chafee said the Narragansetts should have a share of the state's gambling revenue, and perhaps a larger share than the 5 percent -- up to $10 million -- state lawmakers promised them last year out of the expanded slot-operation at the Lincoln Park. "So I just would go back to the drawing board and try and be fair to the tribe," he said.

Standing outside the Woonsocket Senior Center recently, trying to explain his brand of Republicanism to a national news correspondent from ABC, Chafee said: "In Rhode Island, on top of our State House, there's a statue called the Independent Man. . . . We just cherish people that show independence, from our founding."

"Rhode Island was the last state to sign the Constitution, and that has kind of reverberated through our culture -- a streak of independence -- and I think they like that in Linc Chafee."

kgregg@projo.com / (401) 277-7078

EXTRA: Browse more coverage of the Chafee-Laffey battle for U.S. Senate and campaigns around Rhyode Island, at:

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