Kerry digs a deeper hole

Posted by Frank James at 11:00 am CST

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) really has a way with words. Fortunately for Karl Rove, it’s a way that makes keeping a Republican Congress easier.

For Republicans, Kerry is the gift that keeps on giving. For Democrats, he’s turning out to be the October surprise and Halloween all wrapped into one.

The Internet, of course, is abuzz with a comment Kerry made during a Los Angeles campaign event last night.

“You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

Posted by Frank James 7:28 am CST

Democrats aren't happy with what they consider a slap on the wrist meted out by Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) to a staffer who threatened with revenge a former Kirk supporter who is supporting the congressman's opponent, Dan Seals.

So one prominent Democrat, Abner Mikva, who once occupied the seat 10th Congressional District, has asked U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald to probe the actions of Kirk staffer Caryn Garber for criminal violations.

Posted by Frank James at 7:00 am CST

President Bush has recently taken to mocking Democrats for allegedly declaring victory before voters cast their votes exactly one day from day. And to a certain extent the minority party appears to be trying to validate the premise behind the president's taunting.

The Washington Post has an article today that reports on a competition between two Democrats for the House Majority Leader's job appears to have reignited between Reps. Jack Murtha of Pennsylvania and Rep. Steny Hoyer of Maryland.

Posted by Mark Silva at 6:40 am CST

Jeb Bush has run his last campaign, and now brother George W. Bush is running his. And the younger Jeb, stepping down as governor of Florida at year's end, has joined the eleventh-hour fundraising appeal and get-out-the-vote drive of the Republican Party to help the president defeat what Jeb Bush is calling a Democratic Party intent on gaining control of Congress with an "agenda of anger and revenge.''

In an e-mail appeal to millions of Republicans this morning, Jeb Bush is calling on those who cannot contribute any more money – the president already has raised close to $200 million for his party and its congressional candidates in this election cycle – to take part in telephone-calling to targeted Republicans in "key states.'' The president has been "vilified'' by Democrats, the media and Hollywood, his brother tells fellow Republicans, and now it's time "to make your voice heard.'' With Election Day one week away, he boasts that the president, first lady, vice president and GOP leaders have campaigned in 194 cities.

Happy Halloween.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Tuesday, October 31, 2006 as collected by the Associated Press.

President Bush is campaigning for Republican candidates in Georgia.

10 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. MIDTERM ELECTIONS — George Washington University' Graduate School of Political Management hosts a panel discussion on the fate of the 2006 midterm elections, featuring leading political experts from both sides of the aisle and moderated by Christopher Arterton, dean of GW's Graduate School of Political Management. As campaigning draws to a close, the panel will focus in on the key races that will determine the outcome of congressional control.
Location: Room 2168, Rayburn House Office Building.

Posted by William Neikirk at 2:20 p.m. CST

A report issued by British Prime Minister Tony Blair's government warned today that global warming will devastate the world economy by 2050 and beyond if world leaders do little or nothing to stop it.

The price for inaction could be a worldwide depression every bit as severe as the Great Depression in the 1930s, said the report, perhaps the grimmest to date on the impact of climate change. And guess who will be advising the British government on how to deal with the problem? Al Gore.

Posted by Frank James at 11:16 am CST

It’s not often that you hear President Bush called soft on terror by another Republican. But that’s precisely what happened yesterday. Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Rick Santorum, appearing on Fox News Sunday, agreed with interviewer Chris Wallace who asked him if he would equate supporting a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants with being weak on terrorism.

The issue came up because Santorum’s campaign is running an TV ad which links support for such immigration reform, his opponent Bob Casey Jr.’s position, with being a wuss on terror.

Posted by Mark Silva at 11:30 am CST

Every good Bush campaign-closer demands a stirring, patriotic country anthem, and the president rolled a beauty today with a campaign rally appeal for Republican control of Congress that underscores the president’s resolve to fight a war against terrorism – and to fight it in Iraq.

“The Democratic goal is to get out of Iraq,’’ the president said on stage in Statesboro, Ga., today. “The Republican goal is to win in Iraq.’’ And the goal of Aaron Tippen’s gallopping Where the Stars and Stripes and the Eagle Fly is to carry Bush off stage with a patriot fervor in the closing week of a campaign in which the president maintains that American freedom itself is at stake.

Posted 9:57 am CST

David Lightman of the Hartford Courant has a story today that captures the ambivalence many voters have about the coming election: they're fed up with the Republican-led Congress but not persuaded that Democrats would do much better.

Tired Of GOP; Wary Of Dems

HARRISONBURG, Va. -- The mood on the streets of this small Virginia town is the same one dominating the political landscape across key states in this last full week before the Nov. 7 election: People are fed up with Republicans, but not sure they want to vote for Democrats.

Posted by Frank James at 7:10 am CST

Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio,) the House Majority Leader who looks like he could've belonged to Frank Sinatra's Rat Pack, is a reliable producer of good quotes. And he delivered on ABC News's This Week with George Stephanopoulos yesterday.

Stephanopoulos, very craftily to be sure, asked Boehner a damned-if-you-do-or-don't kind of question. "Your own senator, as I said, Mike DeWine, thinks Rumsfeld has to go. Do you agree?" Sephanopolis asked.

Posted by Mark Silva at 9:15 am CST

Every bluesman and wannabe-a-bluesman who picks up a guitar takes a crack at Sweet Home Chicago, but David "Honeyboy'' Edwards has earned the right to play it. In his time, he has played with Robert Johnson, author of the homage to this great northern city, terminus of an epochal migration from Mississippi that carried the music of the Delta with it.

Honeyboy is 91. So you know we weren't the only ones happy to hear the song at the close of his set on the south side of Chicago last night. Every time he rolls it out - "Baby, don't you wanna go?'' - the old bluesman born on June 28, 1915, in Shaw, Miss., has made it through another night.

"Honeyboy'' Edwards, second from right, at the University of Chicago last night. Photo by Mark Silva

Posted by Mark Silva at 10:30 am CDT

Vice President Dick Cheney, attempting to quash the controversy surrounding his remark that a dunk in the water for a suspected terrorist is a "no-brainer,'' insists that he was not condoning water-boarding -- and maintains that he wasn't even talking about water-torture; his radio interviewer was.

The vice president spent some time answering questions aboard Air Force Two en route to Washington, returning from speeches out west. He acknowledged that the Republican Party had gone through a "rough patch'' with the Mark Foley scandal this fall, but suggested that "momentum'' has turned toward the party's favor again. He noted the impact that falling gasoline prices might have on that. And, as for the GOP's campaign debate with Democrats on the war in Iraq, the need to tough interrogation and controversial surveillance techniques, Cheney said: "We're not pulling our punches.''

Posted by Mark Silva at 10 am CDT

With Election Day "around the corner,'' President Bush wants to talk about tax cuts, the ones that he has won, the ones he wants to make permanent and the ones that he warns Democrats will take away if they gain control of Congress in these midterm congressional elections. That's the message of his weekly radio address

Democrats are happier talking about the war in Iraq, as they attempt to connect Republican congressmen and candidates for Congress with the president's "stay the course'' policy. Jim Webb, the Democratic candidate for Senate in Virginia, says in his party's radio response to the president today that he hates to say "I told you so,'' but none of the president's strategies for victory have worked. Here are the duelling radio addresses delivered by the president and the Democratic candidate for Senate:

Posted by William Neikirk at 2:10 p.m. CDT

Vice President Cheney told a radio interviewer earlier this week that dunking terrorist suspects during questioning was a "no-brainer," creating a tsunami of protests that he was endorsing a torture technique known as "waterboarding." Not so, said the vice president's office. No way, said President Bush.

"This country doesn't torture, we're not going to torture," Bush told reporters Friday. "We will interrogate people we pick up off the battlefield to determine whether or not they've got information that will be helpful to protect the country." Cheney's office concurred.

(Vice President Cheney is interviewed at White House by Scott Hennen, host of the Hot Talk radio program on WDAY AM 970 in Fargo, N.D. White House photo by David Bohrer.)

Posted at 10:33 am CDT

Turning out the vote will become the greatest challenge for Republican and Democratic candidates alike fighting for the balance of power in Congress on Election Day.

And the Latino vote, a traditionally Democratic-leaning force, is high on the minds of candidates across the country. One of the key pitches this year is that the Hispanic vote matters more than ever for a party hoping to wrest control of Congress from the GOP. In some close races, notably Senate contests in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Missouri and Rhode Island, and about a dozen House races, it could be decisive. See this account from today's Hartford Courant:

Posted by Frank James at 9:00 am CDT

For all those who believe media coverage of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) has made him out to be a latter-day Mr.-Smith-Goes-to-Washington, there's the new Harper's magazine cover story whose essential point appears to be that the junior senator from Illinois is really shaping up to be a tool of the monied interest.

The piece by Ken Silverstein isn't available on the Harper's website so you'll need to go buy a copy of the magazine if you want to read the entire thing.

Posted at 7:00 am CDT

Glenn Thrush of Newsday has an interesting piece in his paper today about a person he describes as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's "former right-hand man" who has made sizable financial contributions to Sen. Hillary Clinton's political action committee.

It all seems very strange, given the way the New York senator has taken to beating Rumsfeld like a pinata whenever she gets the chance.

By Glenn Thrush
Newsday Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — Stephen Herbits — Donald Rumsfeld’s former right-hand man at the Pentagon and once a trusted Iraq adviser — has allied himself with the defense secretary’s nemesis, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Good morning.

Here are a few Washington events of note for Friday, October 27, as compiled by the Associated Press.

The Commerce Department is releasing the Gross Domestic Product for the 3rd quarter, 7:30 a.m. CDT.

President Bush is meeting with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer this morning.

10 a.m. CDT-- MOUNT VERNON-FESTIVAL — Mount Vernon, George Washington's home, opens 25 new galleries and theaters in the new Donald Reynolds Museum and Education Center. Opening festival features author David McCullough, broadcaster Roger Mudd, 18th-century military re-enactors, and others.
Location: Mount Vernon, Fairfax County, Va.

Posted by William Neikirk at 5:35 p.m. CDT

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said today that people should "just back off" and "relax" about the issue of setting timelines for Iraq to take control of its country.

In saying this, the defense chief sought to quiet the controversy arising from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's statement that he had not agreed to such timelines or "benchmarks" pushed by the Bush administration--that it was just an election ploy by the White House. Rumsfeld said the prime minister had not specifically rejected these timelines.

(Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld at Pentagon press briefing today. Defense Dept. photo by James M. Bowman.)

Posted by Mark Silva at 3:38 pm CDT

Add another volatile vote-driving issue stirring emotions anew as voters face the midterm elections of 2006: Same-sex marriage. If only the president can get this Republican candidate's name right.

President Bush, who has advocated but failed to win House or Senate approval for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union of man and woman, has found new cause to raise the issue on the campaign trail with the New Jersey Supreme Court's ruling this week that same-sex couples must be afforded the same rights as married couples. Another "activist court'' has demonstrated why Congress must act, the president said at a campaign fundraiser for a Republican candidate for Congress in Iowa today.