The Iowa Daily Report, Saturday, December 6, 2003

* QUOTABLE:

"It depends on the other candidates in the race and what they have to say," the 54-year-old account manager said. "There's no sense putting another jerk in there. At least Bush has already been in for a while."

"The AARP pays actors to play seniors in TV commercials. But real-life seniors are getting left out in the cold," said John Kerry.

"The more we're attacked, the more our support grows. The response of our grass-roots support intensifies and we then have the resources to compete," Joe Trippi, Howard Dean’s campaign manager said.

“It's insane. You know what happens when you don't campaign in New Hampshire," [Howard] Dean said, adding that his schedule for later this month includes more time in the Granite State. "We purposely made sure that we didn't short New Hampshire no matter what our lead was because I know what happens when you do that."

"There's very little compassion. There's even very little conservatism because a true conservative would not have put us into a half-trillion dollar current account deficit," said Hillary Clinton about President Bush.

"They stretched the truth to suit their purposes, they demonized their opponents, they used every trick in the book to get their way," released Saturday’s excerpt from Joe Lieberman’s speech for Sunday in Florida.

* TODAY’S OFFERINGS:

Howard Dean: 

*Upping the ante   *Success is failure   *Dean to meet up with S. Carolina   *Money, organization & candidate   *Meetup  

Dick Gephardt:

*Job loses Bush’s fault

John Kerry:

*Wash his mouth out with soap   *Kerry in Florida   *Kerry on Baker   *Max Cleland in Iowa for Kerry   *Kerry’s Madness   *Kerry believes in positive thinking

John Edwards:

*Edwards in Florida

Wesley Clark:

*Clark on mercury   *Bush is the problem   *Clark turnaround?

Joe Lieberman:

*Lieberman’s town forums   *Lieberman’s new ad

Dennis Kucinich:

*On the Planet Kucinich

Al Sharpton:

*Sharpton funnier off camera

Just Politics:

*S. Carolina Blacks   *Democrats push morals   *Washington state cancels primary   *Money for no name

* CANDIDATES & CAUCUSES:

Upping the ante

Groups and opponents are trying to dent Howard Dean’s steamroller but his supporters just provide more money to flatten his detractors. They still have not found the issue or the candidate to slow him down.

Sen. Joe Lieberman is one of the latest to try with the unsealing of the records issue. Lieberman chastises Dean for sealing some of his correspondence and other records as Governor. He states, "We, Democrats are better than that."

Another group -- looking like the beginnings of a “Democrat Stop Dean Movement” -- is buying $230,000 worth of ads in Iowa. The group is called Americans for Jobs, Healthcare and Progressive Values. The head of the group is Tim Raftis who is the former campaign manager for Iowa Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin's unsuccessful presidential bid in 1992. Sen. Harkin (from Iowa) has not endorsed anyone and is not affiliated with the effort. The organization states that it is an unaffiliated independent organization.

The ad hits Dean by stating he and President Bush received the National Rifle Association's highest marks for their stances on gun ownership. It also calls into question Dean’s liberal credentials by asking, ‘If you thought Howard Dean had a progressive record, check the facts and, please, think again.’

All of this just brings the Dean supporters rallying round their candidate. The Associated Press offers these insights in their story:

Dean's campaign said Friday it raised nearly $200,000 to run a response ad less than 24 hours after Club for Growth, a group that works to elect fiscal conservatives, began running a commercial in Iowa and New Hampshire faulting Dean for seeking a repeal of President Bush's tax cuts. Upping the ante, campaign manager Joe Trippi said it's up to Dean's supporters whether the campaign would air counter ads to the other critical spots.

The campaign plans to spend "several million dollars" to return to the TV and radio airwaves beginning Monday in South Carolina and New Mexico, where voters can start requesting ballots Dec. 15. Within the next two weeks the campaign will do the same in Oklahoma and Arizona — four states among the seven holding contests Feb. 3. The former Vermont governor hasn't been on the air in any of the four states since September.

Dean also will boost paid staff members starting Monday in the four states and run commercials soon in the other three states — Missouri, North Dakota and Delaware — as he continues heavy ad buys in Iowa and New Hampshire, which hold their contests in January.

Success is failure

Howard Dean calls the record revised growth in the economy, dropping unemployment, and record rise in productivity a failure and says it is all Bush’s fault. Democratic presidential candidate Governor Howard Dean commented on the November unemployment figures released this morning, and how, despite the growth, this administration has compiled the worst economic record since the Great Depression:

"Today's job announcement is another link in the chain of President Bush's broken promises. When he proposed his program of tax cuts for the rich, he said they would create 306,000 jobs a month. November's 57,000 job record puts the administration even further behind its promise -- and puts the American worker further behind the eight-ball.

"Worse yet, manufacturing -- the heart of American prosperity -- continued to lose jobs for the 39th consecutive month. In November, another 17,000 American factory workers got the unwelcome news that they lost their jobs -- just in time for Christmas.

"Meanwhile, the Administration and the Republican Congress refuse to take up the extension of unemployment benefits that would help millions of jobless workers in the new year. It's time to take back America and put America back to work."

Dean to meet up with S. Carolina

Howard Dean will be in South Carolina on Sunday, December 7, to officially open his state campaign headquarters and to deliver what is being called a major address on the American community. Dean will be accompanied by Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. for the address.

Explaining the speech's theme of talking about the importance of the American community, Dean said: "Today, Americans are working harder, for less money, with more debt, and less time to spend with our families and communities. In the year 2003, in the United States, over 12 million children live in poverty. And yesterday, there were 3,000 more children without health care-children of all races. By the end of today, there will 3,000 more. And by the end of tomorrow, there will be 3,000 more on top of that."

"It's time we had a new politics in America -- a politics that refuses to pander to our lowest prejudices," he added.
Dean and Jackson will also attend the campaign's office grand opening in Columbia Sunday with State Director Don Jones and Deputy State Director Kelley Adams.

"Governor Dean's offers a compelling message of hope and an inspiring vision for America," Jones said. "I look forward to spreading his message throughout South Carolina and building upon our successful Meetups in eight cities."

Dean to meet up with Nation

The Boston Globe reports Howard Dean’s campaign is going ahead with a national campaign focus with the heavy buys in the super seven states of the Feb 3rd primary date. The Dean campaign is also making substantive changes in the handling of the candidate, according to the Globe:

Late this week, Dean started traveling on a separate plane from the press corps, which his staff had assiduously courted earlier in the race. Interaction with the governor was restricted to four or five questions following events yesterday in Iowa and Thursday in Texas. Dean's schedule has also filled with closed-door events as the campaign has sought money and courted support from members of the party establishment. One such meeting occurred in Dallas between Dean and Ron Kirk, a former mayor of Dallas and US Senate candidate in 2002.

The Rutland Herald also reported Thursday that Dean was planning to make only one visit to New Hampshire in the first half of this month, and instead concentrating his campaigning elsewhere in the country as he has opened up, according to two polls released this week, a 30-point lead in the Granite State. In Iowa, meanwhile, the campaign that once operated on a shoestring budget now travels with a satellite phone so Dean can be in constant contact across a state with spotty cellphone service.

Dean assured the press while campaigning in Iowa that he had made plenty of time for New Hampshire because he knows what happens if he wouldn’t. The state is famous for dumping on those who dump them. He also acknowledged that his campaign was aiming at a different target according to the Globe:

"If you can't focus on what's beyond, we're not going to beat George Bush," Dean said "In the end, we're really not running against each other, we're running against George Bush."

Money, organization & candidate

Three things you need to win a campaign are money, organization and a candidate. However, it also helps to have good ideas. An Internet supporter of Howard Dean is responsible for the campaign spending $2,100 for a 30 minute commercial at 4:30 p.m. in Madison, Wisconsin. The ad is the first of its kind by the Dean campaign. (H. Ross Perot did the same in the 1992 presidential election.) The spot is being used as a test to see how the medium would play in gaining supporters. The campaign is test marketing the idea in the cheaper Wisconsin media market and if it works they will air it in other states. The ad asks for support and financial contributions.

Meetup

The NY Times has an in-depth story (six pages on the Internet) on the Dean youth phenomenon and the Internet model that propels the campaign. One of the great phenomena of the Dean campaign are Meetups. The campaign in part is tapping into the aspect of chat rooms and other means of the new social character. The Times article recognizes this fact when it references Robert Putnam’s work:

Meetup.com takes its inspiration from books like ''Bowling Alone,'' by Robert D. Putnam, about the decline of American public life; its founders claim that the regular monthly meetings arranged through its site (gathering any group from Wiccans to dachshund lovers to, more recently, supporters of political candidates) can help heal the disintegration of the American community.

Responsiveness is the watchword of the Dean campaign if not the appearance of it, according to the article:

Part of Dean's appeal is that he behaves in recognizably human ways. He talks with real emotion and seems to respond to events (if sometimes poorly) as they come. In this election season, Dean's responsive, even angry, voice has had political resonance. Many Dean supporters objected not just to the war in Iraq itself, but also to the Bush administration's failure to even maintain the appearance of listening to the massive protests and U.N. resolutions. By contrast, responsiveness is the essential sound of the Dean campaign. It is embodied not only in Dean himself, but also in the blog, which creates the impression of a constant dialogue between supporters and campaign staff, and in the organizing on the ground.

The campaign sees political involvement in the way ''Bowling Alone'' does, as related to participation in civic organizations -- to people getting together socially. People at all levels of the Dean campaign will tell you that its purpose is not just to elect Howard Dean president. Just as significant, they say, the point is to give people something to believe in, and to connect those people to one another. The point is to get them out of their houses and bring them together at barbecues, rallies and voting booths.

People have sold their houses and traveled across country to work for free for the Dean campaign. Supporters call up the campaign to see if they can do something for Dean in Timbuktu and the staff tells them yes and ads that they don’t need permission to do anything they want. Many believe as Lauren Popper, a 24-year-old actress -- who temporarily left her boyfriend and career in New York City to work as an organizer for the Dean campaign in Manchester, N.H, -- that they are creating a new community and world:

''The thought that he'll be president is a side effect,'' she said. ''This campaign is about allowing people to come together and tell their life stories.''

The campaign, like the Internet, is a grid pattern. The key power points are the intersecting points or junctions where people (or ‘traffic’) congregate. The Drudge report is one such junction. You can go to the Drudge report and click on one of the nearly 100 links and get to somewhere else. Dean has a group of techies who maintain and write code for his central hub and the Times covers them in the article:

The software that is supposed to bridge the gaps in the contemporary landscape is maintained here by three often-barefoot boys. They frequently work through the night, as piped-in soft rock fills the empty lobby. When you ask them how long they've been working, they respond in increments like ''40 hours'' or ''three days, with naps.'' During these spans of time spent in front of the computer, they may at any given point be coding software, corresponding with Internet theorists and venture capitalists or just firing off instant messages to one another that say, ''Shut up.''

Zephyr Teachout, 32, is the campaign's director of Internet organizing. She is responsible for overseeing the three barefoot boys -- Clay Johnson, Zack Rosen and Gray Brooks -- who keep the system running. Teachout is a lawyer and runs Dean’s web effort:

Teachout, sitting at the very edge of her seat, tells me that ''the revolution,'' as she calls it, has three phases; the first is Howard Dean himself, the second is Meetup.com and the third is the software that Rosen, Johnson and Brooks work with: Get Local, DeanLink, DeanSpace. ''DeanSpace,'' Teachout says, ''is the revolution.''

DeanLink is a version of Friendster that Johnson wrote the code for the Dean campaign. On Friendster, users are able to see friends of friends in up to four degrees of separation and read the comments their friends have written about them.

Rosen is responsible for creating Dean Web. It allows any site to reprint another sites’ stories, images and campaign feed automatically… as if they have a collective consciousness. This cuts out the copy-cut-and-paste function that is normally required to communicate between sites. It also provides a ''dashboard'' where the people at the campaign can track patterns on its unofficial sites and observe which content is most popular.

When Teachout says that Dean Space is the revolution she means that the space on the planet know being populated with Dean supporters who create the movement are the revolution. In late October, Teachout went on a tour of the country to meet the people running the campaign.

Job loses Bush’s fault

Rep. Dick Gephardt released this statement today about the Jac Pac food manufacturing plant closing in Manchester, New Hampshire, costing 550 local manufacturing jobs and 170 jobs in Maine.

"For three years middle-class families have watched their jobs disappear while George W. Bush put tax cuts for the wealthy at the top of his economic agenda. Jobs like the ones at Jac Pac in Manchester are consolidating or leaving the country because George W. Bush's failed policies aren't helping employers pay decent wages and offer benefits. We can't just watch 550 jobs in leave Manchester this winter or hope that 130 laid-off workers in the North Country are back to work soon. American workers need a different approach. Every bold idea that I am talking about in my campaign, from my health care plan to my energy independence plan, is about moving the economy forward again."

Wash his mouth out with soap

Sen. John Kerry has moved into an X-rated campaign. He is quoted in the Rolling Stones Magazine as having used the ‘F word’ in describing President Bush. The NY Post is covering the story and kids in New Hampshire are asking Kerry if it is appropriate language, according to the Post:

"I voted for what I thought was best for the country. Did I expect Howard Dean to go off to the left and say, 'I'm against everything'? Sure. Did I expect George Bush to f _ _k it up as badly as he did? I don't think anybody did," Kerry told the youth-oriented magazine.

Brookings Institution presidential scholar Stephen Hess said he can't recall another candidate attacking a president with X-rated language in a public interview.

"It's so unnecessary," Hess said. "In a way it's a kind of pandering [by Kerry] to a group he sees as hip . . . I think John Kerry is going to regret saying this."

Kerry was accurately quoted in Rolling Stone, said spokesman David Wade, adding the X-rated language reflects the fact that Bush's Iraq policy "makes John Kerry's blood boil."

Kerry yesterday angrily cited his war record in Vietnam when asked by a New Hampshire student about charges that it's unpatriotic to attack the commander-in-chief, fuming: "I left some blood on a battlefield that President Bush never left anywhere.

Kerry in Florida

"On issue after issue, George Bush has given America a raw deal, and everyone in this room knows it," he said in the text. "George Bush goes to Baghdad to carry around a fake Thanksgiving turkey while he cuts support for our troops and 40,000 veterans are left on a hospital waiting list."

Kerry on Baker

“As long as the world sees Halliburton cashing in on what George Bush's campaign manager Joe Allbaugh called the 'gold rush' in Iraq, James Baker or anyone else will be handcuffed by this President's unilateralism.

"George Bush needs to change the policy, not just the personnel.”

"To make up for their failure at Madrid to get the world invested in Iraq’s future, the Bush Administration must take meaningful steps to make Iraq's debt and its reconstruction the world's mission, not just an American one. They must transfer authority for Iraq’s reconstruction to the international community."

Max Cleland in Iowa for Kerry

Former US Senator Max Cleland will return to Iowa on Thursday, December 11th and Friday, December 12th to rally support for John Kerry and his campaign for the presidency. Cleland visited Iowa earlier this fall and will return again in January.

Cleland lost three limbs while serving in the Vietnam War. When he returned he became the youngest VA Administrator in history and helped institute “vets centers”, which for the first time offered psychological counseling to combat veterans to heal the emotional wounds of war. While serving as Georgia Secretary of State, Cleland fought for tougher campaign finance laws and implemented the “motor voter” program adding almost one million new registered voters to the system.

Kerry’s Madness

Sen. John Kerry is employing one of those wonderful pop-ups on his website. He is not the first -- Dick Gephardt is the first website among the nine candidates to employ pop-ups asking for funds.

Kerry, however, has one that catches your attention with the admonition of “Stop the Madness.” The madness features pictures of Bush, Cheyne and Ashcroft. Also pictured is a blackened photo of smokestack polution, Halliburton and Enron. Cronyism, extremism, pollution, deception and economic failure are the five madnesses that you can explore in depth. Kerry also offers his solutions to these madnesses. Then you can contribute to help stop the madness.

Kerry believes in positive thinking

When Sen. John Kerry announced that Manchester Mayor Robert Baines was endorsing his candidacy. He boldly stated that he would still win according to the Manchester Union Leader:

“I’ve been behind before in races,” Kerry told students and reporters gathered in the school library. “I’m known as a good closer, and I intend to be a good closer in this campaign.

“I am going to win this race,” he insisted. “And I will win because I do have a passion — 35 years of it — that I’ve exhibited from the day I came back from Vietnam. I will show a passion and an energy that’s second to nobody in this race.”

Kerry then clarified that by “this race,” he was predicting not only that he eventually will win the Presidency, but that first, “I intend to win New Hampshire. I’m going to do my best to win in New Hampshire. You bet I am.”

Edwards in Florida

Sen. John Edwards chose the DieBold electronic voting machines as his way to beat up on President Bush while attending the Florida Democrat Convention according to Associated Press:

"We now have touch screen voting machines that some people think are just as bad as a butterfly ballot," Edwards said, referring to the confusing ballots that became notorious in the botched Florida election in 2000. "What makes this worse is that one of George W. Bush's fund-raising Pioneers said he wanted to help Ohio 'deliver' its electoral votes to George Bush," Edwards said.

Edwards called on Bush to return $100,000 donated to his campaign by Walden O'Dell, head of DieBold Election Systems, who collected the money.

Clark on mercury

According to a recent newspaper report, the Bush Administration is looking for ways to loosen regulations on mercury emissions at power plants.

"This is unbelievable," said Wes Clark. "We've got mercury in our air, mercury in our water, and mercury in our food - and too many Americans, especially children and pregnant women, are at risk. This is just another example of how this Administration is committed to dismantling environmental protections, one regulation at a time. Giving power plants free reign to pollute our country and poison our citizens doesn't protect our environment - it protects our special interests."

New Hampshire has one of the highest concentrations of mercury pollution in New England, which puts its children at an unacceptably high risk for birth defects. "Reducing mercury emission and contamination is top priority of my environmental agenda," Clark said.

Bush is the problem

Wesley Clark said that New Hampshire’s faltering bond rating is Bush’s fault: "We recently learned that the state of New Hampshire will have to lower its bond rating because of faltering state revenues. As a result, the state must pay higher interest on the money it borrows to pay for vital investment and social services. This will lead to higher taxes for New Hampshire families. This is just one more example of how New Hampshire families are footing the bill for Bush's irresponsible tax cuts for the rich… My Job Creation Plan includes a State and Local Tax Rebate Fund that would provide $177 million over two years to New Hampshire, helping alleviate the fiscal distress facing states like New Hampshire without having to increase taxes on hard-working families."

Clark turnaround?

A Boston Globe story entertains the idea that Wesley Clark may be turning his campaign around:

If Clark ends up going to the White House, these past two weeks might mark the start of the turnaround. His response to the Republican Party's latest ads -- "I'm not attacking the president because he's attacking terrorists; I'm attacking him because he isn't attacking terrorists" -- popped up on television screens throughout the country. His latest stump speeches have drawn a positive response from crowds. And polls in New Hampshire this week registered a small but definite uptick.

"Someone's going to end up being the opposition to Dean," said pollster Dick Bennett, president of the Manchester-based American Research Group. "I'm tending to think that it may be Clark."

Lieberman’s town forums

Joe Lieberman's campaign is once again stepping up its New Hampshire effort, announcing today that Lieberman will be the very first candidate this cycle to host an unedited, televised town hall forum in the state, and that the campaign has extended its TV advertising campaign by making a significant ad purchase of $300,000 in five Boston television stations, which cover the majority of New Hampshire.

"It's only fitting that Joe Lieberman will be the first to hold a televised town hall forum in New Hampshire because he has a unique and powerful way of connecting with Granite Staters," said Lieberman's NH Press Secretary Kristin Carvell. "He has already visited the homes of many in New Hampshire, and this forum will allow him to visit the living room of literally every voter across the state."

The half-hour forum will be filmed live-to-tape next Thursday and will air on Saturday, Dec. 13 at 7 p.m. on WMUR. The audience will be composed of undecided voters.

Lieberman’s new ad

Sen. Joe Lieberman is running a new ad that singles out Howard Dean for sealing his records as Governor of Vermont. In the 30-second ad entitled "Better Than That," Lieberman faces the camera and says, "A secret energy task force? Twenty-eight sealed pages of a 9-11 report? Why does George Bush keep hiding important facts from us? I believe in open government, fully accountable to the people. I believe in leveling with you about what I've done and where I stand. So why did Howard Dean seal his records as governor and invoke executive privilege? We Democrats are better than that. I'm Joe Lieberman and I approve this message because I trust the American people with the truth." The ad features Lieberman speaking from a diner, continuing a series called "On the Road with Joe" in which he confronts issues currently in the headlines.

On the Planet Kucinich

On the planet Kucinich the candidate has come up with a diabolical plan to subvert the process of winning delegates to the Democrat National Convention. Rep. Dennis Kucinich now believes that if he can make his website the number one visited site among the nine presidential candidates he will win. Of course, it is hard to know exactly what Kucinich is thinking. However, he recently issued a release calling on all Kucinichians to help make his website number one.

Alexa, owned by Amazon.com, counts traffic on users who utilize their Alexa toolbars and Kucinich has had a fast climb in traffic to his campaign’s website since Nov 3. The Kucinich release currently posted on his site urges supporters to help:

Traffic to the Kucinich website at www.kucinich.us has soared. As of December 5, 2003, the site is the third most popular among presidential campaign websites and closing fast on the other two.

On December 5, 2003, Alexa.com, a highly regarded source of data on web traffic, posted this story on its website: http://pages.alexa.com/features/candidates.html

If you want to help increase traffic to the Kucinich website, please do two things:

1.      Put the website address www.kucinich.us in your Email signature. Or, even better, include one of these banners: http://www.kucinich.us/banners.htm

2.      Go to www.kucinich.us and sign up for the campaign Email list. When you get an Email from the campaign that you find important or entertaining, forward it to your friends.

The overall rankings of the site (the lower the number the better) is: Howard Dean-3,755; Wesley Clark-9,779; Kucinich-39,998; John Edwards-37,188; Dick Gephardt-27,780; John Kerry-23,641; Joe Lieberman-85,857; and George Bush-17,248.

Sharpton funnier off camera

The LA Times reports that Al Sharpton was funnier in rehearsal off camera than on:

…Sharpton showed more wit off camera than he did on. For example, when a director noted during a break that the opening skit between Jimmy Fallon and the reverend was a few seconds too long, Sharpton immediately suggested, "So just cut Jimmy's part." The room broke up; Sharpton let the laughs subside and added, "I learned that at the debate."

While the rest of the country will get to see Sharpton, Iowans (living in the ‘first in the nation caucuses’ state) will not. The Iowa television stations don’t want to take a chance with the “fairness doctrine” that requires equal time for opponents.

S. Carolina Blacks

Reuters reports on Democrat candidates’ search for Black votes in S. Carolina. Yesterday, IPW reported that historically Democrats have coalesced around a Democrat candidate by now but haven’t this election cycle. Democrats are now trying to demonstrate that they are the candidate who can align the Black vote with their candidacy and provide the margin to beat Bush the way Clinton beat Bush, Sr. Besides going to Black churches and advertising on Black radio stations, one of the big efforts is in the endorsement game. Here Reuters reports that three candidates are leading the way:

Sen. John Edwards of neighboring North Carolina, who often talks to black audiences about his experiences with segregation growing up in the South, has built the largest list of endorsements from African-American leaders.

But Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri is expected to win the endorsement in the next few weeks of the state's most influential black politician, Rep. James Clyburn.

Howard Dean is going to import his famous Black endorsement:

Dean, accompanied by Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. of Illinois, will visit a black church in Columbia on Sunday before opening his state headquarters.

If the election were held today, it is possible that Sharpton would win the largest portion of S. Carolina’s Black votes.

Democrats push morals

A New York Times article shows how the Democrat candidates are trying to bridge the religious divide by discussing morality and framing issues around moral and religious terms. A recent Pew poll showed that never before have the two political parties been so divided between religious and sectarians as presently. Democrats are now trying to bring back some of their previous lost religious voters. The Times references Clark, Lieberman and Gephardt:

Mr. Gephardt, a Baptist who once considered becoming a minister, always mentions his college scholarships from the Baptist church and promises, if elected president, to help all Americans achieve their "God-given potential." Once he even discussed Jesus' commitment to the poor as a model for politicians. ("He was a Democrat, I think," Mr. Gephardt told voters in Marshalltown[IA].)

The first part of fixing any problem is recognizing and understanding the problem. However, it may take more than rhetoric for the Democrats to regain their previous cultural religious voters. After all, Bill Clinton in 1996 was for school uniforms, prayer, youth curfews and better children's television.

The Times reports that the Republicans are not worried:

"They may be taking a first step in talking in a different way," said Jim Dyke, a spokesman for the Republican National Committee. "But until they can come around to adopt the policies that fit mainstream America, their rhetoric will only go so far."

Washington state cancels primary

Democratic Gov. Gary Locke proposed cancellation of the Washington state’s presidential primary this year and the legislature overwhelmingly approved the measure, canceling the primary.

Money for no name

The Democratic Presidential nominee won’t be known for several months, but that isn’t stopping some groups from collecting donations for him or her now. The Council for a Livable World and a political action committee called WE LEAD (Women Engaged in Leadership, Education and Action in Democracy) have launched campaigns to collect $100,000 each for the eventual nominee. They are among the first groups to take advantage of a recent decision by federal election officials to allow certain political committees to collect donations for candidates yet to be determined. The November decision overturns — or clarifies, depending on who is talking — rules that were generally interpreted as requiring most such groups to only collect donations for specific candidates and to hand over that money within 10 days.

The Federal Election Commission has said the 10-day window may open whenever the candidates become known. For the Council and WE LEAD, that will be when the Democratic Party announces that a candidate has amassed enough delegate support to become the presumptive nominee.

* ON THE BUSH BEAT:

Better numbers

Not only is the economy improving but president Bush’s chances of reelection are improving according to the Associated Press’ latest poll:

People are increasingly comfortable about job security for themselves and for those they know — 44 percent now, compared with 35 percent in early October. And more approve of the way Bush is handling the economy — 50 percent compared with 45 percent in the October poll, according to the poll conducted for the AP by Ipsos-Public Affairs.

More in the poll say they favor the president's re-election than oppose it, with 41 percent saying they will definitely vote for him and 36 percent definitely against him. One in five is considering voting for someone else.

Right direction wrong direction:

In the new poll, 43 percent said the country was headed in the right direction, and 51 percent said it was on the wrong track. In mid-November, 38 percent had a positive view, and 56 percent said wrong track.

Bush pressured on Jailed activist

An Associated Press story highlights the growing congressional support for President Bush to intervene with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao on behalf of a Boston scholar who has been jailed in China for spying for Taiwan:

Eight senators, including three members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, asked Bush in a letter Friday to discuss the case of Boston scholar Yang Jianli with the premier next week.

China’s visit comes a time of increased trade tensions with President Bush placing trade sanctions on certain clothing exports from China. There will also be discussions concerning curbing N. Korean nuclear ambitions and having china place pressure on N. Korea to abandon their nuclear weapons ambitions. Several Democrat candidates have called for more sever sanctions against China. Sen. John Edwards has called for China being required to wait two more years before the World Trade Organization’s.

* THE CLINTON COMEDIES:

It’s personal

While in Texas, Sen. Hillary Clinton took the time to take a personal swipe at the President, according to the NY Daily news:

"We've made a hard right turn to pursue an extremist agenda that was certainly not advertised by the campaign President Bush ran," the former first lady, told the Austin (Tex.) American-Statesman. In Texas for a fund-raiser and to sign her book "Living History," Clinton said Bush is trying to undo everything her husband's administration built over eight years. "I took that kind of personally," she said. The Bush policies also cut into years of work by previous administrations, she said - not just her husband's. "Just on every front it became clear to me they wanted to undo the New Deal," she said.

 

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