Huckabee in Iowa
The Des Moines Register offers coverage of Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee’s
recent visit to Iowa:
Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Iowa Saturday downplayed the threat North
Korea's missile testing last week posed to the United States, but
discouraged U.S. officials from confronting the actions without strong
international collaboration.
"They are doing some saber-rattling, but their swords are very dull and very
rusty," Huckabee, a Republican weighing a presidential campaign, said about
the rogue communist nation as he began a three-day swing through Iowa.
Having returned from a trip to South Korea and Japan just days before the
test, Huckabee said North Korea's missile technology is so crude that South
Koreans are less concerned than Americans about the developments.
"They don't really have the weaponry that's advanced enough to have people
ducking and covering just yet," he said in an interview. "But this clearly
can't be another situation where the U.S. goes it alone."
Edwards slams moderates
Former Sen. John Edwards (D-NC) bashed moderate Democrats in a fundraising
event for David Loebsack, who is running in Iowa's 2nd U.S. House District:
"I don't believe in a party that's trying to navigate its way to the
political center and to see how careful we can be," Edwards said.
Edwards also refused to endorse fellow Democrat Sen. Joseph Lieberman
(D-CT), who like Edwards was a recent vice presidential candidate for the
Democrat party.
Giuliani's in for 2008
Robert Novak writes in his column that Rudi Giuliani is in the race for the
2008 presidential nomination:
Well-connected public figures report that they have been told recently by
Rudolph Giuliani that, as of now, he intends to run for the Republican
presidential nomination in 2008.
The former mayor of New York was on top of last month's national Gallup poll
measuring presidential preferences by registered Republicans, with 29
percent. Sen. John McCain's 24 percent was second, with former House Speaker
Newt Gingrich third at 8 percent. National polls all year have shown
Giuliani running either first or second to McCain, with the rest of the
presidential possibilities far behind.
Santorum in the cross-hairs
The
NY Times reports on Sen. Rick Santorum’s (R-PA) race for reelection:
Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, the third-ranking Republican in the
Senate leadership, sums up his race for re-election this year with a
paradoxical pride: "The other side of the aisle wants to beat me more than
anything you can possibly imagine," he told the Greater Lehigh Valley Auto
Dealers Association not long ago.
Matlin/Allen distraction
The
Washington Times’ "Inside the Beltway" reports that Mary Matlin and
Virginia’s First Lady Susan Allan were asked to leave a public celebration:
Virginia senatorial wife Susan Allen and Republican operative Mary
Matalin, accompanied by their respective daughters, were asked to leave a
birthday celebration for the city of Alexandria on Saturday evening because
they were "distracting."
That says a close friend of Mrs. Allen, the wife of Virginia Republican Sen.
George Allen, who is seeking re-election to a second term.
"They were asked to leave the public event by Alexandria's Parks and
Recreation Department because they were told they were 'distracting,'" the
friend states. "That was the exact word [officials] used. Perhaps these
Alexandria servants should be reminded that politicking at public, community
events is a time-honored, American tradition, not to mention a First
Amendment right."
Hoekstra’s way
The
Washington Post covers the House Intelligence Chairman’s flap on the
briefing of secret programs:
The Bush administration briefed top lawmakers on a significant intelligence
program only after a key Republican committee chairman angrily complained of
being left in the dark, the chairman said yesterday.
House intelligence committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.) would not
describe the program, but he said it was significant enough that the
administration should have briefed him and others voluntarily, without
waiting for them to learn of it through government tipsters.
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