“I do not understand how
anyone can vote for a resolution to send our
people over there [Iraq] and then not back the
funds to see that they succeed,"
Dick Gephardt
said.
"I ask you please to
bring a friend, I ask you to bring five friends,
drag somebody with you, I ask you to make phone
calls," Howard
Dean said.
“I needed to have TV
commercials on the air a week ago in South
Carolina,' Braun
explained, 'but I did not have the money.'
And without TV or radio ads, she felt it was
unfair to ask her volunteer ground troops to work
the streets,"
Carol Moseley Braun said.
"My campaign has always
been about a positive, optimistic, unifying vision
for America ... I will not change over the next
five days. I am reaching out and lifting up this
country," John
Edwards said.
“[Clark] is a good guy,
but I truly believe he's a Republican,"
said Howard
Dean.
“… if the economy
continues to improve and Iraq stabilizes, "it
almost doesn't matter who our candidate is -- it's
going to be very hard for our side to win,"
said Democrat
Pennsylvania Gov. Edward Rendell.
"We have a superior
ability to get our people to actually appear on
caucus night and stand up for us,"
Dick Gephardt
said.
“Rudy Giuliani will be
out in Iowa on Monday speaking to first responders
who know firsthand how hard President Bush
continues to work to keep our country safe and
secure," said
Giuliani's spokeswoman, Sunny Mindel.
``I think everybody has a
little anxiety when they approach a job like
that,'' Howard
Dean said of the presidency. ``During my
life, I've made hard decisions about people who
could die if I made the wrong decision.
She [Carol Moseley Braun]
has been a welcome surprise, with her quick
tongue, impressive knowledge of politics and
connection to the lives of real, middle-class
Americans. She held the other candidates
accountable during the debates. Her presence
brought female and minority perspective. She was
bold, and some might say she could be that way
because she didn't have much to lose.
-- writes Des
Moines Register editorial.
Gephardt "is reigning
Iowa champ with 20 years of building the ground
game," and "Dean's headquarters is the size of a
city block,"
said Michael Meehan of the Kerry campaign.
"We are competitive but definitely outgunned" on
the ground, he said.
"…the Republicans are
much meaner than the Democrats are. I don't want
to absolve the Democrats, but Republicans are just
brutal. They do not care what happens to the
country as long as they stay in power, and they're
willing to do anything they can to stay in power."
– Howard Dean,
in a new interview with Rolling Stone
magazine.
"I think we're going to
win here [Iowa],"
Howard Dean
said, "though we need every single Iowan to
get to the polls in order to do it."
In a tight race anything can
happen and usually does. However, an organization
that has been identifying which voters are
favorable to the candidate and turnout of those
voters is everything at this point. The polls are
probably underestimating the Gephardt and Dean
support. Many of Dean’s supporters have cell
phones and are not being called in the polling
numbers we are seeing. The other group that is
probably under-represented are the union members
supporting Gephardt. Contrary to popular belief,
many of these people are not registered as
Democrats, and therefore not called in polling
endeavors.
In the latest three-day tracking
poll, Kerry gained two percentage points to 24
percent, with Howard Dean and Richard Gephardt
each dropped two points to 19 percent. John
Edwards is holding steady at 17 percent. "Any one
of the four can win this one," pollster John Zogby
said.
Reports are that lots of
undecided voters are showing up at all of the
candidates’ visits. Clearly Iowa Caucuses could
see a very large turnout and the buyers are hot to
decide.
It will be interesting to see
how well the old industrial unions deliver for
Gephardt. They are in the fight of their life to
maintain top influence over the service unions,
who have endorsed Howard Dean. How well they
perform in the Iowa contest has great consequences
for them within the union movement.
Kerry continues to surprise and
impress people with his late push to the front of
what is a statistical dead even race within
polling margins of error. Iowa’s First Lady
Christie Vilsack seems to be providing a flood of
women joining the Kerry campaign. And Kerry’s
personal performance seems to be catching on with
some voters. He is giving 20-minute stump speeches
that focuses on issues -- corporate
responsibility, foreign policy, taxes and health
care. He verbally slaps around President Bush and
does not say a word about any of his Democratic
opponents. His close is:
"As
Democrats, we cannot just offer anger," he said.
"We've got to offer solutions." He ends by urging
people to caucus for him and to "go there not just
to send a message, but to send America a
president."
A big part of the issue in
campaigning is how the Democrats run against Bush.
If a candidate goes to the middle, they will
depress their base vote turnout. President Bush’s
political advisor Karl Rove complained about the
millions of Christian Right that sat out the last
election, for example. The debate at hand in the
Democrat Party right now is the core of the
question of electability among Democrat
candidates. Here is what the Post quotes Dean’s
campaign manager Joe Trippi saying:
In an
interview, Trippi said, "The established way is to
go after the middle, even if it means depressing
your base." He said that swing voters will look at
large issues -- the war and the budget -- but that
policy positions are secondary to the larger mood
and promise Dean conveys.
Kerry gets a dig in on Dean in Ft Dodge
Looking over his audience in
Fort Dodge, many of them retirees and veterans,
Kerry dryly said, “This is a great tribute to the
democratic process … out here in Iowa, and I
respect it. I have not seen any special interests
anywhere in this Iowa caucus process.”
Kerry is strong in his attack on
Bush according to the Mason City
Globe Gazette:
“If
you’re a drug company, if you’re a polluter, if
you’re among the wealthy in this country, then
George Bush can beat his chest and say ‘mission
accomplished.’
“But if
you’re unemployed, if you’re a family farmer, if
you’re without health insurance, it’s mission
deserted, mission abandoned, mission not even
tried,” said Kerry.
Braun’s debt erased?
We now know why Carol Moseley
Braun was defending Dean during the Brown and
Black Forum Debate. Look for sometime in the
future that the Dean campaign helps her retire her
debt. In fact, The
Chicago Tribune reports on that very fact:
Braun
campaign manager Patricia Ireland -- the former
National Organization for Women president who was
never able to energize the feminist community
behind Braun -- started talking to Dean campaign
manager Joe Trippi at the end of last week. Trippi
turned her over to Dean senior adviser Jon Haber.
Ireland is quoted as saying:
"We are
going to help her with the debt," Haber told me.
The debt tab could be in the neighborhood of some
$300,000 and Dean's camp will help Braun raise the
money to pay it off.
Gephardt launches new attack ad against Dean
"Did you know Howard Dean called
Medicare 'one of the worst federal programs
ever?"' the narrator asks.
"Did you know he supported the
Republican plan to cut Medicare by $270 billion
dollars? And, did you know Howard Dean supported
cutting Social Security retirement benefits to
balance the budget?"
Gephardt concludes the ad by
saying "I will be a president who will fight to
protect Medicare and Social Security."
Dean is still airing a
television ad in Iowa criticizing Gephardt,
Edwards and Kerry for supporting the war.
The key to a Gephardt victory
rests with the unions and yesterday 18 unions held
a rally for him.
"Dick Gephardt has stood up for
workers for 27 years. Now we're going to stand up
for Dick Gephardt," Joe Hart, president of the
steelworkers' union said.
Teamsters President James Hoffa
called Gephardt labor's bona fide friend, one who
has steadfastly during nearly three decades in
Congress pushed to protect U.S. jobs, expand
health care and upgrade education. Hoffa has been
in Iowa for days now. He and Gephardt attended
University of Michigan Law School together.
Gephardt said on Thursday the
state is key to all of the Democratic presidential
contenders who are trying to unseat Bush. He said
regardless of the outcome, he will be campaigning
the next day in New Hampshire, which holds its
presidential primary on Jan. 27.
Meanwhile, Kerry has distributed
fliers that attack Dean and Gephardt for
advocating repeal of all of President Bush's tax
cuts, including those that benefit the middle
class. The Gephardt camp responded with an attack
on Kerry's position on the farm bill and ethanol.
Is Dean electable?
Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin is doing
the warm up as Howard Dean continues to tour Iowa.
“In my adult lifetime I have never seen anyone
energize and bring people into this party as much
as Howard Dean has done in the last year,” Harkin
says in introducing Dean. Harkin’s efforts are
full blown and could provide some tilt into a Dean
campaign that has faltered of late. However,
Dean’s organization supplemented by Harkin has got
to be a daunting picture for his opponents.
Dean’s electability continues to
be the central issue that dogs him. Dean for his
part asserts that he is the only one who
can beat Bush. The
Washington Post carries a couple of stories
that explore the question:
The
question haunting Dean, raised in various ways by
all his main rivals in recent days, is whether he
stands any chance of exerting appeal beyond core
Democrats who share his strong opposition to the
Iraq war and his liberal social views, and who
raise their fists in agreement with his biting
attacks on Bush.
The
LA Times reports on how the insider
endorsements may have cooled some of the ardor for
Dean and now he is going back to his ‘running
against Washington’ message:
But
privately, even some Dean advisors agree that his
backing from Gore and the others has blurred his
appeal to supporters — one reason that Dean this
week, in both his television advertising and stump
speeches, has recharged his attacks on "Washington
Democrats."
Edwards on fire
John Edwards is on fire in his
campaign:
“We
have five days to change this country," the North
Carolina senator told a noisy, packed ballroom at
a Des Moines hotel. "I can't do it alone but you
and I can do it together. There is so much energy
and excitement around this campaign ... it is
everywhere."
"You
give me a shot at (President) George Bush. I'm
gonna give you the White House!" Said Edwards.
Elizabeth Edwards, 54, is
campaigning in Iowa for her husband and the
NY Times does a story about this bankruptcy
lawyering and how her support is in sharp contrast
to rival candidate Howard Dean’s wife. Elizabeth
says she has a hard time with everyone saying her
husband is so young:
"Truth
is, my hair is more like yours," Mrs. Edwards said
with characteristic bluntness at a restaurant in
rural Marshalltown, Iowa, the other day. "But I
don't want to walk around and hear people say,
`Oh, look, there's
John Edwards with his mother.' "
She often participates in the
campaign's daily conference call, in which
strategy and tactics are discussed. She likes to
make sure the staff doesn’t mislead her husband:
"Sometimes when they're talking about planning a
message, some of the folks will get full of
themselves sometimes and they'll start being more
negative than John would be," she said in an
interview. "Sometimes he'll let them talk on — I
don't know why he does that — but I won't let them
talk on. I'll say, `O.K., that's all fine, but
that's not the way John thinks about it.' "
The story also covers the effect
of the loss of their son Wade, who was killed in
an automobile accident at the age of 16.
Defends the indefensible
Wesley Clark’s statements before
a Congressional hearing on Saddam Hussein have
been brought out on the Republican National
Committee
website. In his testimony concerning the fact
Hussein had chemical weapons and desire to acquire
nuclear weapons Clark urged Cocngress to take
action.
"It
needs to be dealt with and the clock is ticking on
this," Clark was quoted as telling committee
members six months before U.S. forces invaded Iraq
last March.
Clark now spins his
congressional testimony by saying, "What I was
saying then is what I'm saying today, that Saddam
Hussein was not an imminent threat ... Was he
troublesome? Sure. Was he a threat eventually?
Sure. Was a clock ticking in a two-year,
five-year, 10-year time period? Sure. Did we have
to do this? No."
Clark’s flip-flops on this
subject are beginning to come back home on him.
"I
think there are some mass destruction capabilities
that are still inside Iraq. I think there's some
weapons that have been shipped over the border to
Syria. But I don't think we're going to find that
their capabilities provided the imminent threat
that many feared in this country. So I think it's
going to be a tough search, but I think there's
stuff there." Clark said on (NBC's "Meet The
Press," 6/15/03)
Clark subsequently stated that
he talked with people inside who said that the
bombings destroyed the weapons even though in an
earlier statement he said that the bombing hadn’t
destroyed the weapons of mass destruction. These
same “inside” people are the ones he was alleged
to have talked to that he later said had destroyed
all the WMD.
There is also the bumbled aspect
of advising a candidate for Congress to support
the Iraq war resolution and his later denial that
he couldn’t have told her to support it because he
wasn’t following the resolution.
"[2002
Congressional Candidate Katrina] Swett said ...
'At that time, frankly, he spoke with great
knowledge about Iraq and the upcoming vote ... My
impression is that he knew more about it than most
of us.'" (Nedra Pickler, "Swett: Clark Knew Facts
Of Iraq Resolution," The Associated Press,
10/24/03)
Clark’s continual shifting of
positions and lack of consistency may make for an
interesting contest between him and Howard Dean if
the two eventually match up as so many think they
will.
Reuters reports that Clark is continuing to
push for Congress to investigate President Bush:
Asked
if it was "criminal" to mislead a country into
war, Clark responded: "I think that's a question
that Congress needs to ask. This Congress needs to
investigate precisely why this administration
determined to take us into a war with Saddam
Hussein that wasn't connected with the threat of
al Qaeda."
The Wall Street Journal raps
Clark in an editorial: "Mr. Clark is reinventing
himself almost daily to serve the goals of his new
political ambition."
Clark on airport security
Wesley Clark has laid out a plan
to tighten air transport security. Preceding his
announcement, Clark was introduced by Maura
Landry, a New Hampshire campaign staffer whose
fiancee perished in the attack on the World Trade
Center.
"We shouldn't have to wait for
another September 11th to take every preventative
step possible to secure America's skies," Clark
said.
Although we've made progress
since 9/11, Clark believes that America still
faces too many unnecessary risks in aviation. The
Bush Administration has made matters worse with
its plan to cut the number of federal airport
security screeners by 6,000. At the same time, the
President plans to out-source another 4,000
airport security positions.
Clark plan to strengthen air
transportation security includes:
·
Invest in more screeners and better
technology. Ending cutbacks to the federal airport
security screener program, maintaining this
security force as a federal program and improving
training programs for both screeners and screener
supervisors.
·
Require background checks for
individuals with access to sensitive areas of
airports and air operations. Require background
checks of individuals with access to commercial
airliners, sensitive areas of airports and air
operations.
·
Work to protect airplanes from
surface-to-air missiles. Fund experiments to test
methods of protecting airplanes from the danger of
surface-to-air missiles.
·
Enhance air cargo security. Expand
non-intrusive inspection systems to greatly
increase the percentage of air cargo that is
inspected before it is loaded aboard airplanes,
and set a goal of inspecting all cargo loaded
aboard commercial passenger planes.
Kucinich: airline profiling
Today Democratic presidential
candidate Dennis Kucinich released a statement
strongly opposing the Bush Administration's latest
plan to effect the in-depth profiling of airline
passengers:
"The
Bush Administration is diverting resources to
measures that appear to make us safer but actually
make our lives more difficult and violate our
privacy," said Kucinich. "The new system will
require all airline passengers to provide their
full names, home addressees, phone numbers, and
dates of birth when they book flights. The
government will feed that information into
databases and produce profiles on all passengers.
The databases will include government records,
information from commercial systems such as
Lexis-Nexis and Acxiom, and mailing lists and
other commercial information. And the databases
will be secret, and therefore no one will have any
idea why they would be given a specific security
level.
"The
Administration is turning every airline ticket
counter into a Big Brother Booth. Our freedoms and
our liberties are on the line. This Administration
is moving with breathtaking speed to demolish the
Bill of Rights and privacy protections. In a
democratic society we have a right to live free
and they're taking that right away.
"What
conceivable right does the government have to
develop these database profiles? What else will
the government do with the information? The FBI is
already collecting information on people who
attend peace demonstrations. What purposes will
all of this data be put to? Once someone is deemed
a threat to air travel, will they also be denied a
driver's license? Will they be denied admittance
to large public events?
"These
are serious questions. Big Brother is here. This
is absolutely unacceptable in a democracy. We have
to live free, or it's not America anymore. I will
work quickly to repeal the 'PATRIOT Act,' to
repeal the intelligence authorization bill that
slipped in sections of Patriot Act II, and to
rescind all practices that mine data for the
purpose of profiling.
"We are
being driven to fear each other, and it is not
helpful. There is no evidence that this new
scheme, or duct tape and plastic, or the general
color-coded terror threat warnings actually make
us safer. Rather than pouring hundreds of billions
into an illegal war that is destabilizing the
Middle East and additional resources into
assigning people color codes, we should be working
to rejoin the world community and make the world
safer through diplomacy and cooperation."
Dennis
Kucinich is the only candidate for President who
voted against the Patriot Act. He has introduced a
bill to repeal major sections of that act. He has
protested the proposals for a Patriot Act II. And
he has committed to file suit to overturn the
Patriot Act upon election as President.
NASCAR dads
A group of people wanting to
help Howard Dean are looking at spending $2.5
million to sponsor a race car. There seems to be
some questions about compliance with the Federal
Elections Commission laws, though, according to
the Washington Times:
"As
complicated as the new campaign-finance laws are,
this is a no-brainer," said a Democratic
campaign-finance lawyer. "If they're paying for
something that benefits the campaign, then it's
either an in-kind contribution or an independent
expenditure. Either way, they have to file with
the" Federal Election Commission (FEC).
Erin
Titman, spokeswoman for Team Dean Racing, said
federal election lawyers have reviewed their plans
and determined that they are free from
campaign-finance laws, are not required to
publicly list supporters and don't need to file
papers with the FEC.
Just fun
The
Des Moines Register has a story that’s just
plain fun. It covers the question of what day is
it with Carol Moseley Braun telling Comedy Central
that the Caucuses are on Tuesday -- try Monday.
It also offers this ditty about Iowa Democrat
Chairman Gordon Fischer’s observations:
Best Questioner - Adam
Nagourney of the New York Times. "He seems to be
quite insightful, and he's also just kind of a
charming guy."
Favorite Reporter - "I
really like all the local reporters because they
have a good grasp of the caucuses." (Good answer,
Gordon!)
Most Distant Interview
Request - Jakarta TV, which called from
Indonesia. "Apparently they were doing a
documentary on the caucuses."
Biggest Misconception -
That Iowa is all farms and pigs. "I think the
caucuses have really helped shape an image of a
more diverse Iowa, a more cultured Iowa, a more
urban Iowa, even a more hip Iowa than reporters
may have thought." (Nice try, Gordon!)
Second Biggest Misconception
- That the caucuses are complicated. "It's a
lot like sixth-grade gym," he said. "You just
divide up into different groups and go to your
corner."
Elections now
Iraq's most revered Shi'ite
cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has refused to
support the U.S. plan for regional caucuses to
select a transitional assembly which will pick an
interim government to take sovereignty by the end
of June.
Paul Bremer continues to meet
with President Bush in Washington trying to work
through the Shi’ite Muslims objections to
caucusing first in setting up a new controlling
government for Iraq.
If (Sistani) issues a fatwa
(edict) all the Iraqi people will go out in
protest marches and demonstrations against the
coalition forces," Ayatollah Mohammad Baqer al-Mohri
said.
Bush in Atlanta
President Bush proclaimed Martin
Luther King’s Holiday today stating, “all
Americans benefit from Dr. King's work and his
legacy of courage, dignity, and moral clarity."
However, while joining King’s family laying a
wreath on King’s graveside, protesters booed the
President and protested his visit.
Bush received a warmer welcome
from Georgia’s Democrat Senator Zell Miller, who
has publically supported Bush’s re-election. Bush
also raised $1.3 million in Georgia and $1 million
in New Orleans in his two-state swing for his
reelection efforts.
President Bush announced new
rules while in Georgia that help "faith-based"
charities compete for $3.7 billion in Justice
Department funding.
State of the Union
President Bush will try to
revive a proposal that would allow younger workers
to invest a portion of their Social Security taxes
in the stock market, aides say; make
already-enacted tax cuts permanent, such as the
elimination of inheritances taxes and reductions
in capital gains taxes; push for a new kind of
tax-preferred savings accounts that could be used
for retirement, college, health care or other
purposes.
Vote for Hillary
Bob Kunst, a Florida supporter
of the Draft Hillary movement, said 110 ads were
bought in the Des Moines media market and are
aimed at moving undecided voters. The group is
running TV ads in New Hampshire as well. Clinton
has said she does not intend to seek the
nomination in 2004.
Health care
Hillary Clinton has sent out an
email regarding her efforts concerning health
care.
Hillary
is speaking out on health care: "Americans need a
new, modern, 21st-century health care system.
Information in the hands of the right people at
the right time will improve quality and reduce
costs." CLICK HERE TO READ MORE:
http://activate.friendsofhillary.com/t?ctl=50ED57:1F0AD46
!
Health
care is an issue that has long been important to
Hillary, as it is to so many of us. Her new plan
will use the advances of information technology to
improve the quality of our health care system, and
improve the care each American receives. Hillary
envisions a system in which we can use technology
to lower costs for patients. Her proposal promotes
a system that enables doctors to access the latest
research, and provides patients with the resources
they need to make informed decisions about their
own healthcare. At the same time, her legislation
safeguards patient privacy.
While
the United States has the most advanced medical
system in human history, we know we can do better.
Our current health care system is fragmented,
inefficient, and bureaucratic. Health spending is
skyrocketing; but too much money is being spent on
bureaucracy and not on improving patient care.
Administrative costs alone consume up to 25 cents
out of every health care dollar. By using
information more wisely and effectively, Senator
Clinton believes we can lower the costs of health
care and improve access to quality health care.
Hillary
will be working hard to move this legislation
forward in the United States Senate. She knows
that by promoting quality in the health care
system, we will be able to lower health care costs
for all Americans.
E.U. calls for trade sanctions
The European Union is increasing
tensions with the United States by calling for
trade sanctions against America just as Washington
begins efforts to revive global commerce talks.
The Trade Ambassador recently called on Europe to
give up agricultural subsidies in order to move
global trade talks. The U. S. is expected to
protest the trade sanctions and that will delay
the imposing of what could be $4.0 billion in
duties to a variety of U. S. exports by the E.U.
Democrats behind in fund-raising
The
Associated press reports the Democrat National
Committee is not doing well compared to the
Republicans in fundraising:
With
$33.1 million in the bank and more to come, the
RNC is laying plans to spend in races up and down
the ticket as the Democratic National Committee
works to complete its first task: raising $16
million to help promote its presidential nominee.
The
parties' finances as the year began offer a
striking look at the effect broad new fund-raising
restrictions are having. The DNC started with $10
million in the bank, one-third as much as the RNC.
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