Entries for October 2009

Pollster John Zogby updates our weekly Obama Report Card with a grade on the president's performance. Zogby uses his polling, expert analysis, and interaction with major players to come up with a grade and some comments that capture how he sees the president's week ending.

John Zogby on Week 41:

By Anna Mulrine, Washington Whispers

Top scientists working for the Pentagon say that they are close to creating "chemical robots." Yes, bloblike creations that can morph back and forth from solid to liquidlike forms and squeeze under doors and through keyholes, much like the Sandman of Spider-Man fame or the villain of Terminator 2. The point: to help troops in the field who "might want to go through a space or a hole but can't because it's too dangerous or small," says Mitchell Zakin, the program manager for the programmable matter division at the pioneering Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. "The way you do that, you have some sort of object that will squeeze through a door or drop through a drain or vent hole." This "blobby" robot of sorts "sounds futuristic." But, Zakin adds, "it's mind-boggling the progress being made on this."

By Anna Mulrine, Washington Whispers

Terrorist mastermind Osama Bin Laden was the shy child of a divorcée, and his favorite food is zucchini stuffed with marrow. That's according to Najwa Bin Laden, Osama's wife and first cousin. She tells the story of their courtship in her new tome, Growing Up bin Laden, written with her son Omar bin Laden and author Jean Sasson; the subtitle promises that "Osama's Wife and Son Take Us Inside Their Secret World." Najwa shares that at the age of 15, she was impatient for Osama to propose. No chatterbox, his "silence soon grew annoying," she confesses. She tells about a trip she took with Osama to the United States in 1979, visiting Indiana. "I came to believe that Americans were gentle and nice, people easy to deal with," she writes. "As far as the country itself goes, my husband and I did not hate America, yet we did not love it."

By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

The head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, while acknowledging the challenging political climate in advance of the 2010 midterm elections, declared today that the Democrats won't lose control of the chamber like they did in 1994. "This will not be another 1994," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat. While he has 49 members on a special watch list, he said that the upcoming election and the 1994 shocker have three "significant differences."

First, he said, unlike in 1994, there are not a lot of Democrats retiring from the House, opening their seats to a new member. Second, he said, the Democrats "have stayed on offense" in this election period. And third, he said that the "Republican brand is at an all-time low," doing even worse in polls than when George W. Bush was president.

Still, Van Hollen said, the 2010 is "going to be a tough, very competitive election." He suggested that if any of his members were sleeping on the job, they aren't after the summer's town hall meetings, some of which turned ugly as opponents of healthcare and government bailouts vented. "The spectacle of these town hall meetings was a wake-up call," he said. He added that the grass-roots base has rallied as a result, donating record amounts in small-dollar checks.

By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

You knew it would be long, but 1,990 pages? That's how big the House Democratic leadership healthcare reform bill is that Speaker Nancy Pelosi unveiled today. So how does that size up to other major works? Well, some critics have begun sending around lists to giggle at, including this:

By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

Jefferson Airplane singer Grace Slick is pushing Congress to adopt a bill that would stop invasive experiments on chimpanzees and free the mammals from small testing cages. "I will do whatever I can," she told Whispers from her California home. "I want the whole idea of testing banned. Use a petri dish if you want to test an animal," she says. Slick is part of a broad effort, led by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, to limit or end drug testing on animals. The activists are backing H.R. 1326, which would end the testing, release federally owned chimps to permanent sanctuaries, and end federal funding for breeding federally owned chimpanzees.

By Anna Mulrine, Washington Whispers

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has a plan to end the practice of stop loss, in which soldiers are kept in the military past their contracted service dates. But Pentagon officials say it looks as though the plan will not be put in place before 2011. In the meantime, the Pentagon announced this week that it will give $500 to each service member for each month he or she served past the contracted end date. Those eligible have one year to send in their paperwork.

By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

Nothing gets a cattle-state senator riled up more than elites promoting vegetarianism in the name of public policy. So you can imagine what South Dakota GOP Sen. John Thune thought when Britain's Lord Stern, a leading authority on global warming, called on the world to give up meat to save the planet.

"With falling beef prices, higher costs of production, and onerous cap-and-trade legislation looming, the last thing ranchers and employees of America's meat industry need right now is elitist lecturing and misinformation from Lord Stern—a reported meat eater," Thune told Washington Whispers.

By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

Like a lot of busy Washingtonians, Republican Sen. Dick Lugar of Indiana likes to get out on Saturdays for a little exercise. His choice: some quiet speed-walking around a McLean, Va., high school track. But last weekend's solitude was broken when a gang of triathletes and their wives showed up for their second annual Running of the Bull, where they run four laps while drinking beer and eating a spicy Oscar Mayer hot dog.

Lugar, in his red running shorts and a T-shirt, appeared game, asking one of the organizers, Bethesda lawyer Lou Aronson, what was up. "He said, 'What are you guys doing?' " said Aronson, the winner of the four-lap race at 8:38. Aronson said that when told of the ceremonial race to end a season of summer races and marathons, Lugar smiled and said, "Wow, that's crazy. If I'm in the way, I'll get out of the way."

By Kenneth T. Walsh, Washington Whispers

The White House's battle with Fox News is only part of a new pattern of hitting back harder than ever at President Obama's adversaries in an effort to isolate the Republican Party and its allies. White House Communications Director Anita Dunn started the Fox fuss when she said: "We're going to treat them the way we would treat an opponent. As they are undertaking a war against Barack Obama and the White House, we don't need to pretend that this is the way that legitimate news organizations behave." What happened: The president and his aides finally got fed up with Fox news coverage and with three Fox commentators, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, and Bill O'Reilly. Obama's acolytes are now also attacking the health-insurance industry more aggressively, with a White House official telling Whispers that the industry has been spreading "highly misleading" information. Obama officials say they are reviewing whether to rescind the insurance industry's long-standing exemption from federal antitrust laws.

By Paul Bedard, Washington Whispers

Talk about timing. With former GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin readying the release of her own 432-page campaign tell-all, Going Rogue: An American Life, now would be the perfect time to pop out another Palin book, and that's exactly what Weekly Standard's Matthew Continetti has done with The Persecution of Sarah Palin.

With his 226-page defense of Palin and slap-down of the media coverage she has faced since being selected by Sen. John McCain as his 2008 veep, Continetti is likely to ride the next wave of Palin frenzy that will accompany her book release set for November 17. If you like Palin, it's a good read. If you don't, well, check it to see what the other side thinks of the potential 2012 presidential candidate. We won't review it here because Whispers just received the book earlier today. But here are some highlights: