Political Bulletin

WASHINGTON NEWS

Insurgents Adapt To Iraq Security Push

Coverage of yesterday's attack on a US outpost outside Baghdad, reportedly carried our by an al Qaeda-linked group, is being portrayed as an ominous sign for President Bush's new Iraq strategy. The story was given major play on TV (all three networks led with the story), and is splashed across the front pages of today's major newspapers. ABC World News reported that "part of the President's new plan in Baghdad is to place US forces in a number of outposts in and around the city. One of those outposts, heavily-fortified, occupied by about 100 American troops, came under attack today. Two Americans were killed, 17 wounded. The attack raises new concerns. If the additional US troops now in the city restrict insurgents, will they start attacking outside the city? And it raises the question about whether smaller outposts put America's troops in greater danger." ABC later added that "overall, six US troops died in Iraq" on Monday, "bringing this month's US death toll to 59." The CBS Evening News attributed the attack to "Sunni insurgents," making no mention of the al Qaeda connection, and said they "are responding to the US and Iraqi sweep of Baghdad with some new tactics of their own. They made a direct in-your-face attack." And NBC Nightly News called the attack "devastating," adding "what we saw today is that the enemy is trying to probe the weaknesses and look for weaknesses in the new battle plan and it looks like they found at least one. ... It is very much a new war."

USA Today reports "the number of extremist attacks in Baghdad has declined over the past two weeks since a new security plan took hold, although the relative lull may be short-lived, the US military said Monday. Bombings on Monday that killed more than 40 Iraqis demonstrated that extremists were still staging attacks aimed at grabbing headlines." The Christian Science Monitor assesses the effects of the security push and concludes it's meeting with "mixed results," and the New York Times says "hundreds of Iraqis have died in a recent wave of car bombings in Baghdad and elsewhere." Insurgents "have been able to shoot down more helicopters through coordinated assaults, captured documents suggest, and American and Iraqi military officials say they are concerned that militants are moving to areas where the American troop presence remains thin." Likewise, the Washington Post sees "a shift toward more aggressive tactics" on the part of the enemy, and the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune run similar reports.

The violence continued this morning. The AP reports "car bombs killed at least 11 people in Baghdad on Tuesday as militants show increasing defiance to a major security operation in the capital. ... More than 100 people have been killed in the Baghdad area since Sunday, when twin blasts in a market claimed 62 lives."

Democrats Make Plans To Force Bush's Hand CNN's Situation Room reported yesterday that "Democratic sources say the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services chairmen are now writing a resolution reauthorizing the war, but limiting US troops in Iraq to a support, not a combat role." E.J. Dionne, in his Washington Post column, says "the war's opponents are focused on three strategies. One would be to cut off funds for the war, but there is currently no majority in either house for this. A second approach, expected to come from Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), would propose restrictions on troop deployments -- for example, forbidding the redeployment of units that have been home for less than a year and imposing substantial training requirements on the troops who are sent. ... A third path, offered by Sens. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.)," would have Congress "revisit its original 2002 Iraq resolution to make clear that the war authorized then (against Saddam Hussein and what turned out to be nonexistent weapons of mass destruction) had nothing to do with putting American troops in the midst of a Muslim civil war now." Rep. Chris Van Hollen "has an additional idea: Opponents of the war need to force full consideration of the original Baker-Hamilton proposals."

Bush Compares His Plight To Washington's

USA Today reports President Bush yesterday "honored the 275th birthday of the nation's first president Monday, likening George Washington's long struggle that gave birth to a nation to the war on global terrorism." The AP notes Bush said, "As we work to advance the cause of freedom around the world, we remember that the father of our country believed that the freedoms we secured in our revolution were not meant for Americans alone. ... Over the centuries, America has succeeded because we have always tried to maintain the decency and the honor of our first president." Likewise, the Los Angeles Times reports Bush "linked the ideals of the first president to the war being fought by the 43rd, saying Washington's goals guided the nation's quest to extend freedom beyond its borders." The Washington Post and Washington Times run similar stories.

But the New York Times reports Bush "implicitly compared himself to his predecessor. 'With the advantage of hindsight, it is easy to take George Washington's successes for granted,' Mr. Bush said after enumerating Washington's achievements as commander of the Continental Army and later as president. But 'America's path to freedom was long and it was hard,' he continued, 'and the outcome was never really certain.'" McClatchy also says Bush "drew comparisons between America's first wartime president and the current one. He likened Washington's struggles in fighting for and forging democracy to his global war on terrorism."

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Cheney's Influence Said To Be Declining

The Washington Post reports, "Mistrustful of North Korea and its willingness to keep promises, Vice President Cheney worked hard in President Bush's first term to prevent talks aimed at halting that country's push to develop a nuclear bomb." Now, "many of the vice president's conservative allies consider" the State Department's nuclear agreement with North Korea earlier this month "foolhardy and" some "of his own staff are said to find" it "hard to swallow." While "there is no evidence that Cheney's close relationship with Bush has been lessened," there is "also little doubt that the causes he has championed...are being rethought within the Bush administration, according to officials inside the government and experts outside it."

Meanwhile, under the headline "Trial Spotlights Cheney's Power as an Infighter," the New York Times reports "a close reading of the testimony and evidence" presented in the trial of Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, Scooter Libby, reveals "a portrait of a vice president with free rein to operate inside the White House as he saw fit in order to debunk the charges of a critic of the war in Iraq." The evidence "shows Vice President Dick Cheney and Mr. Libby...countermanding and even occasionally misleading colleagues at the highest levels of Mr. Bush's inner circle as the two pursued their own goal of clearing the vice president's name in connection with flawed intelligence used in the case for war."

Cheney "Snubbing" Japanese Iraq Critic? Philip J. Cunningham, professor at Doshisha University in Kyoto, writes in a Los Angeles Times op-ed that during his upcoming visit to Japan, Vice President Cheney "will snub the defense chief," Minister Fumio Kyuma, who suggested the Iraq war was a mistake, "the very person he would be expected to talk to in a visit focusing on defense and security issues. The message seems to be: Friends don't criticize friends."

Grassley May Block Minimum Wage Bill.

Roll Call reports that in a "role reversal, Senate Finance ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) has warned that he may block a House-Senate conference on the minimum-wage bill unless he is assured his Democratic colleagues will join him in demanding inclusion of a sizable tax-cut package."

Army Hospital To Repair Patient Housing

On its front page, the Washington Post reports Walter Reed Army Medical Center "began repairs yesterday on Building 18, a former hotel that is used to house outpatients recuperating from injuries suffered in Iraq and Afghanistan and that has been plagued with mold, leaky plumbing and a broken elevator." Facility commander Maj. Gen. George W. Weightman "said Army staff members inspected each of the 54 rooms at the building and discovered that outstanding repair orders for half the rooms had not been completed."

Aid Director Had Alleged Conflict The Washington Post reports that for the "past three years, Michael J. Wagner directed the Army's largest effort to help the most vulnerable soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center." Wagner was responsible for matching "big-hearted donors with thousands of wounded soldiers who could not afford to feed their children, pay mortgages, buy plane tickets or put up visiting families in nearby hotels." But while "he was being paid to provide this vital service to patients, outpatients and their relations, Wagner was also seeking funders and soliciting donations for his own new charity, based in Texas, according to documents and interviews with current and former staff members." The medical center has "launched a criminal investigation" of Wagner's activities.

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CAMPAIGN NEWS

Rudy Routing McCain

The latest CBS News poll asked GOP primary voters, if they had to select between Rudy Giuliani and John McCain, who would they pick? The answer was fairly unequivocal 50% said they would pick Giuliani, while only 29% picked McCain. More importantly for Giuliani, he is preferred by both moderate and conservative GOP primary voters. Giuliani leads McCain 48%-21% among conservatives and 55%-37% among moderates.

McCain Blames Rumsfeld

Sen. John McCain, who has come under fire for ongoing support of the Iraq war, is looking to place blame for the situation there. The AP reports that McCain, campaigning in South Carolina yesterday, hit former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld hard, saying, "We are paying a very heavy price for the mismanagement - that's the kindest word I can give you - of Donald Rumsfeld, of this war. The price is very, very heavy and I regret it enormously." Fox News' Special Report also says McCain had some harsh words for the attempt by the Democratic leadership in the Senate to pass a non-binding resolution opposing President Bush's "surge" strategy over the weekend, saying, "It was a charade and a joke and a publicity stunt on the part of the Democrats in the Senate, because they wanted to embarrass the President of the United States, my friends."

Clinton, Obama Battle For South Carolina's Black Vote

Both Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were in South Carolina over the weekend, where they courted the state's large pool of black voters. The Washington Post reports that a series of Clinton appearances "was aimed at projecting her as the candidate best equipped to deal with the hopes and hardships of black voters. She called on state leaders to remove the Confederate flag from the grounds of the State House here, as have several other Democratic candidates." The New York Times reports that Clinton "told an audience of black voters on Monday that they would be 'breaking barriers' if they supported her for president in 2008 - deliberately signaling that they could still take pride in making history if they chose a woman over one of their own, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois." It was "a delicately worded pitch - Mrs. Clinton did not mention Mr. Obama by name - and it drew applause." The Times adds Obama "said Saturday that history was full of examples of people telling blacks, 'We can't.' He then said that, with black support, he could say to voters, 'Yes, we can.'" The Times adds Mrs. Clinton "also appeared at a tribute Monday in Charleston for the state's most powerful black Democrat, Representative James E. Clyburn, majority whip of the United States House, who also met with Mr. Obama over the weekend."

Dodd Backed By Few Democrats In Home State

A new poll from Quinnipiac University shows that few of the voters that know Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd (D) the best want him to be president. Among Connecticut voters, Dodd places fourth in the Democratic primary, with 8% -- trailing Sen. Hillary Clinton, 33%, Sen. Barack Obama, 21%, and Al Gore, 9%. On the GOP side, Rudy Giuliani leads with 43%, followed by Sen. John McCain, 27%, and Newt Gingrich, 5%. In general election trial heats, Clinton is the strongest Democratic candidate, and leads McCain, 48%-40%, and Giuliani, 46%-44%.

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POLITICAL HUMOR

The Latest From Late Night Comedians

Jay Leno: "Today is the day...we honor presidents ranging from George Washington, who couldn't tell a lie, to George Bush, who couldn't tell the truth, to Bill Clinton, who couldn't tell the difference."

Conan O'Brien: "Of course, politics in the air. The latest political rumor -- this is the latest political rumor, is that if Hillary Clinton wins the presidency, she will be replaced in the Senate by her husband Bill Clinton. Yeah. Yeah, that's true. That's what they're saying. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, when asked about it, Bill Clinton said, 'I dream of replacing Hillary every day.'"

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