Friday, July 6, 2007

WASHINGTON NEWS

Domenici Breaks With Bush On Iraq

Sen. Peter Domenici, a New Mexico Republican who is up for reelection next year, broke with President Bush on the Iraq war. Domenici's move is being treated as a significant development, indicative of Bush's increasingly weak position within his own party. The Washington Post says Domenici is a "party loyalist and former staunch war supporter," and thus "one of the most significant GOP losses to date." The timing of Domenici's announcement is interesting. As the Wall Street Journal reports, "a showdown is likely" in coming weeks "over a Democratic amendment to the main Defense Department spending bill demanding that US troops begin leaving Iraq within 120 days." The New York Times notes that is "an idea Mr. Bush has already vetoed," and in fact Domenici "made it clear Thursday that he did not support such measures either, saying, 'I'm not calling for an immediate withdrawal from Iraq or a reduction in funding for our troops, but I am calling for a new strategy that will move our troops out of combat operations and on the path to continuing home.'" Instead, USA Today reports, Domenici "supports a bipartisan bill that embraces findings of the Iraq Study Group, which said combat troops could be out by March 2008 if certain steps were taken."

The AP notes Domenici "said he has not talked to the administration about wanting a strategy shift," and the Los Angeles Times reports the senator's comments "drew a measured response from the White House, which has been trying to maintain Republican support for the president's 6-month-old strategy of using additional American forces, primarily in Baghdad, to control sectarian violence." ABC World News said the White House is worried over Domenici's defection, but "officials are taking some comfort by the fact that he said he wasn't ready to cut off funding, wasn't ready to call for a complete withdrawal of troops."

Doolittle Calls Iraq A "Quagmire" Domenici wasn't the only Republican to abandon Bush yesterday. The Sacramento Bee reports, "Rep. John Doolittle, questioning whether the Iraq war is worth the continued loss of American lives, said Thursday that US troops should be pulled back from the front lines 'as soon as possible'" and "the fighting should be turned over to Iraqi forces." The "criticism came from an archconservative Republican who had campaigned with Bush and long repeated the president's refrain that Iraq is a central front in the war on terror."

White House, Clintons Spar Over Pardons

After former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Clinton expressed indignation over President Bush's commutation of "Scooter" Libby's jail term, the White House on Thursday made light of the situation, recalling Clinton's controversial pardons on his last day in office. The AP reports White House spokesman Tony Snow said, "I don't know what Arkansan is for chutzpah, but this is a gigantic case of it." The Washington Post notes Clinton "pardoned 140 people in the final day of his presidency, stirring a controversy that continues to reverberate. His actions provoked a Republican-led investigation that focused on political donations and ties between pardon recipients and Sen. Clinton's brothers." The Washington Times reports one recipient of a Clinton pardon, fugitive financier Marc Rich, "fled to Switzerland in 1983 and his socialite wife, Denise became a large donor to the Democratic Party and the Clinton library during Mr. Clinton's time in office."

The Los Angeles Times, under the headline "Depends On Meaning Of 'Unpardonable,'" and The Politico also report the story. The Politico focuses on whether there's a term for chutzpah in Arkansas. "I'm not familiar with chutzpah or whatever you're saying," said an officer at the Arkansas House of Representatives, who "declined to give his name because he was unfamiliar with the terminology used. 'That's foreign to me.'"

The Libby matter with the added twist of the Clinton pardons continued to generate commentary in major newspapers' opinion pages. The Los Angeles Times editorializes that Sen. Clinton "happens to be right. A defining feature of this administration has been its arrogant refusal to submit to the most basic public inquiry, a hubris that extends to its rejection of the rule of law." But "Clinton is a particularly poor spokeswoman for that idea, as her husband displayed the same cavalier regard for equal justice under the law." E.J. Dionne writes in the Washington Post, "We spent months talking about Clinton's pardon of the fugitive financier Marc Rich. This commutation is an even greater outrage because it involves the administration taking steps to slip accountability for its own actions." Eugene Robinson writes, also in the Washington Post, "The reason Bush gives -- that he accepts the verdict against Libby but thinks the sentence was excessive -- makes no sense either. The remedy in that case would be to wait until Libby served a non-excessive amount of time in prison and then commute the sentence." And Paul Krugman says in the New York Times that "obstruction of justice when it gets too close to home is a family tradition. And being a loyal Bushie means never having to say you're sorry."

Hearings To Include Clinton Pardons The AP reports House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers "has scheduled hearings Wednesday on Bush's commutation of Libby's 2 1/2-year sentence." Conyers "said the hearings would include pardons made by Clinton, former President Bush and possibly other past presidents."

Wexler To Introduce Censure Resolution ABC World News, meanwhile, reported, "Democratic Congressman Robert Wexler of Florida says he'll introduce a resolution censuring the President for commuting Libby's sentence."

Libby Pays Fine The New York Times focuses its report on Libby paying "the $250,000 fine for his conviction on perjury and obstruction of justice charges in the Central Intelligence Agency leak case, according to court papers made public Thursday." The payment, "of $250,400, which included a 'special assessment' of costs, was paid by a cashier's check dated July 2."

300 Investigations In 100 Days

The AP reports the White House "on Thursday pushed back against congressional investigations of the Bush administration and said lawmakers should spend more time passing bills to solve domestic problems." Spokesman Scott Stanzel "said Thursday the White House has received...many requests for information since Democrats took control of Congress in January and has turned over 200,000 pages of documents. 'They've launched over 300 investigations, had over 350 requests for documents and interviews and they have had over 600 oversight hearings in just about 100 days,' Stanzel said."

Disapproval Ratings Worry Democrats The Wall Street Journal reports Speaker Nancy Pelosi "presses fellow Democrats to spend vacation days shaping climate for 2008 re-election campaigns, cautioning, 'We must create a drumbeat of accomplishments this summer.' Democrats privately fret over paltry congressional-approval rates, but divide on whether to seek bipartisan deals or draw sharper contrasts with Republicans."

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CAMPAIGN NEWS

McCain Camp Cutting Staff In Key States

John McCain's well-documented campaign cash woes are forcing significant staff cuts in key early states. The Des Moines Register reports that McCain's "staff has been pared to a skeleton crew in Iowa in light of the financial difficulty the Arizona senator's campaign reported this week. At least 10 McCain staffers working directly on the campaign for the leadoff nominating caucuses have been laid off or have turned down the chance to keep their jobs at lower pay, Republican sources in Iowa confirmed Thursday. The changes leave in place seven McCain aides in Iowa."

The Miami Herald reports a "cash crunch has forced Republican John McCain to gut his presidential campaign in Florida, an early sign that only a few, extremely flush contenders will be able to compete in a state hosting one of the nation's first primaries." The Herald adds, "A Miami consulting firm, the campaign's state coordinator, and the assistant to the finance director are off the Florida payroll, leaving only McCain's finance director. A political director for Florida and other southeastern states has moved to South Carolina full time."

The AP reports McCain's "former South Carolina director, Trey Walker, is now a strategy consultant -- a role the campaign calls an 'enhanced position' despite a drastic pay cut. Richard Quinn remains a state strategist, though unpaid." Both moves "were voluntary, and the two remain critical to McCain's operation in South Carolina, the campaign said in a statement."

It is not just state operations that are being cut. The Wall Street Journal reports, "With the campaign's cash dwindling, former Congressional Budget Office director Holtz-Eakin will advise McCain on economic policy without pay. But e-campaign chief Christian Ferry departs to job hunt."

Obama Talks Up Merit Pay To NEA

Barack Obama's appeal seemed to transcend the issues yesterday when he addressed the National Education Association's annual convention in Philadelphia. The AP reports Obama "told the largest teachers union Thursday that performance-based merit pay ought to be considered in public schools." Teachers at the NEA annual convention "have expressed concerns about merit pay, which is gaining favor with lawmakers, including those currently rewriting the No Child Left Behind law. ... Obama said teachers' salaries should be increased across the board, but he also said there should be fair ways of measuring teacher performance and compensating teachers accordingly."

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports, "Fifteen minutes before" Obama "was scheduled to speak yesterday, teachers in the audience were crawling across the floor, trying to get closer to the lectern for a better camera angle. When the Democratic presidential candidate finally took the stage, cheers from the delegates to the National Education Association were deafening, and nobody booed or hissed when, near the end of a 40-minute appearance, Obama endorsed the idea of merit pay for teachers." A "First Read" report on the website of MSNBC says Obama "risked a strong reception and broke from the other Democratic presidential candidates by calling for merit-based pay -- an issue unions are typically against. But Obama did not receive any audible boos, and he actually received some applause because of the way he framed his stance."

Gephardt Backs Clinton

Former House Democratic Leader and two-time presidential candidate Dick Gephardt of Missouri yesterday endorsed Sen. Hillary Clinton for president. The AP reports that Gephardt said, "Hillary Clinton is the champion working families deserve in the White House ... She's got the strength and experience to deliver the kind of change America wants." The Kansas City Star says the endorsement "might help Clinton a bit in Iowa, where Gephardt was popular (at least in 1988, when he won the caucuses). She trails John Edwards there in the polls."

In a "Pure Horserace" column on the website of CBS News, Vaughn Ververs writes that Clinton "continues to nab endorsements from some of her party's biggest names. ... While endorsements are of questionable value in winning votes, Clinton has compiled an impressive list of big-name backers at the national, state and local levels. Gephardt, who twice sought the Democratic presidential nomination, could give Clinton a boost within Iowa's important labor unions, where he has longtime ties. Then again, after his fourth-place finish in the 2004 caucuses, the campaign probably shouldn't be banking on much outside of adding one more name to the hefty list of public backers."

Implications For Free Trade? The Hill reports that Gephardt says he will be an "economic adviser" to the Clinton campaign. While none of the larger papers make much of this fact, the New York Sun says the moves signals "the collapse of support for free trade in the Democratic Party," because Clinton's campaign "has signed up as an economic adviser a former House leader who staunchly opposed major trade deals." The decision "is a blunt repudiation of her husband's strategy from 1992, when he won the White House in part by distancing himself from unions and protectionist elements in the Democratic base."

Edwards Camp Brings In New Blood

While most of the fallout from poor 2nd quarter fundraising has fallen on John McCain, the word is out today that John Edwards, who brought in $9 million, is re-shuffling his staff in response. The AP reports Edwards, in response to "disappointing" fundraising numbers, "is reshuffling the ranks of his top staff, adding two prominent Democratic operatives as senior advisers and shifting some responsibilities from campaign manager David Bonior. Paul Blank and Chris Kofinis, leaders of the labor-backed anti-Wal-Mart effort 'Wake Up Wal-Mart,' were expected to join the Edwards campaign as early as next week. Blank would take over day-to-day campaign operations, while Kofinis would serve as communications director." The deal was expected to be finalized in the next few days. Bonior "would retain the title of campaign manager but step up his role as public spokesman for the campaign. He's also expected to travel extensively with Edwards."

Marc Ambinder, in his blog at the Atlantic Online, writes, "An Edwards adviser said the additions in no way amount to a staff shake-up, instead characterizing the new campaign structure as evidence of a growing campaign. Other Democrats close to the campaign said that Bonior better serves the campaign as a strategist, rather than a day-to-day supervisor."

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