The Wall Street Journal reports that on the "first full day after Hillary Clinton signaled their rivalry was over," Barack Obama campaigned in southwestern Virginia, "wasting no time reaching out to the sort of rural and small-town white voters who shunned him in the Democratic primary -- and who he will need in November." ABC World News reported Obama's appearance "is a signal he plans to contest this state in the fall." As both candidates "emphasize their appeal to independents, the electoral map is expected to change. Not just traditional battlegrounds like Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and Florida but also newcomers, including Colorado and Virginia." The Washington Post reports in a front page story that Obama choice of Virginia to kick off the general election campaign was "sending a clear signal to voters and Republicans that he plans to compete hard in a state that past Democratic presidential candidates largely ignored."
NBC Nightly News adds that Obama was simultaneously "reaching out to disappointed Clinton supporters" who dominate the region's electorate, while USA Today reports in a front page story that Obama is "targeting the voters he had the hardest time winning in the primaries: those who are white and working class." Obama "told USA TODAY Thursday that his appearance here in a small town on the Virginia-Tennessee border represented the first stop in a 2½-week tour about economic issues."
The Washington Post reports Obama also swung through northern Virginia, where he "drew more than 10,000 people to a late afternoon rally at Nissan Pavilion," where he was joined by Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine (D) and Sen. Jim Webb (D).
John McCain campaigned in Florida on Thursday, where he was seen as implementing a strategy to win over core supporters of Hillary Clinton's unsuccessful Democratic campaign. The Washington Post reports McCain "envisions a November victory built in part around attracting a large number of the millions of voters who turned away from Sen. Barack Obama's promise of change during the historic Democratic primary campaign." Buoyed by polls "showing a quarter or more" of Clinton's supporters "planning to back McCain, his advisers have already started wooing the white working-class voters and women who made up the bedrock of her coalition." On ABC World News, McCain was asked what is "the biggest obstacle that you face to getting elected," and he replied, "I think energizing Independents and the Reagan Democrats, both old and new, to have a look and see if they can understand that I'm the best qualified to serve. I think that we're going to be in the kind of a presidential campaign where the Independents, Reagan Democrats would be the reason I win."
Fox News Channel's Special Report reported that McCain also "praised" Clinton and Obama "at a convention of print reporters in the battleground state of Florida, then began the process of overtly courting Clinton's soon to be former supporters." McCain "wants to inspire women and others who backed Clinton to flip to him. He has launched a new Web page as part of his overall cyber campaign, specifically designed to court two of Clinton's most loyal constituencies, white women and white blue collar workers, specifically so-called Reagan Democrats."
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The Los Angeles Times reports Barack Obama met last night with Hillary Clinton at the home of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D) in Washington, DC. An aide to Obama "confirmed the tete-a-tete, the first between the two senators since he clinched the Democratic nomination Tuesday after a 16-month campaign." The Washington Post adds, "Campaign aides would not comment on the meeting, but on the eve of Clinton's expected departure from the race it was seen as a reconciliation gesture to the senator from New York and her millions of disappointed supporters."
Hand in hand with the meeting, Clinton yesterday distanced herself from efforts to press Obama to select her as his running mate. ABC World News reported Clinton's "spokesman said she's not seeking the vice presidency, and that she wishes that some of her supporters would stop talking so much about this. That choice, said the spokesman, is Obama's, and his alone." McClatchy reports Clinton "said Thursday that she's not actively seeking to be" Obama's running mate "and suggested that people who are pushing her for vice president are acting on their own." Fox News Channel's Special Report reported the move was "the first step in what many Democrats see as a path of redemption Clinton must walk to unify the party and heal the wounds inflicted by her failure to acknowledge Obama's historic nomination victory on Tuesday, an admission even Clinton loyalist say has taken a toll."
Barack Obama began restructuring the Democratic National Committee, a recognition of his new status as the party's presumptive nominee. McClatchy reports Obama said the DNC "will stop accepting campaign contributions from lobbyists and political action committees, just as Obama's campaign has done." While DNC chair Howard Dean will remain the official head of the DNC, the Los Angeles Times reports Obama "continued to fasten his grip on the Democratic Party and its political machinery, dispatching a top aide to Washington to help run the national committee."
USA Today reports Obama "told a town-hall-style meeting Thursday in Bristol, Va., that the fundraising changes will help keep him and Democrats free of special-interest influence. 'We are going to change how Washington works,' he said." USA adds, "The Democrats' move is largely symbolic, since lobbyists are not a major source of contributions, said Sheila Krumholz of the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics."
USA Today reports on its front page that John McCain "said he won't try to 'separate' himself from a weakened President Bush or his unpopular handling" of the war in Iraq. In an interview, McCain "also made it clear that he would emphasize his steadiness and experience - particularly on national security issues - to counter the vibrancy and oratory skills that have made Obama a sensation on the campaign trail." Asked on ABC World News "how large an obstacle is the incumbent president," McCain said, "I hear that over and over from the Democrats, and from Senator Obama, and I understand that political tactic. I don't think it's going to work. I think Americans know me. They didn't just get to know me yesterday."
Sen. John McCain's campaign long struggled financially, particularly in 2007 when financial problems came close to crippling his effort. However, things appear to be changing, as the New York Times reports McCain's campaign brought in $21.5 million in May, "its best fund-raising month yet," in "a sign that its effort to draw donations in tandem with the Republican National Committee is yielding dividends." The "two organizations raised a combined $45 million last month, campaign officials said Thursday. That left the campaign with $31.5 million in the bank at month's end and the Republican National Committee with $53.6 million, much of which can be used to help Mr. McCain."
In a story headlined "BIG MAC RACKS UP $22M MAY," the New York Post notes that McCain "is slated to attend a high-roller bash at the '21' Club on Tuesday night. Event organizers include hedge-fund honcho and former Rudy Giuliani supporter Paul Singer, Merrill Lynch CEO John Thain, JPMorgan executive James Lee, and investment titans Henry Kravis and Ted Forstmann."
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In the aftermath of the release of a Senate panel on pre-war intelligence, media reports are taking a markedly critical view of the Administration's case for invading Iraq. The New York Times says on its front page that the report "concluded" that President Bush "and his aides built the public case for war against Iraq by exaggerating available intelligence and by ignoring disagreements among spy agencies about Iraq's weapons programs and Saddam Hussein's links to Al Qaeda." The report accuses Bush, Vice President Cheney "and other top officials of repeatedly overstating the Iraqi threat in the emotional aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks." Its findings "were endorsed by all eight committee Democrats and two Republicans, Senators Olympia Snowe of Maine and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska."
In particular, press accounts focus on Administration "claims" that "Iraq had close ties to Al Qaeda," as the Los Angeles Times puts it -- claims which "were not backed by available intelligence." The report, adds the Times, "amounts to the most direct rebuke to date of the Bush administration's use of intelligence to build support for the Iraq war," but the document...stops short of calling for any further inquiry or punishment."
The Financial Times says "the long-awaited report...was attacked by several of the Republicans on the committee as a partisan exercise." Snowe and Hagel "questioned some of the Democratic leadership's handling of the report but broadly endorsed the final product, which they described as the 'final chapter of the committee's enquiry into prewar intelligence with regard to Iraq.'" The Times does not detail what aspects of the report the two Republicans questioned, but adds other GOP senators, "including Kit Bond, the committee's vice-chairman, attacked the report as a 'partisan exercise' and a 'cover-up for Democrats' who had also made incorrect statements about Iran's weapons of mass destruction."
McClatchy notes the White House "dismissed the main report as a partisan rehash of what's already known about erroneous US intelligence on Iraq." The Washington Post, however, reports that "while most of the administration's prewar claims about Iraq reflected now-discredited US intelligence" information, yesterday's report argues "the White House crossed a line by conveying certainty about the threat that Saddam Hussein posed to the United States."
Likewise, CNN's The Situation Room reported that while the charges are not new, "Scott McClellan's book is giving Democrats new ammunition to charge the White House misled the nation into war." What is "troublesome for the president is the new report goes beyond just saying the intelligence in the run-up to the war in Iraq was wrong. It concludes the White House left out contradictory evidence and exaggerated intelligence to make the threat from Saddam Hussein sound more ominous."
Under the headline "The Truth About The War," the New York Times editorializes, "Over all, the report makes it clear that top officials, especially Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld knew they were not giving a full and honest account of their justifications for going to war." The Times adds, "We cannot say with certainty whether Mr. Bush lied about Iraq. But when the president withholds vital information from the public -- or leads them to believe things that he knows are not true -- to justify the invasion of another country, that is bad enough."
Bloomberg News and McClatchy, meanwhile, run stories on a second report issued by the committee, critical of the Pentagon's handling of meetings with Iranian dissidents in Europe.
ABC World News last night reported on "the unprecedented dismissal today of both the top civilian and top military commander of the Air Force. Chief of staff General T. Michael Moseley and Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne were dismissed following a series of embarrassing and potentially dangerous lapses involving the nation's nuclear arsenal." For the Air Force, added ABC, "this is a blood bath. Pentagon insiders say never before have the top military and civilian leaders of one of the services been fired at the same time. Defense Secretary Gates said the Air Force was guilty of systemic failure on its most important mission." The CBS Evening News said that for the Air Force leaders, "it was either resign or be fired," and noted "Gates "acted after reviewing the results of an investigation into a hard-to-believe mix-up in which four fuses used on nuclear armed missiles were accidentally shipped to Taiwan in response to an order for helicopter batteries, and no one realized it for a year and a half."
NBC Nightly News also reported "the boss at the Pentagon got angry today and...fired the general in charge of the US Air Force and the Secretary of the Air Force." On its front page, the New York Times says that "never before has a defense secretary ousted both a service secretary and a service chief, according to senior Pentagon officials. Since taking office 18 months ago, Mr. Gates has made accountability of theme of his tenure." He has also "fired senior Army officials, after disclosures of shoddy conditions at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the service's premier medical facility for wounded soldiers." Also on its front page, the Wall Street Journal reports "the forced resignations mark an attempt by Mr. Gates to use his remaining time in office to shake up the service, which he believes has failed to adapt to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan." And beyond the nuclear "gaffes, the firings are the culmination of a broader dispute between Mr. Gates and the Air Force's leadership over the service's strategic direction." USA Today, Los Angeles Times, McClatchy, Washington Post, AFP and The Hill run similar reports.
The Washington Post this morning interviews "the No. 2 commander of US military forces in Iraq," who said that "the withdrawal of most of the American troops that made up the 'surge' has not harmed the war effort, adding that it was 'certainly possible' thousands more could be pulled out later this year." Asked "if the improving security situation in Iraq meant additional brigades could leave this year," Lt. Gen. Lloyd J. Austin II said, "It's certainly possible. But, again, I don't want to make a definitive statement right now and say we're going to draw down beyond what we're planning to draw down. We'll see what happens.'"
WSJournal: "Were Winning The War" The conservative Wall Street Journal editorial page this morning sounds a markedly optimistic note on the situation in Iraq, only to put what it sees as strong US progress in the context of the presidential election: "Is this emerging victory achieved at a cost of more than 4,000 American lives something we are prepared to abandon after November?" The Journal also states, "We are winning in Iraq. Indeed, we can now say with certainty that we will win, as long as we don't repeat our earlier mistakes and seek to draw down too soon. This is the improving Iraq that the next US President will inherit, and it is the heart of the Iraq debate Americans should have in November."
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, and four co-defendants made their first court appearance yesterday before a military tribunal at Guantanamo Bay. All five were arraigned on charges that carry the death penalty. The hearing is receiving heavy media attention this morning, with reports focusing on Mohammed's testimony as well as the tribunal system itself. Many reports question whether the five men, will receive a fair trial. The Wall Street Journal reports that "some of the defendants...said they had been tortured by the US during years of harsh captivity and called the military commission set to try them a sham. When one defendant began to describe what he called torture, a Defense Department contractor cut the audio feed to reporters watching through a glass-walled room or via closed-circuit television." Defense lawyers and defendants, the Journal adds, "complained that the proceedings had been rushed, and that some defendants hadn't met some of their lawyers until they arrived in the courtroom, nor had they seen evidence against them." The Washington Post says on its front page that the case "is largely designed to obtain death sentences against them," but "even acquittal would probably leave the men in US custody indefinitely" due to their "enemy combatants" status.
ABC World News reported Mohammed was "very much defiant," calling "American law evil and rejected his US lawyers." When informed that the charges against him -- murder, terrorism, hijacking -- "could get the death penalty," Mohammed replied, "Yes, that is what I wish. I'm looking to be martyred." The other four Al Qaeda suspects, "too rejected their US lawyers and lashed out at the government. One, Ramzi Binalshibh, said he was supposed to be a hijacker on 9/11." Said Binalshibh, "I tried for 9//1 and could not get a visa. If this martyrdom happens today, I welcome it."
The New York Times says Mohammed "quickly staked out his position as the leader of the accused men. He gestured to them, shared animated conversations while the proceedings droned on and, at one point, turned his chair toward the back of the courtroom to face his co-defendants, lined up in a row behind him." According to the Times, "his strategy seemed to work. One of the detainees, a military lawyer said, decided to reject his lawyers on Thursday, after a few minutes in the courtroom. Another, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, was intimidated by Mr. Mohammed, said his designated lawyer, Maj. Jon Jackson." And "by day's end, each of Mr. Mohammed's four co-defendants had said he wanted to represent himself. That could turn a trial into a jumble of rhetoric and a new opportunity for critics to attack the Guantánamo system as designed to get easy convictions." The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Financial Times and Washington Times, among other media outlets, also report on yesterday's hearing.
CIA Director Defends Use Of Harsh Interrogations In an interview with Fox Special Report, CIA Director Michael Hayden yesterday said "the fear of an imminent attack led to what are now known as enhanced interrogation techniques." Hayden was shown saying: "Keep in mind, this is a time when we didn't know nearly as much about al-Qaeda as we know today, and you have the nation suffering, reeling from a recent attack in which 3,000 citizens had been killed, until it was the collective judgment of the American government that these techniques would be appropriate and lawful in these circumstances." In the interview Hayden stressed that "two of the people against whom waterboarding was used created a significant fraction of our reporting in al-Qaeda over a period of several years."
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Jay Leno: "Today, Hillary Clinton's camp said she is not actively seeking the vice presidential nomination. And then her pantsuit caught on fire."
David Letterman: "Hillary Clinton...has announced that she" will be "officially ending her campaign on Saturday. ... She's going to wait until Saturday because tomorrow is the Honduras primary."
David Letterman: "But I'm beginning to wonder if maybe Hillary doesn't get it," because she is "now saying that she still has a shot at the Republican nomination."
Conan O'Brien: "Barack Obama clinched the Democratic presidential nomination this week. And it's been reported that Hillary Clinton is going to concede on Saturday. That's right, yeah. Yeah, that's Saturday, December 15th, 2017."
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