Entries for November 26, 2006

Teen-idol-cum-aging-crooner Pat Boone comes to Washington this week for his first address to a group he has long helped fund: the conservative Heritage Foundation. Boone says it will be a welcome change of venue from his home base in Beverly Hills, where, he says, "I feel like a Don Quixote tilting at windmills." The windmills? Hollywood's entertainment studios. "They've force-fed rap music to kids," he says, "selling them the idea that if you want to be a recording artist, you have to have been to prison, worked as a pimp, and have been shot at." Boone just finished an album of R&B duets with the likes of James Brown and Smokey Robinson, but he says he steered clear of political talk during those recording sessions: "Many people say to me, 'I believe everything you say, Boone.' But the entertainment industry is overwhelmingly liberal; most artists just go with the flow."

Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback says he'll announce whether or not he's seeking the White House in '08 within a month, but it sounds to us like he's in. His calculus: None of the current crop of GOP presidential candidates have strong backing from religious conservatives who make up the party's base. "There is room in the Republican primary for somebody who is unapologetic about being pro-growth, pro-limited government, pro-life, and pro-marriage," he tells us from Kansas. Current Republican presidential frontrunner JohnMcCain famously knocked the religious right in his 2000 presidential bid, while former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani–McCain's main rival for the nomination, according to polls–champions abortion rights and gay rights. Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, another contender, has stepped up outreach to religious conservatives, calling on his state legislature to fight the judicial ruling that legalized gay marriage there in 2003. But until recently, Romney had a pro-abortion-rights stance. "There has been some mixed record in [Romney's] background," says Brownback.

–Dan Gilgoff

Democratic White House aspirant and outgoing Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack tells us that when he formally declares his candidacy this week, his message to the nation will be that it's time for tough love. Exhibit A: weaning the United States off foreign oil. Vilsack helped boost the Hawkeye State's ethanol production by 300 percent, making it the nation's top producer. "I realized the country was in need of somebody who would challenge it," Vilsack says, explaining his decision to run. "Somebody who is not going to tell you what you already think, but who will take you to a different place, a place we need to get to if we want a bright future for our kids."

–Dan Gilgoff

The online news outlet that swiped the Washington Post's political editor and one of its top political reporters last week says it has more thieving to announce. Fred Ryan, president of Allbritton Communications, which owns the yet-to-be-named, yet-to-be-unveiled website, says new hires will be announced this week and that ­they're just as "stellar" as former Post stars John Harris and Jim VandeHei. "Our model is to have world-class political reporters who have established their own franchises," Ryan says, vowing to build "the ultimate political reporting website." The site is part of a multiplatform news service that includes The Capitol Leader, a beltway newspaper set to begin publication in January.

–Dan Gilgoff

She hasn't said she's running yet, but that's not stopping Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's foes from trying to keep her out of the White House with a new website, www.stophernow.com. Launched this week, the site features the animated Hillary Show, with new episodes planned for when Clinton makes news. The show's first cartoon guests: Sen. John Kerry, whom the animated Clinton calls "loser," and a screaming Democratic National Committee Chair Howard Dean. "We knew people were tired of the mean television ads you find in every campaign," says Dick Collins, the Dallas-based moneyman who ponied up most of the $250,000 that the site launch required. "So we wanted to have some fun." But Collins says it could turn nasty as '08 nears: "You never know where you end up."

–Dan Gilgoff

Business is booming at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, the government's chief mapmaker, which relies on imagery from spy satellites. Over the past year, we hear, the NGA printed 10.3 million mapsand charts and delivered 12 million images to military and intel agencies. The NGA has also been on a buying spree for commercial imagery, purchasing 126,439 gigabytes since early last year. The images show battlefields in Iraq and nuke sites in North Korea, along with hurricane damage in the Gulf and refugees in Darfur, Sudan.

–Dan Gilgoff

Clintonites are whispering about a new dream ticket: Hillary Rodham Clinton/Wes Clark. The way they see it, Clinton is the celeb fundraiser who needs national security credentials. The former NATO commander has been promoting a federal "Department of Failed States" or "Department of Preventive Diplomacy" to head off "impending conflict" around the globe and make friends abroad. "Respect is the starting point for all human interaction," he says.

–Dan Gilgoff

"This was an ill-considered project."

"I am not running for president...If the American people say I have to be president, it will happen."

"His songs were full of the notes of facts, but he knew to make the most of music you have to improvise."

"I am not a racist. That's what's so insane about this."

Sources: New York Times, Fortune, CBS News, ABC News