All Blog Posts from Political Hotsheet

Arizona Sen. John McCain suggested today that the push to investigate and possibly prosecute Bush administration officials who crafted the legal basis for the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques," such as waterboarding, may have grown from a desire to "settle old political scores."

Appearing on CBS’ Face The Nation Sunday, the former Republican presidential nominee — who was himself tortured as a prisoner of the North Vietnamese — said, "Are you going to prosecute people for giving bad legal advice?" He suggested that Washington should ignore calls to investigate who was behind government lawyers writing memos which gave legal cover to the use of torture on detainees.

"We need to put this behind us," he told host Bob Schieffer. "We need to move forward. … We need a united nation, not a divided one."

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Chris Simcox, who founded the border-patrolling Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, plans to challenge former Republican presidential nominee and current Arizona senator John McCain in the Republican primary in 2010.

Ben Smith, who reported the story today, points us to Simcox's Web site. Here's a bit from the "border security" section:

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Meghan McCain, the daughter of former GOP presidential nominee John McCain, was on CBS’ The Early Show this morning, where she talked about her distaste for controversial right-wing pundit Ann Coulter.

McCain has called Coulter “offensive, radical, insulting and confusing all at the same time,” adding, “if figureheads like Ann Coulter are turning me off, then they are definitely turning off other members of my generation as well.”

“I love the Republican Party, I spent two years campaigning with my father and I completely fell in love with the Republican Party, and I think it’s hard for me to explain to my friends that are in their 20s when these icons of the party say radical things,” McCain told Harry Smith. “I have a friend that’s Jewish – she made anti-Semitic comments. It’s hard to defend that.”

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The lobbyist who filed a lawsuit against The New York Times over a story which allegedly implied she had a romantic affair with Sen. John McCain, has withdrawn her $27 million defamation suit, the Associated Press reported.

According to the U.S. District Court, attorneys for Vicki Iseman filed a notice of voluntary dismissal of the December legal action. The story in question appeared in the paper almost exactly a year ago, when McCain was out on the campaign trail. The piece, written by four veteran Times' reporters, was about McCain's first campaign for President in 2000 and the chummy appearance the candidate displayed with the lobbyist.

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Republican Sen. John McCain was on CBS' The Early Show this morning, where he expressed reservations about President Obama's economic stimulus bill now being debated in Congress.

"There's too much spending, too much unnecessary spending, not the right kind of tax cuts and no end game," McCain said. "In other words, after the economy recovers, we should be on a path to a balanced budget. We're laying the biggest deficit on future generations of Americans in history."

The former Republican presidential candidate added that he "appreciates" the outreach Mr. Obama has made to Republicans, but "we're a long way away."


"I appreciate the fact that the president came over and spoke to Republicans on both sides of the Capitol, but now it's time to sit down and negotiate," he said. "Now's the time to sit down and take into consideration the ideas that we have -- particularly on things like tax cuts. We should have payroll tax cuts. We should be having… incentives for people to stay in their homes. There's a lot of other proposals we have. We think we need to eliminate a lot of the wasteful pork barrel spending that's been put in and have a real, meaningful stimulus package. We realize they need the package. We need the package, America needs the package, but we're not there yet."

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President Obama will have four senators and 11 House members over to the White House for a Super Bowl party Sunday.

It's worth saying up front that sometimes a Super Bowl party is just a Super Bowl party.

Still, the White House provided the list of attendees to reporters and Obama aides (including Bill Burton who ) seem to be talking up the affair as another gesture of cross-party outreach. (A rundown of past efforts is here.) So here's a quick rundown of who's coming by for the big game.

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Former GOP presidential candidate and Arizona Sen. John McCain has launched a new political action committee called "Country First."

McCain, you'll recall, used the phrase "Country First" as one of his slogans during that campaign, and the phrase was prominently featured during the Republican National Convention.

McCain sent an email to supporters saying the group will promote Republican causes and candidates and work to help the GOP redefine itself.

"Country First will allow us to strengthen our party, better define our Republican ideals and message, recruit and back strong, dedicated candidates, and continue our efforts to bring real reform to government by always putting our country and the noble ideals she stands for first," he wrote in the email.

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We have known Barack Obama will become the nation's 44th president since Election Night, but now it's official. The Electoral College voters cast their ballots in state capitals today, fulfilling their ceremonial but very important role as laid out by the Constitution.

But this is actually not the last step in the process. Congress will still have to confirm the results at a joint session scheduled for Jan. 6. Mr. Obama will then be sworn in as the country's first black president on Jan. 20 at noon.

Earlier today, the Associated Press reported that 131 million Americans voted this year – the most ever. That amounted to 61.6 percent of eligible voters, the highest percentage since 1968. Read more on turnout here.