Washington Wrap

ARG 2/5-6 (600 interviews)
Kerry 32
Edwards 21
Clark 20
Dean 8
Undecided 17

ARG 2/5-6 (600 interviews)
Kerry 35
Edwards 22
Clark 17
Dean 9
Undecided 15

On To Wisconsin: Although the polls show that today's races are likely to go John Kerry's way, his rivals are spouting brave words about plans for the next contest in Wisconsin, which votes on Feb. 17. Kerry already has a substantial lead in the polls in Wisconsin but his competitors say they could make a comeback.

For John Edwards and Wesley Clark, the trip to Wisconsin leads directly through Virginia and Tennessee. Polls show Edwards running second in Virginia and Edwards and Clark locked in battle for second place in Tennessee. Should Clark come in third in both, "some of General Clark's supporters said he was likely - but not certain - to end his bid for the presidency," according to The New York Times. However, Clark has already spent $550,000 on television advertising in Wisconsin since Jan. 1, Clark spokesman Bill Buck tells CBS News. The Clark team also has three offices in the state and 17 paid staff who have been in the state for "several weeks," Clark Wisconsin press spokesman Peter Shakow tells CBS News. The Clark team also says it will get a "whole bunch" of staff after the Feb. 10 votes are counted.

Edwards will spend Tuesday night watching returns not in the South but in the American Serb Hall in Milwaukee. The Edwards campaign has spent significantly less time and money in Wisconsin, but that is now changing. Edwards Campaign Manager Nick Baldick tells CBS News that Edwards has "four to five offices, 30 to 40 paid staff and went up on the air last week" in the state with a "significant" buy. The Edwards team believes there will be a "practical narrowing" of the candidates after the Tennessee and Virginia results and it has vowed to stay in the race through March 2, hoping to be "competitive" in Wisconsin along the way. As Baldick notes, "Edwards has done well in rural states with diverse populations ... We're confident in our positive, populist message ... Wisconsin works for us on many levels."

Although Howard Dean told supporters in an email last week that he would quit the race if he did not win Wisconsin, on Monday he changed his mind, saying in interviews with local television stations, "We're going to find a way to stay in one way or the other." CBS News has learned that this decision was made without any discussion among Dean's advisors, most of whom were very surprised. "Oops," said one. "He wasn't supposed to say that." The New York Times reports that Dean said he "was unaware of making this decision" before announcing it saying he often let choices "incubate unconsciously for a long time before I actually make a formal decision."

In his effort to stay in, the Dean team has "really bulked up" his Wisconsin team to between 50 and 75 paid staffers, Dean spokeswoman Sarah Leonard tells CBS News. Leonard says the Dean camp will continue to run his 60-second "bio" ad in addition to two new grassroots ads that begin tonight. Look for the Dean team to roll ahead, aided by no fewer than eight organizing offices now arrayed around the state.

Kerry, who is on the air in Wisconsin, has not been to the state since the party convention last June and doesn't plan to get in until Friday. He has not yet indicated whether he will participate in Sunday's Milwaukee Sentinel debate. As Kerry and his rivals look towards Wisconsin, it remains to be seen whose strategy will work best.

Trippi: He Said, They Said: Much has been made about the $40 million spent by the Dean campaign and quite a few fingers have been pointed at former campaign manager Joe Trippi. Trippi, McMahon and Squier, a consulting firm where Trippi is a partner, produced the campaign's TV ads was paid $7.2 million by the campaign in 2003, the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday. In a Tuesday Times article, Trippi defended the arrangement, saying Sunday's article left the impression he had gotten rich from his effort.

Trippi said that most of the money was used for ad buys and that he deliberately stayed in the dark about how much he and his partners kept in commissions from the ad purchases. After leaving the campaign, Trippi learned that his company charged the campaign a 7 percent commission – which is 8 percent less than the firm typically charges. Trippi waived a salary from the Dean campaign and was paid based on advertising buys. He says his share of the commission came to $165,000.

Trippi's comments came while giving a speech to a San Diego conference on political technology. When asked the golden question, what he had done wrong during the campaign, Trippi responded that one regret was spending $1 million on early advertising in a number of states, even before Wesley Clark entered the race. "If I could take that one back, I would do it in a second," he responded.

The Dean campaign spent an additional $6.3 million on TV in Iowa and New Hampshire this year. When Dean stalled right before the Iowa caucuses, Trippi continued to add buys. When Iowa's most popular stations sold out, the campaign then bought ads elsewhere, including the WB affiliates, reports The Washington Post. Peter Fenn, a veteran media consultant, says Dean's free-spending ways "have to raise questions. They went through $41 million with only two states voting. And they got, what, 300,000 votes? Do the math on that."

FOT's (Friends of Trippi's) have defended him in recent days, saying that he never had sole authority over spending and asking what happened to the $27 million not spent on TV ads.

On another note, Trippi said he would think twice about handing over the list of 600,000 e-mail addresses the Dean campaign compiled to the eventual nominee because they don't have a relationship with the supporters (that is, if it's not Dean), The Associated Press reports.

Conservative United Front Not So United: For most of his presidency, George W. Bush has counted on a chorus of conservative newspaper columnists, radio hosts and television commentators to give powerful punctuation to his initiatives, proposals and defenses, The New York Times reports. In recent days, criticism of Mr. Bush has weakened the link between him and the Republican base that has so faithfully defended him in the past.

Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan responded to Mr. Bush's interview on "Meet the Press" by writing in Sunday's opinionjournal.com, "The president seemed tired, unsure and often bumbling. His answers were repetitive, and when he tried to clarify them he tended to make them worse."

George Will, the conservative columnist also piled on saying, "It is surreal for a Republican president to submit a budget to a Republican-controlled Congress and have Republican legislators vow to remove the 'waste' that he has included and that they have hitherto funded."

And even Bob Novak, who used to get major leaks from the administration, has recently criticized Mr. Bush for giving "the most ineffective State of the Union address in recent years." Novak added that the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the admission that the president's plan to expand Medicare would cost more that initially estimated were "a double blow to his credibility."

Republicans disappointed with Mr. Bush's performance on "Meet the Press," were concerned that he was not in fighting form to take on possible Democratic challenger John Kerry. Despite this, some columnists and commentators who have voiced criticism of the president insisted Monday that they were not breaking ranks and that he remained their standard-bearer.

According to Terry Holt, the president's campaign spokesman, "when the campaign enters a new period where Kerry will stand in direct comparison to the president, there will be a more intense focus on Kerry's record. And I think what we're seeing from these folks is a sense that they are ready for that period to begin."

Vietnam, Redux: CBS News White House Correspondent Mark Knoller reports that the White House said Tuesday morning that it will release documents that it says show President Bush fulfilled his duties in the National Guard. The records include payroll documents from the personnel center in Denver of which the White House says it was not previously aware. The documents were received by the White House last night. Spokesman Scott McClellan says the documents answer "the outrageous accusations" made against the president and "demonstrate he served and fulfilled his duties."

The president said in his interview on Sunday that he would open his records. The Boston Globe, which has done the most serious investigative work on this since 2000, reported today that the documents "seem unlikely to resolve questions about whether Bush shirked his duty during his tour as a fighter-interceptor pilot for the Texas Air Guard during the Vietnam War. That is because some of the dates on the service list fell during a period in the fall of 1972 when Bush was reassigned to a guard unit in Alabama. The commander of the Alabama unit has said Bush did not appear for duty at his assigned unit there."

John Kerry, who has made his service in Vietnam a major piece of his recent campaign stops and TV ads, did not have much to say about the president's records, reports CBS News' Steve Chaggaris. "I haven't seen anything about any records. It's not my issue ... What records?" Kerry asked.

Kerry spokesman David Wade added that these "questions should be posed to the president and the military. None of these questions can be appropriately answered by the (Kerry) campaign."

But Do they Know What a Quart of Milk Costs? While everyone wonders which of the Democratic candidates will win the party's nomination, the real question remains: Who would win at a game of Trivial Pursuit? VH1 News recently conducted a "Presidential Pop Culture Quiz" in New Hampshire, asking Wes Clark, Howard Dean, John Kerry and Joe Lieberman about music, movies, and the Bennifer break-up.

The quiz found that Clark believes Elvis is the first American Idol (not Kelly Clarkson). Dean is a huge Wyclef Jean fan and promises to use his presidential powers to re-unite the Fugees. Kerry can relate to the media scrutiny of the Bennifer break-up. And the most knowledgeable candidate, Lieberman, knows the real name of rapper Eminem is Marshall Mathers, that Brad Pitt is married to Jennifer Aniston and that Michael Jackson's ranch is called Neverland.

Following the quiz Lieberman exclaimed, "I can't believe I know this stuff!"

Quote of the Day: "A woman can take care of the family. It takes a man to provide structure. To provide stability. Not that a woman can't provide stability, I am not saying that. ... It does take a father, though." -- House Maj. Leader Tom DeLay (Roll Call).