Washington Wrap
Dotty Lynch, Beth Lester, Clothilde Ewing and Daniel Furman of the CBS News Political Unit have the latest from the nation's capital.
Wednesday's Headlines
* Bush and Cheney On the Trail and On the Air
* Democrats Play for Seniors
* Environmental Hot Topic
* (No) Money for Reform
* Senate Primaries in Colorado and Georgia
* Powell missing at convention
Bush and Cheney Out On the Trail: President Bush is in the Southwest on Wednesday, still accompanied by Arizona Sen. John McCain, while VP Cheney works the crowd in Joplin, Mo., and Battle Creek, Mich. While the Kerry campaign continues its ad blackout (allowing the Media Fund to compensate), Bush-Cheney continues spending its primary money. Wednesday the campaign announced another new ad, this one called Solemn Duty.
In the ad, President Bush, joined by his wife Laura, looks into the camera and says:
"My most solemn duty is to lead our nation to protect ourselves. I can't imagine the great agony of a mom or a dad having to make the decision about which child to pick up first on September the 11th. We cannot hesitate, we cannot yield, we must do everything in our power to bring an enemy to justice before they hurt us again."
The ad, mentioning September 11th, is in sync with the campaign's rhetoric on Tuesday about Iraq. CBS News' Mark Knoller is with the president:
Knoller Nugget: As part of his strategy to inoculate himself on Iraq, President Bush declared that even if he had known there were no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, he still would have taken the US to war. And he claimed John Kerry agrees it was the right decision -- although Kerry has said no such thing.
Mr. Bush told a campaign rally Tuesday evening in Panama City, Fla. that, after months of questioning his motives and his credibility, Kerry "now agrees it was the right decision to go into Iraq."
What Kerry actually said was that he still would have voted to authorize military action - because the president should have that authority - though he thinks the war was launched on faulty intelligence and without a plan to win the peace.
Expect the Iraq refrain to be part of candidate Bush's stump speech again Wednesday as he heads deep into the Sun Belt and campaigns in New Mexico and Arizona with Sen. John McCain by his side.
What does Mr. Bush think of dumping the federal income tax and replacing it with a national sales tax? He says it's an "interesting idea" and ought to be "seriously" explored. But in answer to question at a Niceville, Florida (yes, Niceville), Mr. Bush conceded the federal income tax code is complex, and he believes the simpler the better.
And lastly, the president admits he's in awe of the Oval Office. So, too, are many visitors who plan on reading him the riot act but, on entering the Oval Office, are overcome by the majesty of the place. And so is his mother: Mr. Bush told a rally that when his mother enters the Oval Office, even she won't tell him what to do.
How will Seniors Vote?: In 2000, seniors broke almost evenly between George W. Bush and Al Gore. In 2003, the President's Medicare prescription drug bill was expected to give Republicans a big boost among voters over 60. But three months out from Election Day 2004, Democrats are looking surprisingly strong in that exact demographic.
Reports the New York Times, "Democrats say the elderly are proving an unexpectedly fertile voting bloc for their party this year because of dissatisfaction with the new Medicare prescription drug benefit, disproportionate opposition to the war in Iraq, worries about mounting deficits and wariness over talk of altering Social Security."
While "Republican officials scoff at the Kerry campaign's talk of big gains among elderly voters," the Kerry-Edwards team is moving full steam ahead to take advantage of a possible opportunity. The campaign announced a Kerry-Edwards senior outreach program Wednesday morning, complete with action groups in the (battleground) states and activities that will take place across the nation. In Las Vegas, Kerry also spoke to a group of seniors and accepted the endorsement of the Alliance for Retired Americans, a relatively new political organization that has three million members. "The group plans to conduct full-scale get-out-the-vote operations in Nevada, Arizona, Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania - all states with large elderly populations," its executive director, Edward Coyle, told the Times.
The biggest reason for fertile Democratic ground appears to be senior dissatisfaction with the Medicare drug benefit. According to a Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard School of Public Health poll released Monday, "Nearly half (47%) of seniors and non-elderly people with disabilities on Medicare say they have an unfavorable impression of the new Medicare law, while just over a quarter (26%) say they have a favorable impression." Another major issue appears to be the war in Iraq, about which the Times says, "polls show the elderly have been more consistently opposed to the war in Iraq than any other age group, in part because they tend to see dollars spent abroad as unavailable for domestic programs, and in part because they see it as driving up the federal deficit."
Concludes Democratic pollster Stanley Greenberg in the Times, "You put together the war, the feeling that we should spend our money at home, a bad prescription drug program, and rising health care costs, and you have a pretty powerful combination." Republicans may not agree, but Kerry-Edwards certainly want to try.
Trail Byte: Kerry moved onto healthcare and seniors on Wednesday but on Tuesday the environment was his topic. CBS News' Steve Chaggaris reports:
During a discussion at a Las Vegas middle school, Kerry focused Tuesday on the debate about whether to use Nevada's Yucca Mountain as a repository for the nation's nuclear waste, leaving some wondering why devote time to what is a Nevada-centric issue in a state that has all of five electoral votes.
Clearly, campaign's mindset is to work for blocs of votes that are easily anti-Bush but, if not paid attention to, could slip through the Democrats' fingers. Aides have pointed to Al Gore's failure to win West Virginia's five electoral votes and barely winning New Mexico's four in 2000, both states that went easily for Clinton just four years earlier. Not coincidentally, Kerry has spent several days in those two states this year.
A perfect example of this extra attention is his courting of Native Americans over the weekend in New Mexico - a group that makes up almost ten percent of that state's population.
Nevada's five electoral votes, which Gore missed out on in 2000, could be the difference in a tight race this November and Kerry, in his third visit to the state this year, is trying to take advantage of a potential Bush liability.
Tuesday, he tried to paint Bush as a flip-flopper on the Yucca Mountain issue, accusing him of promising to fight the movement of nuclear waste to the site during the 2000 campaign, then green-lighting by approving a plan to use Yucca as a repository.
"Yucca Mountain to me is a symbol of the recklessness and the arrogance with which they are willing to proceed with respect to the safety issues and concerns of the American people," said Kerry.
The Bush campaign attempted to turn the tables and say that Kerry flip-flopped on the issue by having voted for some bills that included language that would have permitted sending waste to Yucca.
"Republicans try to point to a few procedural votes," said Kerry, adding that whenever he had the opportunity to vote straight up-or-down on Yucca, he's always voted against it.
Ultimately, Kerry said, "It's about promises kept and promises broken."
This Isn't the Reform Party of Ross Perot: The treasurer of the national Reform Party, which backs independent Ralph Nader for president, has told federal election officials that the party should be terminated because it has only $18.18 in the bank, reports the Associated Press. In an FEC filing, William D. Chapman Sr. said that national party leaders failed to build the organization or to foster "philosophical alignment among members and candidates." In response, the party leaders suspended Mr. Chapman as treasurer.
So what does this mean for Nader? In May, the national Reform Party held a telephone conference call to endorse Nader, potentially providing him ballot access in seven states, including the battleground states of Florida and Michigan. But states like Florida require a face-to-face nominating convention and so the conference call doesn't fit the bill. Reform Party Chairman Shawn O'Hara tells CBS News that, in order to meet Florida requirements, they will hold their national convention as planned in Dallas on August 26-29. He says delegates will come from all over the country and that he will certify Nader as the Reform Party nominee, making it official. "It will be like me putting a pacifier in the mouths of my Democratic brothers and sisters," he continued. He claims they actually have $200 cash on hand but that they are "in the midst of a multi-million dollar" drive.
Chapman said he does not support Nader's candidacy, but that wasn't why he asked the FEC to terminate the party's fund-raising authority. The Reform Party has a ballot line in Florida, Colorado, Mississippi, Kansas, South Carolina, Montana and possibly Michigan.
Senate: Majette in GA and Coors in CO: In Georgia, freshman Rep. Denise Majette won the Democratic Senate primary runoff against Cliff Oxford, a South Georgia native who made a fortune in the computer services industry. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that Majette won despite not matching the funds that Oxford was able to produce, some from his own bank account. Majette said, "Money didn't matter in this race; we won it the old-fashioned way, by working for every vote."
Majette beat Oxford by 20 percent but now must face a tough general election challenge from US Rep. Johnny Isakson. The Republican is heavily favored to win the race and goes in to it with a full campaign war chest. Majette and Isakson are vying for the Senate seat of retiring Democrat (but Bush supporter) Sen. Zell Miller.
In other Senate news, beer king Peter Coors easily defeated Rep. Bob Schaffer in Tuesday's GOP Senate primary in Colorado. According to the Denver Post, Coors and Schaffer fought a bitter race on social issues, each trying to show they were more conservative then the other. At the end of the day, Coors won by 21%.
On the other side, Ken Salazar, Colorado's attorney general, defeated the strongly anti-war candidate Mike Miles, for the Democratic nod. Salazar ended Miles' run decisively, winning 73% to 26%.
Colorado's general election Senate race will now pick up steam as national party help enters the fray. The state is one of the key races that will decide the balance of power in the Senate. It became competitive when Republican Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell announced an unexpected retirement earlier this year.
Powell Missing in Action: Colin Powell will not be on the GOP convention guest list in New York. According to the Associated Press, State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said on Tuesday, "On White House instruction," the secretary will not attend the convention. He said, "This is in keeping with past practice." The spokesman also drew attention to Powell's remarks last week when he spoke to a convention of minority journalists. He said that he was obliged as secretary not to take part in "parochial debate."
Powell had a big role at the 2000 Republican Convention in Philadelphia. But that was before he was Secretary of State. During the Clinton years, neither Secretary of State Warren Christopher nor Madeleine Albright attended the Democratic conventions.. Albright did attend a luncheon sponsored by the National Democratic Institute that in Los Angeles the opening day of the 2000 Democratic Convention.
Quote of the Day: "Yes or no, Mel, will you join Mickey Mouse, Shamu, me and even the Lord Himself by finally endorsing a $250,000 cap on medical malpractice?" --Florida GOP candidate Doug Gallager in a debate with former HUD Secretary and ex-trial lawyer Mel Martinez. (Miami Herald)