Tue, October 21, 2008 - 2:59 PM

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist today sidestepped criticizing the harsh tone that some of John McCain's Republican supporters are taking in the presidential campaign against Barack Obama.

But he did say that he prefers to focus more on what McCain has to offer.

“My take is that I like to talk about John McCain. I’m a huge McCain fan,” said Republican Crist, during a conference call with reporters.

“I think he’s a great man, a true American hero.”

“That’s what I spend a majority of my time talking about,” said Crist.

The conference call, arranged by the McCain campaign, came after reports that Crist hasn't had much use for the attacks from many McCain supporters that Obama is advancing a "socialist" agenda.

He was quoted as saying earlier this week: "I imagine different people have different definitions. I don't think it looks that way to me."

During the telephone conference call today, Crist said he does believe “there’s a time to contrast and compare” the two presidential candidates, and that he thinks tax policies is one of the strongest areas to contrast.

“John McCain will cut taxes and make sure taxes will stay low.”

Crist then repeated that the way he chooses to talk about the campaign is to talk about the great leadership experience of John McCain.

Crist also said the McCain and Obama campaigns are both establishing good election “ground games” in his state.

“I think the ground game is going very well here in Florida, frankly, on both sides,” said Republican Crist, during a conference call with reporters.

The Democratic Party, Crist said, “to its credit, has had a tremendous voter registration effort.”

But he said it comes down to who actually shows up to vote. And Republicans, he said, have good mail and phone strategies to get their voters out.

-- Billy House, Media General News Service

Why hasn’t President Bush done more for fellow Republican John McCain’s presidential campaign?

To hear presidential press secretary Dana Perino explain it this morning, there are at least seven good reasons why -- none having to do with Bush’s low popularity ratings.

Here’s what she said:

1. Past practice. She noted George H.W. Bush, the president’s father, had to distance himself from President Ronald Reagan when he ran for president in 1988. In 2000, then-vice president Al Gore also distanced himself from President Bill Clinton when he ran for president.

2. “We recognize that John McCain has to run on his own.”

3. “We have been very diligent to make sure that we don’t insert ourselves into the campaign and make this about Senator Obama versus George Bush, but about Senator Obama versus Senator McCain.”

4. Russia invaded Georgia.

5. Hurricane Gustav

6. Hurricane Ike

7. The need for Bush to focus on the financial crisis.


-- Billy House, Media General News Service

With two weeks until Election Day, things are not looking good for Sen. Elizabeth Dole, with the latest polls showing Democratic challenger Kay Hagan's lead widening in the pivotal North Carolina Senate race.

Democratic senate campaign officials acknowledge that the major ad campaign and ground game effort by Barack Obama's campaign is playing a big rule in Hagan's somewhat surprising showing in the state. Right now, the state looks very winnable for Obama. But here's an open question. If it looks out of reach for Obama in the last week of the campaign and he shifts North Carolina resources to another state, could that end up dooming Hagan?

--Sean Mussenden

Members of Congress may be focused on their own elections two weeks from today, but with Republicans expected to lose seats in the House, some are already turning to the prospect of a leadership shuffle amid the Republican ranks.

“That’s a debate we’ll probably see emerging,” said Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va.

He wouldn’t put a number on how many seats Republicans would have to lose before they would oust their leadership -- Rep. John Boehner of Ohio, the minority leader, or Roy Blunt of Missouri, the minority whip.

A change in leadership could provide an opening for Virginia’s Eric Cantor, now the deputy whip, to lead the House Republicans in 2009.

“If you go down two or three touchdowns, you need to do something to change the dynamics of the game,” said Forbes. “That kind of discussion is ongoing.”

Cantor has called talk of leadership changes premature, but Politico reports he has “the best shot of unseating Boehner after the election.”

Cantor’s been busy helping Republican candidates this fall. See my story on that here.

--Neil H. Simon

Democrat Barack Obama will be taking a break from the campaign trail at the end of the week to visit his seriously ill 85-year-old grandmother in Hawaii.

According to the Associated Press, Obama is canceling campaign events on Thursday and Friday.
A spokesman said the health of Madelyn Payne Dunham, who helped raise Obama, had deteriorated "to the point where her situation is very serious." Further details about her condition were not released.

Obama events originally planned Thursday for Wisconsin and Iowa will be replaced by one in Indianapolis.

On Friday, Obama's wife, Michelle, will sub for Obama at rallies in Ohio. Obama was expected to resume campaigning on Saturday at an undecided location in the West.

Obama’s running mate Joe Biden is expected to campaign in North Carolina on Thursday.

While family matters obviously come first, there could be some risk involved in leaving the campaign trail during a tight race.

The only confirmed event for the McCain campaign on Thursday or Friday is a rally for vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in Ohio. But expect the Republicans to keep campaigning hard with less than two weeks until Election Day.

-- Amy Dominello

How to downplay bad news? Say it's not news.

Some John McCain backers initially pooh-poohed Colin Powell's endorsement of Barack Obama as inevitable because Powell is black.

Today, conservative columnist Robert Novak is dismissing Powell's endorsement as no real news. Novak, writing on washingtonpost.com, says that the Powell was never a real Republican. Powell's endorsement, says Novak was: "the least surprising and most predictable event of an unusually unpredictable election cycle."

-- Marsha Mercer

Sun, October 19, 2008 - 6:56 PM

Despite the fact more than fourth of the state's voters live in Northern Virginia (and the fact John McCain lives there, too) the McCain campaign can't stop vilifying the state's fast growing D.C. suburbs. Numerous Republican activists and elected officials have criticized the Virginia GOP for its failure to embrace NoVa voters and therefore give themselves huge deficits to overcome down state during elections.

McCain was in Woodbridge, Va. Sunday. Read The Richmond Times-Dispatch's account of McCain's weekend campaign stop in Northern Virginia.

After his brother Joe McCain called the Northern Virginia cities "communist country," another campaign surrogate added a new insult this weekend. On MSNBC, a senior adviser to McCain said the region is not "real Virginia."

From the Richmond report:

"The rest of the state, real Virginia, if you will, I think will be very responsive to Senator McCain's message," Nancy Pfotenhauer said in acknowledging McCain's challenges in the most populous part of the state.

Given a chance to retract her statement, Pfotenhauer said she lives in Oakton, in Fairfax County, "but real Virginia I take to be the -- this part of the state that is more Southern in nature, if you will. Northern Virginia is really metro D.C."

--Neil Simon

Fri, October 17, 2008 - 10:58 AM

In case you missed it, John McCain and Barack Obama poked fun at each other and themselves at a dinner last night for Catholic Charities.

McCain’s monologue:




Obama’s monologue:




Now the big question that could decide the election: Which of these guys is funnier?

-- Amy Dominello

A roundup of polls by two groups is showing women voters favor Barack Obama in the presidential contest.

The weekly Women’s Vote Watch, released by the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University,

Researchers said the polls are consistent with a historical gender gap between female and male voters since 1980.

-- Amy Dominello

Thu, October 16, 2008 - 3:39 PM

A company run by Harry Sargeant III of Delray Beach, a major Republican fundraiser and longtime friend of Gov. Charlie Crist, “appears to have engaged in a reprehensible form of war profiteering,” according to the chair of a congressional committee.

The company, International Oil Trading Limited, ships oil into Iraq for use by American forces based on a 2004 contract with the government.

But Rep. Henry Waxman , a California Democrat, says internal Defense Department documents show the prices the company have charged the government are not “fair and reasonable.”

Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight, outlines his claims in a letter here to Defense Secretary Robert Gates. He notes that over the last four years, Sargeant’s company has been paid more than $1.4 million by U.S. taxpayers to deliver fuel through Jordan into Iraq and has earned a profit of over $210 million.

“Of the $210 million in profits received by the company, at least one third—$70 million—appears to have benefited a single individual: Mr. Sargeant.”

“If the IOTC contracts had been awarded to the lowest bidders, the taxpayers could have saved over $180 million,” Waxman writes.

Sargeant is McCain’s co-finance chairman in Florida and a friend of Crist since college. He has been a major donor to the Florida GOP. Earlier this year, the McCain campaign returned about $50,000 in questionable contributions bundled by a long-time Sargeant business partner.

Last month, the Port of Tampa commissioners voted to lease 43 acres to an affiliate of the same company to store and distribute oil and gasoline shipped into the port.

-- Billy House, Media General News Service

Here's an example of how difficult it is to gauge a lmember of Congress' actual wealth based on their required financial filings,

Freshman GOP Rep. Vern Buchanan of Longboat Key, thanks in part to his car dealerships, finds himself ranked as the fourth wealthiest lawmaker in the U.S. House, at least in terms of net worth.

The same new study by a government watchdog group says he's the sixth wealthiest in all of Congress if Senators are included.

But the Center for Responsive Politics also reports that Buchanan is also tops among lawmakers in both chambers of Congress in liabilities, with perhaps as much as $169 million worth.

At issue is that the disclosure forms lawmakers must file do not require exact values.

Instead, the lawmaker only reports the range of value into which an asset, for example, falls. As the values increase, the ranges get broader. To calculate net worth, the center added together the lawmaker's range of assets and then subtracted their range of liabilities. Then, it calculated the midpoint of the resulting range and used this figure to rank the filers.

Those calculations result in such findings as Buchanan having a minimum net worth of -$70 million and a maximum net worth of $401 million – leading the center to come up with a midpoint of $165 million. That ranked sixth in all of the 435-seat House and 100-seat Senate.

But Buchanan is at the very top, according to the center, in terms of potential liabilities. Liabilities include loans, credit card debt and mortgages on properties that produce income.

Buchanan’s reports indicate a minimum of $38 million in liabilities, a maximum of $169 million, for a tops-in-Congress a midpoint of $103 million.

Other interesting things to find on the center's site here are the top stocks held by members of Congress, and the top assets -- with the Milwaukee Bucks NBA team topping the list.

-- Billy House, Media General News Service

Who is Joe the Plumber? And does he know Joe Six-Pack?

Some answers here.

-- Amy Dominello

Wed, October 15, 2008 - 7:44 PM

The final presidential debate starts in just a few minutes. I'll be twittering the debate in real time and my "tweets" will show up in the box below. There's a lot at stake in this third and final showdown between John McCain and Barack Obama. While some are predicting another boring meeting between the two candidates, I'm expecting some fireworks tonight.

--Sean Mussenden

The McCains appear to have received some special treatment from cell phone companies AT&T and Verizon Wireless to improve the lack of cell service at their ranch near Sedona, Ariz.

The new service towers in the remote desert area came at the request of John McCain's wife, Cindy, the Associated Press reports.

McCain sits on (and used to chair) the Senate Commerce Committee, which oversees the the telecommunications industry. Mrs. McCain requested the service last year the story says.

"The McCains went through the process that is available to anybody who subscribes to one of these cell phone companies to inquire about getting service," a McCain campaign spokesman said.

I've heard of playing tough with the folks at customer service to get a better plan, more minutes, or a discount on a new cell phone, but I guess I never thought of demanding my own cell tower for better reception.

--Neil Simon

Tue, October 14, 2008 - 8:15 PM

Most polls across Canada have just closed in the country's 40th general election and wouldn't you know it, some Canadians want Barack Obama on the ballot.

With the CBC 10 minutes away from disclosing the first results, the network was talking about this site.

The site features an Obama headshot clearly digitally altered to be wearing a furry winter coat.

Obama may not be a choice for the Canadians, but imagine if the U.S. political system were a parliamentary one. Instead of our electoral college votes and strategies to get to 270, we would simply look at how many seats the parties won in the House of Representatives. In a year when Democrats are expected to pad their majority in the House, they would be a sure lock for the White House.

But, of course, we don't, which is why we get to watch the candidates launch a mammoth amount of political marketing in the final three weeks of the U.S. campaign.

--Neil Simon