Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Other newsworthy items...

A crowded primary in Kentucky for the gubernatorial race will trigger a runoff if no candidates get over 40% of the vote.

Could former Senator John Edwards still decide to run for president? He's on a book tour right now.
A click of the television remote this week should have erased any doubt -- small as it would have to be -- that former U.S. Sen. John Edwards is running for president again.

He chatted with Martha Stewart, Jon Stewart, Tim Russert, Hannity & Colmes, Charlie Rose, Robin Roberts on "Good Morning America" and David Letterman on Friday night.[...]

One bump for Edwards' publicity train: a report this week that a volunteer threw around Edwards' name in hopes of securing a Playstation 3 video game system from a Raleigh Wal-Mart. The conversation took place the same day Edwards criticized the company in a conference call with union-affiliated activists.

Edwards said the volunteer made a mistake but was trying to help after hearing secondhand that Edwards' wife, Elizabeth, was searching for a system. Edwards said neither he nor his wife knew of the effort.
The only downside of getting elected to Congress is finding a place to sleep in Washington.
Joe Donnelly, the newly elected congressman from north-central Indiana, is planning on bunking with a relative in Virginia until he is able to figure out a more permanent solution.

Both Ellsworth and Donnelly plan to keep their families and homes in their districts but stay in Washington during the days Congress is in session.

That's what Baron Hill did when he was first elected in 1998, and he's glad that after losing his seat in 2004, he didn't sell the efficiency apartment he purchased on Capitol Hill in 1999. Not only does Hill have a place to sleep after winning back his seat, but the apartment also has quadrupled in value in Washington's hot housing market.

Hill said it was the right decision to keep his family in Indiana. But he said he would continue his practice of calling his wife first thing in the morning, at noon, and right before retiring for the night.
Here is an article on Ohio's incoming first lady, who was born in the Bluegrass State.

Outgoing Minnesota Senator Mark Dayton believes he would have run re-election anyway but he has no regrets.
Former Sen. Dave Durenberger, a Minnesota Republican who defeated Dayton in the 1982 Senate race, said that Dayton would have done better in a more bipartisan era.

"It was a lot more political than he was prepared for," Durenberger said. "He's the kind of person who probably would have fit in another time. Most of the time he was in the minority. There was always the challenge of President Bush and the Republican agenda."

Former Vice President and Minnesota Sen. Walter Mondale, a Democrat, called Dayton a good senator who had the disadvantage of being in the minority through most of his term.

"And that is hard," Mondale said, "particularly during these times when politics is so belligerent. If you're in the minority, you're like a bug on the road."

Dayton said he has no regrets leaving the Senate even though he would have been in the majority next year.
A Daily Show for conservatives?

Is The Daily Show the new ticket to the White House? Why has Sen. Bayh not appeared on the show yet?

Does Sen. Clinton have any sort of advantage in 2008? She spent over $30 million for a re-election campaign against a nobody who had no chance.
Mrs. Clinton’s cash on hand is certainly less than the $20 million to $30 million some of her advisers early this year predicted she would have in the bank as she moved from her Senate re-election toward a decision about a presidential campaign. She is now in the same ballpark as two fellow Democrats, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, who had $13.8 million in his account as of Sept. 30, according to election commission records, and Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana, who had $10.6 million. The law allows money left in a Senate campaign fund to be transferred to a presidential campaign.
Clinton still leads in the 2008 polls.

This is a good move by part leaders in Congress.
The new Democratic-controlled Congress will not seriously consider reinstating the draft, even if concerns about the military's strength and resiliency grow, party leaders said yesterday.

Key Democrats, including the incoming House speaker, House majority leader and chairmen of the House and Senate armed services committees, said they do not support a resumption of the draft. They predicted that the idea will gather little momentum in the 110th Congress, which convenes in January. Pentagon officials also restated their opposition to a draft.

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