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Iowa 2004 presidential primary precinct caucus and caucuses news">
Iowa 2004 presidential primary precinct caucus and caucuses news, reports
and information on 2004 Democrat and Republican candidates, campaigns
and issues Iowa
Presidential Watch's
IOWA DAILY REPORT Holding
the Democrats accountable today, tomorrow...forever.
THE DAILY
REPORT for Sunday, October 26, 2003 "Don't give Bush $87
billion, don't give him 87 cents, give our
troops a ride home,"
said Al
Sharpton at the Act Now & Stop the War rally in
Washington D.C. "Obviously we've had
presidents who haven't had military experience.
I understand that. It's not a prerequisite. But
we are living in a very different time,"
said Sen. John
Kerry in response to the necessity of military
service to be President. "I was not anxious to
serve in Vietnam,"
said Dean,
whose brother, Charles, died under mysterious
circumstances in Laos during the Vietnam War.
"I was opposed to the war and I was glad I was
classified that way, but it was obviously not my
decision."
Howard Dean provided this response regarding his
exemption to service in Viet Nam. "I don't know what I'm
going to do, to be honest,"
said Paulee
Lipsman of Des Moines, an early Lieberman
supporter and former Democratic National
Committee member. "There's no sense in
caucusing for Lieberman. He won't be viable here
with only a handful of support."
Lipsman gave
this response in a Des Moines Register article
exploring that status of Iowa’s Caucuses. "The gun issue is the
silent killer"
of Democrats, said Deborah Barron of Americans
for Gun Safety, quoted in a Washington Post
article on Democrats’ playing down gun control. "Yes, I would. I've
always though Kucinich represents the voice
within the Democratic party which speaks for
workers … it was refreshing to see him here,"
said Danny
Glover when asked at a Florida event for
workers’ rights whether he would vote for
Kucinich who was on the program with him. “I want to make it very
clear that Dennis Kucinich was the first
opponent of the war,”
Dean told the
delegates to the New Hampshire AFL-CIO 46th
Constitutional Convention in setting the record
straight regarding his latest TV ad. “When I am President, I
am not going to leave one tax break for one
Benedict Arnold who takes his jobs overseas,”
said Sen. John
Kerry to a union rally in New Hampshire.
“Dean is from a rural
state. So he says, but I think he is more latte
than lunch-bucket,”
said Michael
Mahaffey, on Iowa Public Television’s Iowa Press
regarding Dean’s drawing large crowds in rural
Iowa. "I'll be around here
more than half the time between now and the
election," he
said of the Jan. 27 primary. "We're going
to take it to every family, to every school, to
every community in New Hampshire,"
said Howard
Dean when he opened his campaign office in New
Hampshire. "It will still be a
buzz campaign just because of the nature of how
he got in the race and who he is,"
Steve
Bouchard, who became General Clark's New
Hampshire campaign director after serving as
Senator Graham’s director, said. “But our
focus from an organizational perspective will
definitely be nuts and bolts." War protester Sharpton Vietnam service an
issue Gun issue dangerous for
Democrats Union loyalty Clark’s star Dean’s response Black support for Dean Dean’s new headquarters Bloggers love her Edwards setting the
record straight Lieberman faces defense Iowa, oh’ Iowa Bush re-election
advantage 911 problem Guards and Reserve
soldiers War protester Sharpton Democratic presidential
candidate Al Sharpton spoke out to the crowd today
in Washington D.C. protesting the Iraqi War to not
be content with the gradual withdrawal of U.S.
forces from Iraq. "Don't give Bush $87 billion,
don't give him 87 cents, give our troops a ride
home," Sharpton said to loud cheers from the
crowd. Vietnam service an issue The issue of military service is
explored in an
Associated Press story. The story explores the
generation shift from elected officials of World
War II to the Vietnam generation. Today’s
candidates for President all came of age in the
Vietnam era. Twenty-five of the 43 U.S. presidents
have served in the military. The high-flying
popularity of Wesley Clark is due to his four star
military service; while Howard Dean’s popularity
is due in no small part to his opposition to the
Iraqi War. Pat Towell, a visiting fellow at the
Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments,
said, "Big surprise, the kids that were in the
kinds of universities where you grow up and become
a senator and run for president weren't drafted."
Dean was assigned No. 143 for 1970 — a number that
was called up — but he was rejected after a
physical in February of that year. In an interview
with the AP, Dean said he had known since he was
in high school that he had an unfused vertebra, a
condition called spondylolysis. For further
details use the Associated Press link above. Gun issue dangerous for
Democrats "With gun rights come
responsibility" is the new mantra Democrat
political operatives and organization want
candidates to use when talking about gun issues.
The
Washington Post
covers the issue in Sunday’s edition: "Democrats
will be extinct in red states unless" they change
how gun owners view their party…” [said Deborah
Barron of Americans for Gun Safety, which is
tutoring candidates on the gun issue.] "…Red
states" is political shorthand for states
President Bush won. These red states have a
significantly higher percentage of gun owners than
the states Gore won in 2000, studies show. …The
centrist Democratic Leadership Council, which
helped moderate the party's image on trade and
taxes in the 1990s, is teaming with Americans for
Gun Safety to try to do the same for gun control.
Dean and most of his rivals have privately
consulted with one or both of the groups on a new
approach. Former American for Guns Safety
spokesman Matt Bennett recently signed on as
communications director for retired Army Gen.
Wesley K. Clark. …The big test for the candidates
will come as Congress begins considering whether
to extend the 1994 ban on some semiautomatic
weapons, which will expire next year. Some
congressional Democrats want to make the law
permanent and fold additional gun models and the
importation of high-ammunition clips into the ban.
But Bush favors a straight extension -- and that
is a position many of the candidates sound willing
to settle for. Union loyalty The Manchester
Union Leader reports on a Union rally in New
Hampshire yesterday where Democrat candidates
tried to outbid each other in their loyalty to the
union cause. Sen. John Kerry, former Vermont Gov.
Howard Dean, U.S. Reps. Dennis Kucinich and
Richard Gephardt, and Gen. Wesley Clark faced the
union delegation in separate appearances,
answering the same set of questions on trade, jobs
and health insurance. Gephardt participated by
telephone. More than 100 vocal union members
cheered relentlessly yesterday as five Democratic
Presidential Primary candidates pledged to create
jobs for the nation’s millions of unemployed and
to keep American jobs from going overseas. Clark’s star Wesley Clark was scheduled to be
at a fund-raiser for Iowa’s Secretary of State
Chet Culver, son of former U.S. Senator John
Culver, Saturday. So who showed up? Actor & Wesley
Clark supporter Ted Danson. Dean’s response Dean’s campaign manager Joe
Trippi pushed back against the charges of Dean’s
attack ads. "We know the American people
understand the difference between results and
rhetoric, and when other candidates distort
Governor Dean's record of results — as they have
for months — we're going to set the record
straight," Trippi wrote. Black support for Dean
Washington Times has a story indicating that
Dean could draw support from Blacks: Democratic
candidate Howard Dean's medical degree and
opposition to the war in Iraq are attracting black
politicians to his presidential campaign, even as
analysts say he lacks the political network to win
the black vote. Among would-be black voters, Dr.
Dean, a licensed internist, has an advantage over
his Democratic rivals on health care issues, said
David Bositis, chief researcher for the Joint
Center for Political and Economic Studies, a think
tank specializing in issues of interest to blacks.
Dean’s new headquarters The
New York Times is running a story concerning
Dean’s opening of his new campaign headquarters in
New Hampshire: "You don't know what you signed up
for," he warned. "You're going to work harder than
you've ever worked in your life, you're going to
carry a stronger message than you ever thought you
could carry and you're going to do more and reach
more and make more happen." They whooped and
hollered and with that. But Deanies, take note --
General Clark also officially opened his New
Hampshire campaign and vowed to take the state by
storm. Bloggers love her Zephyr Teachout, an energetic
wunderkind who is currently the Howard Dean
campaign's director of Internet outreach and
organizing, is wildly popular in the Dean
blogosphere world. There's even a nascent movement
to nominate her for vice president, according to
ABC’s embedded reporter Marc Ambinder. Edwards setting the record
straight Some responsible journalists are
trying to set the record straight on Edward’s
spending. The trouble began when Thursday's
Boston Globe said the Edwards campaign has
outspent all rivals in ad spending, has nothing to
show for it. This implied that Edwards was coming
up against his limits of spending in Iowa and New
Hampshire having spent 73% of allocated spending
limit in New Hampshire and 55% in Iowa. The record
shows Edwards is at 40% for Iowa and 33% New
Hampshire. Lieberman faces defense Lieberman on CBS Face the Nation
said that if he were President that he would
replace Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. He
reaffirmed his willingness to consider Republican
Sen. John McCain as his Secretary of Defense if
elected. He did not rule out McCain as his running
mate. In defense of his campaign he said that he
would run better than expected in New Hampshire
and win two states during the Feb. 3 round. Iowa, oh’ Iowa Thomas Beaumont, Des Moines
Register political reporter, takes an inventory of
the Iowa Caucuses and the effect of Joe Lieberman
and Wesley Clark’s departures and Bob Graham’s
dropping out. Beaumont points out that if
Lieberman or Clark win by bypassing Iowa that the
status of Iowa in the nominating process is
diminished. Given Lieberman’s low standing and
Clark’s bungling campaign, the likelihood of
either of these candidates seems to be slim and
none and slim doesn’t exist. Lieberman’s frank
talk and desire to be different has not garnered
him a larger following, but rather has placed him
to the far right of the field. Clark cannot seem
to get his voice whether because of laryngitis or
lack of cohesion and memory. The latest flap about
his advising a Democrat candidate for Congress to
support the Congressional War Resolution is just
one misstep among many. The significance of Iowa
is summed up well in a quote from the article:
"The political significance of the caucuses has
always depended much less on who wins Iowa's
delegates than on the reverberations the caucuses
generate in the national press and the general
public," said Princeton University political
science professor Larry Bartels. For further
information on the article go to:
Des Moines Register. Bush re-election advantage In a poll conducted for Cook
Political Report, Ipsos-Public Affairs surveyed
742 registered voters, 40 percent said they
definitely would vote for Bush if the presidential
election were today, 33 percent definitely would
vote against him and 24 percent would consider
someone else. In 2002, 50 percent said they would
definitely vote to re-elect Bush. The 40 percent
has been constant throughout 2003. The survey was
conducted Oct. 21-23, and has a sampling error
margin of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
911 problem The
New York Times has an article that shows
looming problems for the Bush administration. The
chairman of the 911 Commission, Thomas H. Kean
(the former Republican governor of New Jersey) is
threatening subpoenas of the White House. "Any
document that has to do with this investigation
cannot be beyond our reach," Mr. Kean said on
Friday in his first explicit public warning to the
White House that it risked a subpoena and a
politically damaging courtroom showdown with the
commission over access to the documents --
including Oval Office intelligence reports that
reached President Bush's desk in the weeks before
the Sept. 11 attacks. "I will not stand for it,"
Mr. Kean said in the interview in his offices at
Drew University, where he has been president since
1990. Guards and Reserve soldiers The Bush administration was
challenged by Sen. Patrick Leahy in the Democrat’s
weekly radio response. Leahy charged that the
administration is not taking care of our guard and
reserve soldiers.
Reuters News is carrying a story on the issue.
Excerpts: “Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, giving
the Democrats' weekly radio address, said the Bush
administration wants $87 billion to rebuild Iraq
and keep U.S. troops there but opposes a
Senate-passed measure to guarantee health care
coverage to all members of the Guard and Reserve.
"They say it's not related to the war effort. But
they're wrong," Leahy said. "And it's time for the
country to come together to support our
reservists, their families and their employers."
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