One in the eye for those of us who tease politicians for self-importantly retaining their security guards long after leaving office.

Al Gore recently went on holiday to Italy, having decided - for the first time since becoming Vice-President in 1992 - to travel without the services of his heavies.

His reward? "The Gores were robbed while staying in a luxurious villa in Castellina," says my man in Chiantishire. "One of the neighbours went in to sympathise, and Al told him that the thieves had taken about £25,000 worth of valuables. Apparently, he was going on and on about what a fool he'd been for leaving his bodyguards behind."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 11:37 AM -

Time Warner Inc. chairman Dick Parsons Friday described Fox News Channel as "crazy people exchanging views," telling a group of minority journalists in Washington he felt that the channel and his own Cable News Network are two different services.

When asked by Univision Anchor Jorge Ramos why CNN was losing the ratings battle with Fox, he was not ready to concede that. He said that Fox was more like talk radio on TV, which meant that its viewers stayed longer because people tended to "come and sit down for an hour or two and listen to crazy people exchange views." CNN actually draws more viewers, he said, but said they were grazers who didn't stay long.

Parsons said he did not feel CNN was liberal, but instead has a bias for the truth.

He conceded that journalists are often perceived as liberal because they tend to challenge the establishment.

He did not make an overt comparison with Fox, but he did say that his news operation "does not give a corporate slant to its journalism. We don't tell them how to report."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:17 PM -

“The Globe is a Times wannabe, but it can’t quite pull it off,” Chandler said last week, as he sat in his office. “We are just trying to extract some news from an event where there isn’t any. We knew that the Globe was going to give it a big blow job. If I produced a newspaper as boring as the Globe, I’d kill myself.”

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:08 PM -

John Kerry has finally started to give us the details of what he would have done differently from George Bush and how he would fight the war on terror. If it had been The Poodle instead of Bush talking to those school children in Florida on September 11th, instead of remaining calm while further information was gathered, he would have jumped up and screamed "Holy S__t! We're being attacked" and run from the room.
...
OK ... let's pick this one apart. Here is what Kerry said to the Unity conference: "First of all, had I been reading to children and had my top aid whispered in my ear 'America is under attack,' I would have told those kids very politely and nicely that the President of the United States had something that he needed to attend to." This, of course, was followed by cheers and loud applause from the "journalists."

Cheap Michael Moorish shot. First of all, Bush was not told that "America is under attack." He was told that an airplane had struck one of the World Trade Towers. The second airplane had not yet struck. President Bush had no idea it was a terrorist attack. What good would it have done to run screaming out of the classroom? Even the principal at the time, a Democrat, said she felt it was an unfair attack and that Bush did the right thing. She says she didn't vote for Bush, but on that day she would have.
...
It's the standard line of The Poodle....I didn't like the way George Bush did something, but my only suggestion is that I would do it better. Whatever.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:44 AM -

The WashPost headline on the Swift Boat vets ad today is "McCain Criticizes Ad Attacking Kerry on Vietnam War Record." On the Post home page, it's merely "McCain Defends Kerry Again." Not only does this obscure the fact that it's Vietnam veterans who served with Kerry making the charges, it almost completely ignores the charges. Isn't this a second-day headline? It's either that, or a very biased way of telling viewers "Warning! Scurrilous Ad! McCain Denounces! Don't Pay Attention!" The story doesn't even address what the ad says until paragraph 8, and it does not include one statement from the Swift Boat vets and not one quote from the ad itself. A disgraceful performance.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:39 AM -

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:10 AM -

Horsepucky.

Every vet in the ad says, "I served with John Kerry," but not one of them claims to have been in his boat. Most of the men are other swiftboat captains. They've been open and clear in their statements that they served in other swift boats operating within 50 yards on Kerry's side, and their statements are their observations on serving alongside him, not under him.

NR's own Byron York had the scoop on Louis Letson, the doctor, months ago. The Kerry letter insists that Letson is a "phony" because he didn't sign Kerry's sick call sheet.

The Los Angeles Times looked at the who-signed-the-form controversy back in May:

"Meehan questioned Letson's role, saying a J.C. Carreon signed Kerry's medical report of the wound. "This gentleman is not the man who is on the report," he said. Letson said that Carreon, a lower-ranked "hospitalman," was "present at the time and he, in fact, made the entry into Lt. Kerry's medical record."

Bad move, Team Kerry. The letter from the lawyers turns this into a bigger story, and the argument that these men are "phony" doesn't seem all that strong.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:17 PM -

John Edwards: "If you have any question about what John Kerry is made of, just spend 3 minutes with the men who served with him."

Al French: "I served with John Kerry."

Bob Elder: "I served with John Kerry."

George Elliott: "John Kerry has not been honest about what happened in Vietnam."

Al French: "He is lying about his record."

Louis Letson: "I know John Kerry is lying about his first Purple Heart because I treated him for that injury."

Van O'Dell: "John Kerry lied to get his bronze star ... I know, I was there, I saw what happened."

Jack Chenoweth: "His account of what happened and what actually happened are the difference between night and day."

Admiral Hoffman: "John Kerry has not been honest."

Adrian Lonsdale: "And he lacks the capacity to lead."

Larry Thurlow: "When the chips were down, you could not count on John Kerry."

Bob Elder: "John Kerry is no war hero."

Grant Hibbard: "He betrayed all his shipmates ... he lied before the Senate."

Shelton White: "John Kerry betrayed the men and women he served with in Vietnam."

Joe Ponder: "He dishonored his country ... he most certainly did."

Bob Hildreth: "I served with John Kerry ...

Bob Hildreth (off-camera): John Kerry cannot be trusted."

Announcer: "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth is responsible for the content of this advertisement."

The lawyers are careful not to demand that the ads be pulled. That's because they know they can't. Instead, they "request" that the ad be refused, and they use words like "libelous" to scare the broadcasters. And then they order the broadcasters to call them "promptly" to tell them what they've decided. If I was one of the broadcasters, I'd use the letter for toilet paper and FedEx them a photo of it.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 4:48 PM -

John Edwards: "If you have any question about what John Kerry is made of, just spend 3 minutes with the men who served with him."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:28 AM -

The time has long past for Teresa Heinz Kerry to end the free ride she has been enjoying ever since she used her immense inherited wealth for the second time in less than eight years to resuscitate her husband's faltering political career. She needs to reveal the details of her finances, which Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry has deftly exploited to his maximum political benefit — first during his tightly contested 1996 Senate race and then during this year's Democratic presidential primaries and caucuses.

In May, Mrs. Heinz Kerry accused Vice President Cheney of being "unpatriotic." This week she asserted that enthusiasts for Bush-Cheney "want four more years of hell." Fair enough. But if Mrs. Heinz Kerry insists on simultaneously playing the three roles of "sugar mommy," pit-bull and speechifying partisan environmentalist, then she ought to play by the same rules to which all the recent spouses of prospective presidents and vice presidents have adhered. Let the voters have access to her financial affairs, including her tax returns for 2002, the latest year for which she has filed.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:21 AM -

In the weeks leading up to the Democratic convention, Senator John Kerry's campaign aides worried that the senator would have to begin spending his $75 million in public financing a month earlier than President Bush. They even flirted with the idea that he would delay accepting the nomination so he could keep raising and spending millions of dollars on advertising throughout August.

But August has brought a spate of what seemed to be Kerry advertisements every day. To a voter's eye, the senator's campaign marches on seamlessly - and usually on message. And the campaign is not a penny poorer for it.

The advertisements introduced this week were not paid for by Mr. Kerry's campaign, but from a newly formed arm of the Democratic Party, which is running a $6.5 million advertising campaign in Missouri and 19 others this week, and The Media Fund, which is running a $2.5 million campaign in five swing states, and the New Democratic Network, which is spending $500,000 on Spanish-language commercials in 11 cities. The advertisements from the campaign and the party are in many ways similar, emphasizing words like "win,'' "strength" and "alliances."

For the second time this campaign season outside groups that are not legally allowed to coordinate with Mr. Kerry's campaign are riding to its rescue at a crucial time in its advertising campaign against President Bush - the most expensive on record.

Yet this time around the spots from outside liberal and Democratic groups have dovetailed almost perfectly with the messages of the Kerry campaign - sticking largely to health care, jobs and the Iraq war - prompting occasional accusations of collusion from Republicans.

Democrats and outside analysts said an extraordinary level of party unity against Mr. Bush had prompted the outside groups to toe Mr. Kerry's line, or at least to try their best without directly speaking with his aides.

Ms. Moran said she had gone so far as to stop socializing with colleagues with the Democratic Party or the Kerry campaign.

"I'm in a bunker,'' she said. "It's a lonely existence, but that's where we are right now.''

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:16 AM -

9:15 a.m. CDT - Sen. John F. Kerry takes a 25-minute bike ride in Milwaukee, where he held a rally the night before. Leaving the hotel, he is accompanied on his ride by two Secret Service bikers, two Secret Service SUVs, about a dozen motorcycle cops and a few police cars with sirens blaring.

4 p.m. - The Kerry bus tour stops in Monroe, Wis., for stops at a cheese store and tavern and then a tour of the Huber Brewery. Kerry gets some chili, Heinz Kerry has a cheese sandwich and buys some cheese on the way out. They step outside and chat with the brewmaster, then both have some beer - but no more cheese.

6 p.m. - The bus tour rolls along rural roads throughout southern Wisconsin as people watch from their front porches or gather to wave from the sidewalks of small towns. At one point, Kerry sticks his head out the bus window and inexplicably holds out two ears of corn.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 5:18 PM -

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 1:14 PM -

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posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 12:06 PM -

As Noemi Emery put it in the Weekly Standard, Kerry is not just "the richest man ever to run on a national ticket", but also "the most self-indulgent in his lifestyle, and the most quasi-royal in his sense of himself".

That gives a whiff of condescension to his chant of "Help Is On The Way", a slogan already a tad too crudely nanny-statish. On the other hand, it's a very good catchphrase for Senator Kerry if he's back at the 15th-century ski chalet in Idaho and Teresa is complaining because she rang for a Scotch five minutes ago. "Don't be so impatient, lovie. The help is on the way."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:49 AM -

Sharon Stone blames US President George W Bush for the absence of a lesbian kissing scene in Catwoman - because of the current conservative climate in America.

Basic Instinct star Stone, 46, was keen to enjoy an intimate moment with Oscar-winning co-star Halle Berry, but believes a puritanical streak running through the country put an end to any potential girl-on-girl action.

Stone says: "Halle's so beautiful and I wanted to kiss her. I said, 'How can you have us in the movie and not have us kiss? That's such a waste.'

"That's what you get for having George Bush as president."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:33 AM -

"Everything is at stake!" Kerry told thousands of supporters who packed into Pere Marquette Park and lined the opposite side of the river. "Jobs! Health care! Education! Civil liberties! Civil rights! The Constitution! Social Security! Medicare! Our children! The environment! Our future! All of it is on the line."

The high-stakes intensity of the campaign could also be seen Monday in noisy confrontations between Kerry and Bush supporters and the use of bullhorns and air horns by a small group of Bush supporters to try to disrupt the speeches, prompting Kerry and his wife to respond to what the candidate termed "goons."
...
"We don't want to be drowned out," Kerry said. "I want to thank George Bush for sending the goons here tonight to excite us to do a little more work! Thank you!"

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:50 AM -

If John Kerry loses Michigan, he will probably blame it on his joke writers, then Woody Hayes and the mighty Ohio State Buckeyes. But he only has himself to blame. He should have used that several-decade gap between his job in Vietnam and his job of running for president boning up on his knowledge of sports. The Prowler has documented several examples thus far, and over weekend Kerry really goofed up.

At that point, before all the boos began raining down upon him, Kerry seemed to realize his error. In an attempt to silent the angry crowd of University of Michigan supporters, Kerry said, "But that was while I was in Ohio. I know I'm in the state of Michigan and you got a great big M and a powerhouse of a team." Then his face, presumably, the Botox permitting, turned Big Blue.

Very briefly the Kerry campaign considered sending potential first lady Terry Kerry into New York on Monday to visit the New York Stock Exchange or the Citicorp building, both of which were under increased security due to potential terrorism threats.

"We nixed it when we realized she might actually have to interact with real people in an unstaged event," says a Kerry advance staffer.

The Kerry camp is looking to pull Mrs. Kerry back after a slew of miscues, including what even the campaign now believes was a potentially disastrous convention speech for the woman who wants to be first lady. That was followed by Mrs. Kerry's claim that a cookie recipe submitted under her name to a "first lady bake off" contest organized by a national magazine was sent in by a possible political enemy.
...
For months there has been internal debate how best to use Terry Kerry in the campaign, and it now appears that the best way may be no way. "She's more willing to appear as the supportive wife than, say, Hillary was on the campaign trail," says the advance staffer. "But it's a limited upside for us. Unless it's in a real controlled setting, I don't think we want her out there too often."

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 9:18 AM -

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Inez Tenenbaum held a conference call with reporters Monday to pitch a TV ad that bemoaned the loss of South Carolina jobs overseas.

Oops.

Tenenbaum learned during the call that her own teleconference had been contracted out to workers in Canada.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:34 AM -

When Kerry bounced the ceremonial first pitch of a Yankees - Red Sox game in the dirt, it was only because he "held back" and "tried to lob it gently" out of concern for the National Guard soldier and Iraq veteran who was standing in as catcher.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 7:47 AM -

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posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 6:25 PM -

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 5:04 PM -

A week ago tonight, I asked Teresa Heinz Kerry a simple question here: "What did you mean?" And a wicked firestorm was sparked. Incredibly, most of it was directed against me.

Entertainer Patti Labelle told the Boston Herald that Heinz Kerry "should've pimp-slapped" me.

Molly Ivins either repeated or created the myth that I had grabbed the possible future first lady. I didn't touch her.

Bombastic, fact-challenged liberal filmmaker Michael Moore supposedly called me "rude."

A friend told me that Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor of The Nation, a leftist journal, said the exchange was the result of a long-running personal feud between Heinz Kerry and myself. That's absurd, patently; I don't run in those circles.

Longtime liberal national political columnist Jack Germond -- now retired and a convention "guest" who was shilling for his new book -- told CNN's Judy Woodruff that I was "not a legitimate newspaperman."

Ms. Woodruff allowed the slander to pass without challenge. Mr. Germond's wife, Alice, is secretary for the Democratic National Committee, noted a profile published before the incident in Editor & Publisher, a trade magazine.

I report, you decide.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 11:20 AM -

Naked Ambition Lunch

Okay, I can understand wanting to eat something better than Wendy's chili. Heck, even us unwashed Walmart Scum that infest the voting world with our parochial ideas of love and war occasionally lift our eyes to the Wendy's menu and dream of steak instead of chili. But that does NOT mean that we are stupid. Stupid defined as:

if we ordered food for ourselves at a five-star restaurant, we wouldn't stop at a Wendy's to go pretend to order lunch, then interrupt a Marine's meal for a photo-op.

Hell, these boys are going to Iraq, how about you buy THEM the five star meal?

Why of course no! The shrimp vindallo, sea scallops, prosciutto, steak salad and "wrapped stuffed chicken" are for the parties of Mr. Kerry, Mr. Edwards, and Mr. Affleck, you goose. Back to the buses!

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:52 PM -

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:39 PM -

His default position is the conventional wisdom of the Massachusetts Left: on foreign policy, foreigners know best; on trade, the labour unions know best; on government, bureaucrats know best; on defence, graying ponytailed nuclear-freeze reflex anti-militarists know best; on the wine list, he knows best.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:46 AM -

While Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry and his running mate, John Edwards, and their families were having a “lite” lunch at Wendy’s in the Town of Newburgh Friday, drumming up local support right after the national convention in Boston, their real lunches were waiting on their bus.

A member of the Kerry advance team called Nikola’s Restaurant at the Newburgh Yacht Club the night before and ordered 19 five-star lunches to go that would be picked up at noon Friday. Management at the restaurant, which is operated by CIA graduate chef Michael Dederick, was told the meals would be for the Kerry and Edwards families and actor Ben Affleck who was with them on the tour.

posted by Cracker Barrel Philosopher at 8:01 AM -