P2008 DEM DEBATE: Talk about tame. The first Democratic Presidential Debate in South Carolina on Thursday evening was an overly polite, friendly exchange that probably changed very few minds. Some observations: (1) Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both easily held their places as the top tier candidates; (2) John Edwards' safe performance was fine, but won't do much to help keep him keep pace with Clinton and Obama; (3) Joe Biden sounded pretty good, pretty Presidential, but didn't do enough yet to break himself out of the second tier; (4) Bill Richardson and Chris Dodd failed to make themselves stand apart from their second tier rivals; and (5) Dennis Kucinich will face a real fight in the third tier with Mike Gravel for the votes of the more leftist party activists.
GONZALES: John McCain became the latest Republican Senator to call for embattled Attorney General Al Gonzales to resign. "I am very disappointed in his performance. I think loyalty to the President should enter into his calculations," he said to CNN. He is the first GOP Presidential hopeful to call for Gonzales to step down.
FLORIDA: RNC Chair Mel Martinez failed last month at pressuring his fellow Florida Republicans to back down from their support for the bipartisan legislation to bust the official Presidential primary schedule and move Florida forward to the whichever Tuesday follows the New Hampshire primary (January 29, based upon NH's current intended date). Now the DNC is attempting the same threats against the Florida Dems. DNC Chair Howard Dean on Thursday told the Mortgage Bankers Association that it looks like Florida is the state most likely to break the official DNC/RNC sanctioned schedule. "If they do, our rules are so strict that not only will those states not collect any delegates, but anybody that campaigns in that state will be ineligible for any delegates from that state. We will reapportion their delegates to all the other candidates if they show up in a state that jumps ahead of February 5," threatened Dean. According to the AP, leaders of both the Florida Republican Party and Florida Democratic Party say "losing delegates is less important than having more influence in the nation's leadership" by holding a pre-February 5 primary. Governor Charlie Crist (R) has also endorsed the legislation.
GEORGIA: Candidate filing closed Thursday for the CD-10 special election to replace the late Congressman Charlie Norwood (R). Ten filed to run, including State Senator Jim Whitehead (R), physician Paul Broun Jr. (R), political consultant Bill Greene (R), wealthy former Yahoo executive Jim Marlow (D), psychotherapist Jim Sendelbach (Libertarian), plus three more Republicans and two more Democrats. Whitehead is the favorite to win, although Marlow has the personal financial resources to possibly the make the open primary race somewhat competitive. All ten candidates will appear on the June 19 primary ballot in alphabetical order. The election is a non-partisan contest, although each candidate’s party affiliation will be listed on the ballot. If no candidate receives a majority of the vote, the top two will advance to a run-off election on July 17. Click here to view the Georgia page to see the entire list of candidates and links to their websites.
Posted by Ron Gunzburger
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