Daily Briefing - June 23, 2006

Posted at 8:12 AM on June 23, 2006 by Bob Collins

Slight seismic activity reported on Planet Politics today.

CBS News has a piece on its Web site this morning about the enthusiasm in the GOP toward retaining power in the Senate. It lists, of course, the Kennedy vs. Klobuchar race in Minnesota as one reason since victors can win here with 50 percent or less of the vote.

In the 5th District race, Keith Ellison has a release out today promoting a speech he's giving to National Association of Minority Contractors tonight. He's going to take on the "GOP's refusal to renew the Voting Rights Act," it says.

And the one Minnesotan politico-journalissimo never to cancel a lunch date with me -- Barry Casselman -- has his periodic column in the Washington Times today assessing the mid-terms at mid-campaigns.

Casselman looks at the MSM folks, looking for signs of a vanishing Republican, he says. And the bloggers, which he seems to equate only with the Kos crowd, and its distaste for Joe Lieberman.

The safari hunters in their pith helmets and stylish kahki jackets are still out there, sweating profusely in the early summer sun and combing the nation for their favorite endangered species. They could yet find one. Anything might happen in this strange political season, but so far they are encountering mostly contrary clues in the states of Washington, California, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, Maryland and New Jersey where incumbent or favored Democrats are unaccountably in trouble.

The netroots bloggers, back in their
air-conditioned home computer rooms, are
excited because they think they have found
another rare species — the aforementioned
centrist Democrat on his way to extinction in
Connecticut. Their line of political theory goes
this way: If the centrist Democrat becomes
extinct, the U.S. will be out of Iraq in a flash,
and the country will, as a consequence, elect a
left-wing Democrat as president in 2008.

I highlighted the phrase above only because if there's one vanishing species in Minnesota, it is the incumbent Democrat. So it's hard to find one that's "in trouble." As for one that's favored, well, it's hard to find them too, let alone one that's in trouble.

And how can you be favored and in trouble at the same time? These questions can only be answered at the St. Paul Hotel lunch buffet, I'm afraid.

In Washington, a weak line-item veto has been sent to President Bush. It gives the power to the president to kill pork barrel spending. I suppose it's important to point out that the Senate and Congress has the power to kill pork barrel spending too, but they just can't seem to stop themselves. This reminds me of days when the Minnesota House and Senate were on slightly better terms. The House would occasionally pass some garbage legislation, knowing full well that the Senate would bail them out and clean it up. (I refer to these as "grenades.") With this bill, I wonder if there's more incentive now to actually put more pork into bills, knowing that there's someone that will clean up the mess?

Since Iraq is now the method of choice for the "campaigning" part of legislating in Washington, it's becoming clear that the 2008 presidential election will most definitely be a referendum on Iraq, just as 2004 was. The AP has a story out today with the views of potential candidates.

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