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Mayor Bloomberg bolts  

First published: Thursday, June 21, 2007

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg made billions of dollars in the private sector by filling a need in the financial information market. Now he apparently sees a need on the national political front, for a leader who can get things done. By formally leaving the Republican Party, the mayor could be opening the way for a possible independent run for the White House.
Time will tell. But Mr. Bloomberg is certainly right when he says the American public wants leadership in Washington. Congress continues to be bogged down in partisan wrangling over major issues, and the White House seems continually at odds with congressional leaders. The result is gridlock.

By contrast, Mayor Bloomberg has a record of getting things done, often in the face of strong opposition. Most recently, he's been in the forefront on environmental issues, including a proposal to improve air quality by charging drivers a fee for using congested Manhattan streets. He's been in the forefront on health issues as well. He led the push to ban smoking in New York City restaurants and, more recently, the ban on trans fats in restaurant meals.

And he considered himself a Republican? In truth, Mr. Bloomberg, who joined the party to run for mayor, never seemed comfortable wearing the GOP label. Unlike many successful business leaders who are faithful Republicans, Mr. Bloomberg did not blindly follow the Republican mantra that tax cuts are the solution to all problems. One of his first acts after assuming office was to raise taxes to close a $6.4 billion municipal deficit he had inherited from Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Close it he did.

Mortimer Zuckerman, writing in the latest issue of U.S. News & World Report, notes how critics warned at the time that because Mayor Bloomberg raised taxes during a recession, businesses and jobs would flee the city. They were wrong. Today, New York City's economy is booming, unemployment is at a record low, tourism is up, and there is a budget surplus.

Not surprisingly, New Yorkers have given Mr. Bloomberg higher approval ratings than those for Mr. Giuliani. But whether his popularity at home will translate into a national voter base remains to be seen. Indeed, for all his accomplishments, he remains much less widely known than his predecessor, who is recognized as the mayor who helped his city recover from 9/11.

The question, then, is whether Mr. Bloomberg can present himself to voters as a viable alternative to the candidates seeking the 2008 presidential nomination. For now, though, he has shaken up national politics, and that's not a bad thing.

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Obama fundraiser held at legendary rock club
Young supporters courted with beer, words of hope and history
BY MEGHAN BARR The Associated Press

   NEW YORK — Save for the American flag backdrop and the presidential candidate onstage, Sen. Barack Obama’s fundraiser could have been mistaken for a rock concert. Beer was served in plastic cups, the young crowd snapped photographs with cellphones and a deafening roar of approval met Obama at the Hammerstein Ballroom — a venue known for rock rather than rubber chicken.
   The event Friday night mirrored the Obama campaign’s aura — youthful, polished and filled with idealistic talk of the future. Invoking the successes of the civil rights movement, he challenged the crowd, which consisted mostly of people under 40, to get involved in politics.
   “There’s a wind that’s blowing,” said Obama, who was introduced by folk singer Ben Harper. “The air is stirring. People are waking out of their slumber.”
   Obama’s speech encompassed most of his campaign talking points, including the need for universal health care, reforming public education and ending the war in Iraq.
   “And while we’re at it, we’re gonna close Guantanamo,” he said, referring to the detention facility for terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Human rights advocates and foreign leaders have repeatedly called for c l o s i n g t h e prison, which has become a crucible for criticism of the Bush administration. The White House said Friday that President Bush has made closing the prison a priority.
   Obama also advocated increasing fuel efficiency in automobiles to 45 miles per gallon to combat global warming. The Senate voted Thursday to boost average fuel economy by 40 percent, to 35 miles per gallon, for cars, SUVs and pickup trucks by 2020.
   Obama poked fun at his “politics of hope” refrain, joking, “They think I’m a hope peddler — a hope monger.” Yet his speech sometimes sounded like a college history lecture, with hope being the central theme, as he vividly described the seminal voting rights march from Selma, Ala., to Montgomery, Ala., in 1965.
   “We bring about change by millions of voices coming together,” he told the crowd of about 500. Cheers erupted when Obama related a story of his first night as a Columbia University student years ago, when he slept in an alley next to a homeless man due to a housing mix-up.
   “He’s young and energetic,” said Amber Gaines, 31, of Belleville, N.J. “He has fresh ideas. He’s not corrupt yet.”
   Jordan Thomas, a coordinator for the grassroots group Brooklyn For Barack, disputed a recent Associated Press-Ipsos poll that showed Obama trailing rival Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton among lower-income, less-educated Democrats.
   “That hasn’t been my experience in working-class neighborhoods,” Thomas said.
   A few blocks downtown, Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards spoke to about 200 supporters at a grassroots campaign function at a nightclub. He gave a detailed, policy-laden speech that focused heavily on fighting poverty.
   “We desperately need universal health care,” he said, pointing to a detailed plan he has laid out for achieving that goal. Edwards emphasized re-establishing America as a “moral leader” and urged Congress to set a timetable for ending the war in Iraq. “George Bush will never change unless he’s forced to change,” he said. Edwards also addressed the prison in Guantanamo Bay: “On the first day I’m president of the United States, if it’s still open, I will close Guantanamo,” he said.

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“And while we’re at it, we’re gonna close Guantanamo,”

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3 New Yorkers too many for presidential race?
Many voters across country left fl at by Empire State choices
BY LARRY MCSHANE The Associated Press

   NEW YORK — New Yorkers: They’re smug, egotistical, and already think they run the country (if not the world). So what’s the rest of the nation to do now that three of ’em are mentioned as White House hopefuls, ready to swap Penn Station for Pennsylvania Avenue?
   Cringe? Clap? Or just consider somebody else?
   “That’s pretty sick,” said Norm Whipple, 59, of Los Angeles, offering a wry grin about the presidential prospects of Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton, Republican Rudy Giuliani and unaffiliated New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. “Someone has to keep an eye on those New Yorkers.”
   The specter of an all-New York November 2008 was raised when Bloomberg, a titular Republican since his 2001 mayoral run, announced last week that he was quitting the GOP to become an independent.
   His predecessor, Giuliani, is running for the Republican nomination for president, while second-term New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is among the Democratic hopefuls.
   While New Yorkers are all too aware of the differences among the Big Apple’s big three, folks beyond the Hudson River were not as certain.
   “I think basically they are the same candidate,” said Bob Haus, a Republican from Des Moines, Iowa. “We all love New York. But when our options are New York, New York, New York, I think people want to see a different life experience.”
   Angeles Perry,
   ,
Vegas, saw more similarities than differences among the New York triumvirate.
   “They have the money,” said the retiree from California’s Silicon Valley. “And they all have big egos.”
   She’s right.
   Billionaire Bloomberg spent more than $155 million for his two mayoral campaigns, and reports indicated he could drop $500 million on a presidential campaign — despite his repeated and coy refusals to announce a candidacy.
   Giuliani and Clinton have millions of dollars on hand. None shrinks from the national spotlight, although it’s shone a little brighter on some than others.
   “I know nothing about Bloomberg,” said Belinda Abelar, 51, a nurse from Los Angeles. “Can you tell me something?”
   Although the nation’s most populous city is regarded by many — including its residents — as the nation’s financial, fashion and cultural capital, it has rarely served as a catapult to the White House. Mayor John Lindsay’s Democratic presidential bid in 1972 was the most recent failure.
   Statewide office offered little promise, either: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, elected in 1932, was the last governor elected president. Oft-mentioned Mario Cuomo, a Democrat, never mounted a campaign, and talk about his GOP successor, George Pataki, making the move was just talk.
   Attorney Felix Lasarte, 36, brought his 9-year-old daughter to see Giuliani speak last week in Hialeah, Fla. He was not bothered by the concept of three New Yorkers vying for the presidency; he even thought their Empire State pedigree was a plus.
   “Coming from a big city, it really helps the candidate to address the issues that are really relevant to the country,” Lasarte said. “Certainly on issues of safety and terrorists, it helps if you’re from New York.”
   As some people noted, two of the three are not New Yorkers anyway: Giuliani was born in Brooklyn, but Clinton hails from Illinois and Bloomberg still bears a trace of his Boston accent.
   “They just happen to be living in the New York area,” said Marvin Hall, 57, of Chicago. Hall said he is more concerned with the abilities than their addresses, although a fellow Windy City resident wondered if too many candidates from adjoining zip codes was a good idea.
   “It doesn’t give me heartburn, or cause concern, but you know what?” said Mary Tripoli, a Chicago court clerk. “I don’t think it’s a great idea. For one thing, it’s not really representative of the nation.”

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Richard Cohen
History points to trouble for Democrats
Richard Cohen is a nationally syndicated columnist.

   There are two ways to predict the winner of the 2008 presidential race: Check the polls or read some history. The polls tell you that with George Bush’s approval ratings abysmally low, with the war in Iraq becoming increasingly unpopular, with the GOP lacking a dominant candidate, and with the party divided over immigration, social issues and even religion (Mitt Romney’s Mormonism), the next president is bound to be a Democrat. History begs to differ.
   The history I have in mind is 1972. By the end of that year, 56,841 Americans had been killed in Vietnam, a war that almost no one thought could still be won and which no one could quite figure out how to end. Nevertheless, the winner in that year’s presidential election was Richard M. Nixon. He won 49 of 50 states — and the war, of course, went on.
   Just as it is hard to understand how the British ousted Winston Churchill after he had led them to victory in Europe in World War II, so it may be hard now to appreciate how Nixon won such a landslide while presiding over such a dismal war. In the first place, he was the incumbent, with all its advantages, and with enormous amounts of money at his disposal. In the second place, back then the Vietnam War was not as unpopular as you might think — or, for that matter, as the Iraq War now is. In 1972, almost 60 percent of Americans approved the way Nixon was handling the war.
   Maybe more to the point, most Americans did not endorse the way the Democrats would handle the war — nor the way the anti-war movement was behaving. Nixon seized on those sentiments and, in a feat that historians will be challenged to explain, characterized George McGovern as a sissy. In fact, the Democratic presidential nominee was a genuine World War II hero, a B-24 pilot with 35 combat missions under his belt and a Distinguished Flying Cross on his chest. Nixon, in contrast, had served during the war but never saw combat. He had, however, seen the polls.
   This is similar to what happened in the 2004 campaign. The George Bush-private Cheney ticket consisted of two Vietnam slackers. Bush had served in the Air National Guard and Cheney had obtained five draft deferments. Their opponent was the muchdecorated John Kerry — Silver Star, Bronze Star and three Purple Hearts. Yet during the campaign, the Republican ticket and its allies in the Swift Boat Veterans movement managed to paint Kerry as a quivering liar. The character attack was so bold, so outrageous, that it of course worked.
   Now we come to the current race. The war in Iraq is not — or not yet — an issue for Republicans. With the exception of Ron Paul, they all more or less support the president. It is among the Democrats that the war is a divisive issue — John Edwards sniping at Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and Obama sniping at both. Everyone now opposes the war, but the issue is not so much their positions as much as the intensity of their feelings. Antiwar Democrats in key primary and caucus states, particularly New Hampshire and Iowa, will not vote for a lukewarm anti-war candidate. This accounts for why Clinton recently reversed herself and voted to end funding for the war. The one presidential candidate from the Senate who did not was Joseph Biden. He said he opposed the war but saw no choice but to fund the troops.
   Precisely right, Joe. But more than right, prescient as well. As if to suggest what an issue this will become, Rudolph Giuliani called Clinton’s vote a “significant fl ip-flop.” Since then the Republicans have mostly trained their fire on each other. You can bet, though, that if Clinton gets the nomination, this vote will be hung around her neck and the hoariest of cliches will be trotted out: weak on defense. It will have added resonance because Clinton is a woman.
   This is where history raises it ugly head. The GOP is adept at painting Democrats as soft on national security. It is equally adept at saying so in the most scurrilous way. And while most Americans would like the war to end, they do not favor a precipitous withdrawal and neither have they forgotten Sept. 11, 2001 — the entirety of Giuliani’s case for the presidency, after all.
   Will history trump the polls? It will, if as in the past, the Democratic Party so wounds itself fighting the war against the war, it nominates a candidate beloved by a minority but mistrusted by a majority. It has happened before.  

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Elizabeth Edwards latest liberal to cave on 'gay marriage,' says LaBarbera

Jim Brown
OneNewsNow.com
June 26, 2007

A pro-family leader says the wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards has sent a terrible message to young people. On Sunday, Elizabeth Edwards kicked off San Francisco's annual "homosexual pride" parade by voicing support for same-sex "marriage."

Mrs. Edwards voiced her stance -- which conflicts with that of her husband, who supports homosexual civil unions but not marriages -- while speaking to an influential Democratic organization in San Francisco the morning of the parade. "I don't know why someone else's marriage has anything to do with me," Edwards said. "I'm completely comfortable with gay marriage."

An Illinois-based family advocate believes the wife of the former North Carolina senator is inflicting great damage by making such remarks. "A sad thing about what Elizabeth Edwards said is that she is a role model," says Peter LaBarbera of Americans for Truth Action. "And young children, for example, look up to what she says.

"The more these liberals talk about homosexual marriage being okay and [that there is] nothing wrong with it, the more they're teaching children that this terrible thing -- the destruction of marriage, the radical redefinition of marriage to accommodate immoral behavior -- is okay," he adds.

LaBarbera contends that once politicians advocate homosexual relationships, it is only a matter of time before they promote same-sex marriage. "We knew that it would not take long for the liberal politicians to go from domestic partnerships to civil unions to full, outright, so-called 'gay marriage' -- and that's precisely what's happened," he says. "We're seeing the complete cave-in of liberal ideology on this issue. They are disposing of all pretense of opposition to homosexuality ...."

LaBarbera also wonders how Edwards can profess Christianity and yet support something God calls an abomination. He says she should have a "big problem" with that. He contends that all aspects of the homosexual agenda must be resisted, starting with sexual-orientation and gender-identity laws.

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Pastor says Obama abandoned campaign promise by condemning 'Christian Right'
Jim Brown
OneNewsNow.com
June 26, 2007

The head of the Christian Defense Coalition says Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has taken political dialogue to a new low by "demeaning, mocking and belittling" the faith of millions of evangelical Christians.
Over the weekend, Senator Obama (D-Illinois) accused evangelical Christian leaders of "hijacking faith" and politicizing religious beliefs in an effort to divide the country. Obama told the national meeting of the liberal United Church of Christ denomination that the "Christian Right" has exploited its stance on several hot-button issues to attack the Democratic Party.

"Faith got hijacked, partly because of the so-called leaders of the Christian Right, all too eager to exploit what divides us," the Illinois senator said. "At every opportunity, they've told evangelical Christians that Democrats disrespect their values and dislike their church, while suggesting to the rest of the country that religious Americans care only about issues like abortion and gay marriage, school prayer, and intelligent design." He added: "I don't know what Bible they're reading, but it doesn't jibe with my version."

Pastor Pat Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition, says Obama's comments were a "cheap attack" on what the Illinois Democrat viewed as an open target.

"Senator Obama, when he entered the race, promised to bring a new tone to Washington, DC, and a new tone to presidential campaigning -- and that was not to be harsh, not to be divisive, not to be negative," the Christian minister notes. "And here, he literally attacks millions of evangelical Christians, saying that they are trying to divide; that they have co-opted the Christian faith."

Mahoney contends it is Obama who is doing the "dividing." The Coalition leader cites a oneness he says he has witnessed on moral issues.

"Historic Christianity and evangelical Christians have been unified in their commitment towards the protection of innocent human life, the sanctity and dignity of human life, and protecting women from the violence of abortion," he says. "The evangelical community has been one voice in terms of saying that marriage is between a man and a woman."

Mahoney says Obama, who is trailing Senator Hillary Clinton (D- New York) in national polls, is "veering hard to the left to win more delegates for the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party."

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"Christian Right" has exploited its stance on several hot-button issues to attack the Democratic Party.

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Mrs. Edwards voiced her stance -- which conflicts with that of her husband, who supports homosexual civil unions but not marriages -- while speaking to an influential Democratic organization in San Francisco the morning of the parade. "I don't know why someone else's marriage has anything to do with me," Edwards said. "I'm completely comfortable with gay marriage."

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Over the weekend, Senator Obama (D-Illinois) accused evangelical Christian leaders of "hijacking faith" and politicizing religious beliefs in an effort to divide the country.

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Obama raises $32.5M to lead Democratic presidential pack
BY JIM KUHNHENN The Associated Press

   WASHINGTON — Sen. Barack Obama reported Sunday raising at least $32.5 million for his presidential campaign from April through June, a record for a Democratic candidate.
   That is about $5 million more than what Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama’s main Democratic rival, has said she would raise for the reporting period that ended Saturday.
   At least $31 million of Obama’s total is for party primaries, according to campaign aides. That fi gure could further distance Obama from Clinton, whose fundraising has included significant sums of money eligible only for the general election.
   The first-term senator from Illinois received donations from more than 154,000 individual contributors and through the first half of the year had 258,000 donors, an extraordinary figure at this stage of the campaign. Obama raised $25.7 million in the first three months of the year.
Clinton Obama
   “Together, we have built the largest grass-roots campaign in history for this stage of a presidential race,” Obama said in a statement Sunday. “That’s the kind of movement that can change the special interest-driven politics in Washington and transform our country. And it’s just the beginning.”
   Meanwhile, Democrat John Edwards raised more than $9 million from April through June and relied on nearly 100,000 donors during the first half of the year.
   The fundraising total met the campaign’s stated goal but was about $5 million less than what he took in during the first three months of the year. The campaign has said it is on track to raise $40 million by the Iowa caucuses in January.
   New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson was at Edward’s heels, with his campaign reporting more than $7 million raised. But Edwards’ sixmonth total was $23 million, compared with more than $13 million for Richardson.
   “Democrats are clearly engaging the public and expanding the donor base,” Edwards’ deputy campaign manager, Jonathan Prince, said Sunday in reaction to Obama’s fundraising.
   He said the aim of the Edwards campaign was to attract more contributors by holding more small donor events to build a grass-roots network. “We feel we are exactly where we need to be,” Edwards adviser Joe Trippi said. “This is not a money race, it’s a race to win the nomination.”
   Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., on Sunday reported raising $3.25 million in the quarter for his presidential campaign, bringing his total raised this year to $7.3 million.

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Sen. Barack Obama reported Sunday raising at least $32.5 million for his presidential campaign from April through June, a record for a Democratic candidate.

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Now, with polls showing Obama flagging in the race against Hillary Clinton — a recent USA Today/Gallup survey showed Clinton had widened her lead to 12 percentage points over Obama — Oprah is out to rescue him once again.

This time she is hosting a mega-fundraiser at her sprawling Santa Barbara, Calif., ranch.

In her invitation, Oprah touts the fundraiser as "the most exciting Barack Obama event of the year anywhere.”

The star-studded event is set for Sept. 8.

The gala event at Oprah’s estate is designed to rekindle support for the Illinois senator from the entertainment industry, which has contributed heavily in recent months to Hillary Clinton.

"It’s a trifecta for Obama,” Hollywood politico Rick Jacobs, who is on the invitation list, told the Los Angeles Times.

"New donors, a rarefied ball with the queen of celebrities, and a chance to glimpse the woman everyone seems to want at least for vice president. This one’s hard to top.”

Entry to the event will cost invitees $2,300, the most allowable under federal campaign laws.

Those who can raise $25,000 or more from friends and family will get to attend a VIP reception and mingle with a host of yet-to-be announced celebrities.

And for $50,000, guests can stay for a private dinner with the senator, the TV talk queen and anyone else who forks over $50,000.

Obama fundraiser Kerman Maddox said Oprah’s support will invigorate the campaign in Hollywood.

"It was a blow when Steven Spielberg endorsed Hillary,” he told the Times. "But this is a huge shot in the arm. Everyone is motivated. They don’t get any bigger than Oprah.”

Obama already enjoys the support of Hollywood moguls like David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg, and California was his top donor state in the second quarter with a total take of $4.2 million.

Readers of NewsMax Magazine got an early look at Oprah’s potential influence on the presidential race.

The recent edition featuring the front-page "Obama & the Oprah Factor” story probed how her backing could go a long way in helping to elect the first African-American president.

A Zogby poll commissioned by NewsMax for the issue revealed how much power Oprah wields — an impressive 32 percent of respondents said they would vote for Oprah over Hillary Clinton to serve as president.

"There’s no doubt that Oprah could tip a close presidential election,” psychologist James Houran, co-author of the book "Celebrity Worshippers: Inside the Minds of Stargazers,” told NewsMax, "if she strongly backs one candidate.”

Just as we predicted, Oprah, the biggest figure in TV entertainment and America’s richest women, wants to be the most powerful with her friend in the Oval Office.

Rest assured Oprah will remain a powerful figure in this race.

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Hunter on a mission to bolster defense
IMPRESSIONS OF THE CANDIDATES

This is part of a series of essays based on meetings of presidential candidates with the Register’s editorial board. They are meant to provide an account of each meeting and give readers a sense of what it’s like to meet the candidates in person.

July 27, 2007
       1 Comment


Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter of California is a Vietnam veteran who has spent his congressional career dedicated to oversight of the nation's armed forces. Now, he's on a new mission: to make a strong national defense and border enforcement the focus of a winning presidential campaign.

Literally at times, it's a one-man mission. Unlike more prominent candidates, who come to editorial-board interviews with three or four aides in tow, he showed up alone at the Register's offices earlier this week.

He doesn't have the cash for slick TV ads. His campaign is about his message, and he's spreading it on talk radio, in appearances at candidate forums and through brochures he distributes. (He pulled one out of his pocket to show a stretch of steel, double-walled border fence built as a result of legislation he wrote in the 1990s, "not these little scraggly fences on CNN with people hopping over them.")

Even when questioned about other topics, his responses, after a detour or two, invariably wound their way back to maintaining a strong defense.

"You asked an education question. I'm taking kind of the long way around," he said at one point.

The long road of his political career started in 1980, when he upset an 18-year incumbent in a Democratic-leaning district and sought a seat on the House Armed Services Committee. He's been on the committee ever since, serving as chairman for four years until the Democrats took over Congress this year.

He advocates rotating all Iraqi brigades into combat for three or four months, so they can learn to exercise chain of command and operate the logistics to support their troops in the field. That would allow withdrawal of U.S. troops to begin in six months, he said. Success will mean Iraq won't be a state sponsor of terrorism, and Iraqis will enjoy "a modicum" of freedom.

Longer term, he ticked off the need to develop undersea warfare capability; maintain the U.S. lead in space, saying that when China shot down its own satellite in a test in January, it heralded a new military competition; keep up U.S. antiballistic missile capability; replace the aging bomber force to maintain deep-strike capacity; and upgrade intelligence apparatus, pivoting from a focus on the Soviet Union to the Middle East.

He represents a border district, and his other main issue, immigration enforcement, is also a career-long focus. He spearheaded building the first sections of fence between San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico, to stop drug smuggling and gang crime.

The fence was built with steel mats that are pieced together to form landing strips, military surplus that his staff scoured up on bases from Guam to Guantanamo. "There's a lot of stuff you can find on military bases, if you look for it," he said with the grin of satisfaction and twinkle in his eyes that appeared when he told stories about making things happen.

He wrote provisions of the bill approved last fall to build hundreds of additional miles of fence.

That detour on the education question? He was discussing the need to inspire more young people to study science and engineering and veered into a call for reviving the nation's manufacturing sector. Too few American companies can make defense-system components these days, leaving America vulnerable, he said.

On the campaign trail, Hunter also touts a roster of conservative positions, working to outlaw abortion and supporting gun rights, school vouchers, a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman and the so-called Fair Tax, a national retail sales tax to replace the income tax.

For the most part, though, he soldiers on with his strong-defense message. One of his sons, Duncan Duane, is a Marine who has served two tours of duty in Iraq and is now in Afghanistan.

If more members of Congress were veterans or had family members serving in the military, he believes, they would have "more endurance" to fulfill U.S. diplomatic and military commitments around the world.

After detailed answers to each question, Hunter gave the shortest answer of any candidate to the final one: What's his vision for America? "I'd like to see a country where the day I walk out of the White House, after a couple of terms, the American people are more independent of government than the day that I walked in."

-Carol Hunter

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Giuliani’s health
may be issue due
to 9/11 exposure
   WASHINGTON — Rudy Giuliani’s experience on Sept. 11 and at ground zero propelled him into presidential politics, yet by his own admission, it may also weaken his health — a key issue for any candidate seeking the White House.
   Just last week, Giuliani was criticized by some fi refighter unions for suggesting he was at ground zero as much, if not more, than many rescue workers and exposed to the same health risks. He quickly backed off that statement, saying he misspoke.
   “I empathize with them, because I feel like I have that same risk,” said Giuliani, who was at the World Trade Center almost immediately on Sept. 11, 2001, and was onsite many times a day after that.
   That assertion — made repeatedly by the former mayor over the years — could pose a difficult challenge in his quest for the White House, by suggesting he may not stay healthy through a presidential term that would begin in 2009.

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Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton (born October 26, 1947) is the junior United States Senator from New York, and is a candidate for the Democratic nomination in the 2008 presidential election. She is married to Bill Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States, and was the First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001.

A native of Illinois, Hillary Rodham initially attracted national attention in 1969 when she became the first student to speak at commencement exercises for Wellesley College. She began her career as a lawyer in the 1970s after graduating from Yale Law School, moving to Arkansas and marrying Bill Clinton in 1975; she was named the first female partner at Rose Law Firm in 1979 and was named one of the hundred most influential lawyers in America in 1988 and 1991. She served as the First Lady of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and 1983 to 1992, and was active in a number of organizations concerned with the welfare of children.

As First Lady of the United States, she took a more prominent position in policy matters than many before her. Her major initiative, the Clinton health care plan, failed to gain approval by the U.S. Congress in 1994, but she was successful in other areas, such as establishing the Children's Health Insurance Program in 1997. In 1996 she became the first First Lady to be subpoenaed to testify before a Federal grand jury, as a consequence of the Whitewater scandal; however she was never charged with any wrongdoing in this or several other investigations during the Clinton administration. The state of her marriage to Bill Clinton was the subject of considerable public discussion following the events of the Lewinsky scandal in 1998.

Moving to New York, Hillary Rodham Clinton was elected to the United States Senate in 2000, becoming the first First Lady elected to public office and the first woman elected Senator from New York. She was re-elected by a wide margin in 2006. She has consistently been the front-runner in polls for the 2008 Democratic nomination for President.

Contents [hide]
1 Early life and education
2 Marriage and family, law career and First Lady of Arkansas
3 First Lady of the United States
4 Senate election of 2000
5 United States Senator
5.1 First term
5.2 Reelection campaign of 2006
5.3 Second term
6 Presidential election of 2008
7 Political positions
8 Controversies
9 Writings and recordings
10 Awards and honors
11 Electoral history
12 Further reading
13 Notes and references
14 External links



Early life and education
Hillary[1] Diane Rodham was born at Edgewater Hospital in Chicago, Illinois,[2] and was raised in a United Methodist family[3] first in Chicago, and then, from when Hillary was three years of age, in suburban Park Ridge, Illinois.[4] Her father, Hugh Ellsworth Rodham, was a son of Welsh and English immigrants[5] and operated a small but successful business in the textile industry.[6] Her mother, Dorothy Emma Howell Rodham, of English, Scottish, French Canadian, Welsh, and possibly Native American descent,[7] was a homemaker.[4] She has two younger brothers, Hugh and Tony.

As a child, Hillary Rodham was involved in many activities at church and at her public school in Park Ridge. She participated in a variety of sports and earned awards as a Brownie and Girl Scout.[8] She attended Maine East High School, where she had participated in student council, the debating team and the National Honor Society. For her senior year she was redistricted to Maine South High School,[9] where she was a National Merit Finalist.[9] Raised in a politically conservative family,[10] she volunteered for Republican candidate Barry Goldwater in the United States presidential election of 1964.[11] Her parents encouraged her to pursue the career of her choice.[12]

After graduating from high school in 1965, Rodham enrolled in Wellesley College where she majored in political science.[13] She became active in politics and served as president of the Wellesley Young Republicans organization during her freshman year.[14][15] However, due to her evolving views regarding the American Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War, she subsequently stepped down from that position.[14] In her junior year, Rodham was affected by the death of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., whom she had met in person in 1962,[8] and became a supporter of the anti-war presidential nomination campaign of Democrat Eugene McCarthy.[16] In that same year she was elected president of the Wellesley College Government.[17] She attended the "Wellesley in Washington" summer program at the urging of Professor Alan Schechter, for whom she would write a senior thesis about the tactics of radical community organizer Saul Alinsky (that, years later while she was First Lady, was suppressed at the request of the White House and became the subject of mystery[18]). In 1969, Rodham graduated with departmental honors in political science. Stemming from the demands of some students,[19] she became the first student in Wellesley College history to deliver their commencement address.[20] According to reports by the Associated Press, her speech received a standing ovation lasting seven minutes.[21] She was featured in an article published in Life magazine, due to the response to a part of her speech that criticized Senator Edward Brooke, who had spoken before her at the commencement.[8] That summer, she worked her way across Alaska, washing dishes in Mount McKinley National Park and sliming salmon in a fish processing factory in Valdez (which shut down overnight when she complained about unhealthy conditions there).[22]

Rodham then entered Yale Law School, where she served on the Board of Editors of the Yale Review of Law and Social Action.[23] During her second year, she volunteered at the Yale Child Study Center, learning about new research on early childhood brain development. She also took on cases of child abuse at Yale-New Haven Hospital, and worked at the city legal services to provide free advice for the poor. In the summer of 1970, she was awarded a grant to work at the Children's Defense Fund in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In the late spring of 1971, she began dating Bill Clinton, who was also a law student at Yale. That summer, she traveled to Washington to work on Senator Walter Mondale's subcommittee on migrant workers, researching migrant problems in housing, sanitation, health and education. The following summer, Rodham campaigned in the western states for 1972 Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern[24] and interned on child custody cases at the Oakland law firm of Treuhaft, Walker and Burnstein.[25] She received a Juris Doctor degree from Yale in 1973.[8] She began a year of post-graduate study on children and medicine at the Yale Child Study Center.[26] Her first scholarly paper, "Children Under the Law", was published in the Harvard Educational Review in late 1973[27] and became frequently cited in the field.


Marriage and family, law career and First Lady of Arkansas
During her post-graduate study, Rodham served as staff attorney for the Children's Defense Fund in Cambridge, Massachusetts and as a consultant to the Carnegie Council on Children.[28] During 1974 she was a member of the impeachment inquiry staff in Washington, D.C., advising the House Committee on the Judiciary during the Watergate scandal,[29] which culminated in the resignation of President Richard Nixon in August 1974. By now, Rodham was viewed as someone with a bright political future; Democratic political organizer and consultant Betsey Wright had moved from Texas to Washington the previous year to help guide her career;[30]

Quoted Text

Obama defends himself in Iowa debate
Candidates spar on economy, matters of experience
BY MIKE GLOVER The Associated Press

   DES MOINES, Iowa — Democrat Barack Obama on Sunday tried to parlay his relative lack of national experience into a positive attribute, chiding his rivals for adhering to “conventional thinking” that led the country to war and that has divided the country.
   In their latest debate, the candidates also said they favored more federal action to address economic woes that have resulted from a housing slump and tighter credit. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said the current financial crisis was “the Katrina of the mortgage lending industry.”
   Prodded by moderator George Stephanopoulos at the outset of the debate, Obama’s rivals critiqued his recent comments on Pakistan and whether he would meet with foreign leaders — including North Korea’s head of state — without conditions.
   “To prepare for this debate I rode in the bumper cars at the state fair,” the first-term senator from Illinois said to laughter and applause from the audience at Drake University.
   The debate capped an intense week of politicking in Iowa, an early voting state in the process of picking a nominee. The Iowa State Fair is a magnet for White House hopefuls each presidential election. This year was no exception, especially for Democrats who swept into the state after a GOP straw poll last week.
   Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., directly addressing a question about Obama’s relative inexperience, said: “You’re not going to have time in January of ’09 to get ready for this job.” Dodd has served in Congress for more than 30 years.
   Former Sen. John Edwards said Obama’s opinions “add something to this debate.” But Edwards, the 2004 vice presidential nominee, said politicians who aspire to be president should not talk about hypothetical solutions to serious problems.
   “It effectively limits your options,” Edwards said, drawing agreement from Richardson.
   Obama said he could handle the rigors of international diplomacy and noted that many in the race, including Dodd, Edwards and Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Joe Biden, voted to authorize the Iraq war in 2002.
   “Nobody had more experience than Donald Rumsfeld and private Cheney and many of the people on this stage that authorized this war,” Obama said. “And it indicates how we get into trouble when we engage in the sort of conventional thinking that has become the habit in Washington.”
   The debate, hosted and broadcast nationally by ABC, took place less than five months before Iowa caucus-goers begin the process of selecting the parties’ presidential nominees.
   Obama, who has criticized Hillary Clinton as a divisive figure, portrayed himself as the candidate who “can bring the country together around a common purpose and rally us around a common destiny.”
   Clinton, under attack from outgoing Bush counselor Karl Rove, said the president’s chief political strategist is “obsessed with me.” She presented a different view of politics than Obama did, arguing that negative campaigning is inevitable no matter who gets nominated.
   The New York senator and former first lady said no one will escape the “Republican attack machine.” She added, “I know how to beat them.”
   Several candidates urged the Federal Reserve Bank to lower more interest rates as a response to upheaval in the financial markets and the crisis with home mortgages. On Friday the Fed cut the interest rate on loans to banks, causing an upturn in the stock market. But many Wall Street analysts have been demanding more, including lower interest for consumers and businesses.
   “It can’t be just left to a bailout of the banks,” Clinton said.
   Edwards, criticized for investing in a hedge fund linked to lenders that have foreclosed on Hurricane Katrina victims, called for a “home rescue fund” to help homeowners who are at risk of defaulting on their mortgages.
   Biden blamed hedge funds and private equity firms, which have invested in many of the lenders. He wants them to have to disclose more of their transactions. “They are the ones that are causing this thing to go under,” he said.
   Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, predicted the Fed would lower more interest rates in September. He also pressed the Bush administration to loosen credit limits for Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the government-sponsored entities that buy mortgages.
   Obama used the crisis as an opportunity to assail lobbyists. Obama and Edwards, both of whom have declined lobbyists’ contributions in the presidential contest, are trying to gain the upper hand on government ethics in the campaign.
   “This is where special interests have been driving the agenda,” Obama said, regarding the need for more regulation.