Rosie O'Donnell's Anti-Aiken Behavior

What a piece of work.

After outrageously slandering Christians, Rosie O’Donnell has now managed to inflame gays, “Regis and Kelly” viewers, and Clay Aiken fans.

The former “Queen of Nice” recently slammed Kelly Ripa for reacting to guest Aiken’s muzzling of her mouth with his hand after he had high-fived half the audience.

O’Donnell ripped into Ripa using the favored bashing technique of the left. She labeled Ripa’s response as homophobic.

Ironically, by using the term, Rosie effectively outed Aiken, a guy who has repeatedly let it be known that he wishes to keep his sexuality private.

I imagine that at the pace O’Donnell’s going with her insults, the audience of “The View” may end up being punier than Katie Couric’s.

Latest on Charlton Heston

For those of us who have watched Charlton Heston in "Will Penny” a dozen times, the recent occasion of the Hollywood icon’s 83rd birthday on Oct. 4 brought back those sharp memories of the laconic aging cowboy soon headed to his last round-up.

Despite intense interest in the star’s condition — he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2002 — his publicist and family are not responding to requests about his health.

Indeed, the last reliable update on Charlton Heston’s battle with the illness came in April of 2006 when his son Fraser Heston told Entertainment Tonight, "He’s doing as well as can be expected. It’s an insidious disease.”

At that time, Fraser added that his then-82-year-old father was under excellent care and would remain at home most likely for the rest of his life. He also revealed that his father was in relatively good health, good spirits, and exhibiting a kind of courage Fraser had never seen before.

Charlton and Lydia had recently celebrated their 62nd wedding anniversary. Fraser said, "He’s with his first and only love — my mother. She’s doing really well — very brave. She will endure.”

Heston’s son not only discussed his famous father’s health but talked about the animated full-length version of "The Ten Commandments" for television he was producing — one of the final projects the senior Heston helped develop. "It marks the end of an era,” Fraser noted.

The welcome update on Charlton came, perhaps intentionally, on the heels of various uncorroborated and apparently sensationalized tabloid reports that family and friends of Heston were shocked by the rapid progression of his illness, that Heston had been hospitalized with pneumonia at a Los Angeles hospital, and that Heston’s illness was at an advanced stage and his family are worried he may not live out the year.

Since the ET comments by Fraser, the family has not volunteered any more information or answered any questions about the state of health of the actor.

Tony Makris of Alexandria, Va.’s Mercury Group public relations firm, a longtime friend and handler of the NRA public relations account, told NewsMax that only a very small group interacted with Heston these days.

Heston served as president of the National Rifle Association from 1998-2003.

"The family basically at this point has no comment on his condition. And there are plenty of requests,” Makris said.

Charton Heston announced he had Alzheimer's disease in 2002. It was a dramatic moment when he disclosed, "For an actor there is no greater loss than the loss of his audience. I can part the Red Sea, but I can’t part with you . . .”

Although best known for his roles as Ben-Hur and Moses, Heston toured for the State Department’s Cultural Presentation Program and had been a delegate to the Berlin Film Festival.

A World War II Army veteran, he visited troops fighting during the Vietnam War and was a strong supporter of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In 1981, Heston was named co-chairman of then-President Ronald Reagan’s Task Force on the Arts and Humanities. Charlton has served on the National Council on the Arts and was elected president of the Screen Actors Guild a record six times.

Furthermore, he has held the office of chairman and president of the American Film Institute and served four terms as president of the National Rifle Association of America. He has authored five books.

In 2003, Heston received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Bush.

Last year, MGM released a four-disc collector’s edition of "Ben-Hur,” the film that won an unprecedented 11 Academy Awards — including best actor for Heston.

The lavish four-hour epic shows off the 100,000 costumes, 8,000 extras, 300 sets, and a staggering budget, which in its day was the largest in movie history.

Meanwhile, Heston’s home and ultimate sanctuary is brimming with memorabilia of his remarkable Hollywood years. He and his wife have lived in the same house near Los Angeles’s Mulholland Drive for more than 40 years.

Built by the actor’s father after Heston won the Academy Award for best actor in 1959’s Ben-Hur, the postmodern style home — inside and out — is filled with the memorabilia of one of Hollywood’s most fabulous runs.

Sitting on a table in the back yard is the figure of a Roman, whip in hand, lashing vigorously at four straining horses harnessed to a chariot. Mounted on the entrance of his study are the two great brass ring knockers from the movie set’s House of Hur.

Hung above the fireplace is a painting of a lumbering Conestoga wagon and, nearby, a pencil sketch of friend Laurence Olivier portraying King Lear. From most windows sparkle views of canyons.

In the home’s central hallway hang 20 paintings of Heston in signature roles: Ben-Hur, Moses, Richelieu, Michelangelo, the "Planet of the Apes" marooned astronaut George Taylor, the steel-willed Major Dundee, "Soylent Green’s" detective Thorn, Andrew Jackson in "The President’s Lady,” tough ranch foreman Steve Leech riding through "The Big Country” — and, of course, cattle poke Will Penny.

"I’m confident about the future of America,” Heston said in the videotaped announcement of his illness in August of 2002. "I believe in you; I know that the future of our country, our culture, and our children is in good hands. I know you will continue to meet adversity with strength and resilience, as our ancestors did . . .”

Moses has spoken.

Mel Gibson Feels 'Kramer's' Pain

Though he's lost many fans after being captured on video hurling racist epithets at a comedy club audience, Michael Richards has an ally: Mel Gibson. "I felt like sending Michael Richards a note," Gibson says in an interview in Entertainment Weekly's Dec. 8 issue.

"I feel really badly for the guy. He was obviously in a state of stress. You don't need to be inebriated to be bent out of shape. But my heart went out to the guy."

The 50-year-old actor-director added: "They'll probably torture him for a while and then let him go. I like him."

After his Nov. 17 tirade became known, Richards apologized on David Letterman's "Late Show" on CBS, saying his remarks were sparked by anger at being heckled, not bigotry. He also apologized to the Rev. Al Sharpton and on the Rev. Jesse Jackson's syndicated radio program.

Gibson, star of the "Lethal Weapon" movies and director of "The Passion of the Christ," was mired in a scandal of his own this summer for anti-Semitic comments he made to police in Malibu, Calif., during his arrest on suspicion of drunken driving. He publicly apologized.

Are people refusing to work with him?

"No, people aren't like that," Gibson tells the magazine. "Those are just the headlines: Mel ostracized by Hollywood! Hollywood is what you make it. There is no great pooh-bah up there saying, `Go! You are condemned!'"

Gibson says he's not anti-Semitic.

"I never have been and never would be," he says. "But (the incident) hit this fear thing in me. My god, I made people afraid. ... And it was a horrible feeling. That's when I said, `My god, I don't want to be that monster.'"

His new movie, "Apocalypto," from The Walt Disney Co.'s Touchstone Pictures, opens Dec. 8. It is a Mayan-language epic filmed in Mexico chronicling the decline of the native civilization.
He's confident his past remarks will not hurt the movie at the box office.

"It's primarily entertainment," he says of his production. "An 18-year-old college guy, out with his buddies, he's going to get into the chase. The movie will stand on its own, regardless of any unfortunate experience I may have stumbled upon."

Colin Powell: Reach Out to Arabs and Muslims

Former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Wednesday President George W. Bush could fight terrorism better by reaching out to Arabs and Muslims.

"We are conveying a bad message, that America does not welcome you particularly - Arabs and Muslims," Powell told a business forum in the United Arab Emirates.

"The greatest weapon against terrorism for America is to open up for the rest of the world."

Arabs and Muslims have criticised U.S. policies as biased towards Israel. Tensions escalated after the U.S.-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and a backlash against Muslims and Arabs in the United States after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

The 19 al Qaeda hijackers who attacked

"I hope President Bush and Secretary (of State Condoleezza) Rice would double the effort to bring stability to this part of the world (Middle East)," he added.

Powell said the number of Arabs and Muslims who visit the U.S. has dropped since the attacks and reflected negatively on educational institutions and leisure destinations.

Arabs and Muslims complain of heavy security searches in U.S. airports and denial of access to the country. Many Arab students, mainly from Gulf Arab states, left the United States after the attacks on fears of discrimination.

"This is bad, not good for America," said Powell.

"When students come to America for a couple of years they will understand Americans more. This is a great weapon against terrorism... not the use of the military."

Jim Webb Threatens to 'Slug' President Bush

Newly elected Senator Jim Webb, D-Va., was so infuriated by a remark from President George W. Bush that the former Marine officer was tempted to punch the commander-in-chief.

The confrontation, disclosed in the influential Washington, D.C.-based publication The Hill, came shortly after the midterm elections at a private White House reception for newly elected lawmakers.

Webb, who defeated Republican Sen. George Allen in Virginia, ran a campaign critical of the administration’s Iraq policy, and has a son, a Marine lance corporal, serving in Iraq.

At the reception, Bush asked Webb how his son was doing.

Webb answered that he really wanted to see his son brought back home, a source close to Webb reported.

The Associated Press quoted Webb as saying, "I told him I'd like to get them out of Iraq."

"I didn’t ask you that, I asked how he’s doing,” Bush countered, according to the source.

Emily Heil wrote in The Hill: "Webb confessed that he was so angered by this that he was tempted to slug the commander-in-chief, reported the source, but of course didn’t.”

Webb’s spokeswoman Kristian Denny Todd confirmed that "Jim did have a conversation with Bush at that dinner. Basically, he asked about Jim’s son; Jim expressed the fact that he wanted to have him home.”

Todd wouldn’t comment on Bush’s response.

Ambassador Flynn Lauds Pope’s Courage

The first positive effect of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Turkey will be a recognition by his host country of his great courage, says a former U.S. ambassador to Vatican.

"The number one effect, I'd say, is admiration for his courage," Ambassador Ray Flynn told NewsMax.com in an exclusive interview.

Flynn, a former mayor of Boston, longtime friend of the Pope, and head of the Catholic Citizenship organization, added "I admire him for his courage. It would have been so much easier for him to cancel the visit and say that the events of the world suggest that it would be better if he made the trip at another time because of the uncertainty and violence taking place in the region.

"I think he has to get high grades for his courage and putting himself out there. I look at him as a real defender of the faith."

About the visit itself Flynn, author of two books, "The Accidental Pope and John Paul II: A Personal Portrait of the Pope and the Man" said that the Pope is in a "no-win" situation.

On the Line

"What he said in Germany about Islamic extremists was correct and no apology was necessary. Unfortunately, if he makes the same kind of firm statement in Turkey there will be violent protests and demonstrations in the streets.

"Innocent people will get hurt and killed. These fanatics would retaliate against nuns, priests, and other Christians. We're experiencing a very violent and divided region of the world and if I'd had my way he wouldn't have made that trip, but once the invitation was accepted there was no turning back."

Noting that the Pope's lecture in Germany was badly misinterpreted by the press, Flynn explained, "That's what's to be expected. You never know how people are going to interpret what you say. How is Al-Jazeera going to interpret his visit to Turkey? You are leaving it in the hands of religious fanatics to interpret what you have to say.

"It's really a very difficult position that he's in. I hope he holds firm to what he said in Germany in terms of there being no place for violence in religion and people who use God to promote their violent political objectives."

Flynn added, " I feel so badly for him because he's in a very difficult situation, he's walking on egg shells. So far his visit has gone very well. He's handled it extremely well. He's talking about the great historic and cultural history of the Turkish people and Turkey and the whole region. There is a great historic heritage there and that's of course what he's going to play up to.

"But he's dealing with a small but dominating minority of fanatics. This extremist Islamist group couldn't even get an official position in the government; they are not even recognized as members of the government, but through demonstrations and protests, they bully their way into legitimacy.

"Turkey is a democracy and a secular state and most of the people there are playing by the rules and want to live in peace, and what Benedict XVI was talking about in Germany was a handful of extremists. But that's all it takes.

"The problem is that the heart of this is not in his hands — if angry protesters and haters decided to misinterpret what he had to say in Germany — and I think they misinterpreted what he had to say intentionally — they'll take to the streets and say that he was ridiculing Muhammad and was equating violence with Islam.

"It makes good headlines but it doesn't make a very peaceful world. There's not much he can do to control that. As for the official part of his state visit, it's worked well, meeting the prime minister and the president."

A Push for Reconciliation

Turning to the original purpose of the Pope's visit — a hoped-for reconciliation with the Greek Orthodox Church and its head, the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, whom he called a close friend, Flynn explained that the patriarch was the one who had extended the invitation to the Pope to visit Turkey.

"He [Bartholomew] is even persona non grata in his own country. He had to rescind the invitation to the Holy Father because the Turkish government says he has no capacity to extend an invitation to anybody. He is just a Turkish citizen.

"They don't acknowledge the Orthodox religion. Even though he's the patriarch, the Turkish government protested the invitation so the Pope instead received an invitation on behalf of the Turkish government."

Cautious Optimism

Flynn expressed optimism that the Pope's attempt to bring about a rapprochement between the Roman Catholic Church and the Greek Orthodox Church, separated from Rome for a thousand years, might succeed: "It's a strong possibility — it's a relationship based on love and faith.

" I think there really is a possibility, more so than ever. Like-minded, value-based Christians throughout the world are beginning to see that we are not each other's enemy. "

Dick Morris: Pitiful Democrats

For all of the dire warnings and pre-election commotion about the impact of a Democratic majority in Congress, the fact is that — now that it is upon us — it can do little or nothing but harass the administration.

There is no real danger of any legislative action emerging from this Congress. Yes, the president has a veto the Democrats cannot override, but nothing will ever make it as far as the desk at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., are just spinning their wheels.

In the Senate, there is no such thing as a majority. Ever since the elder Bush's administration, the filibuster has become routine. No longer reserved for civil-rights issues or for egregious legislation, it now is used to counter even motions for recess and adjournment. Members of the Senate are no longer subjected to the indignity of standing on their feet and reading a telephone book. Rather, the gentlemen's filibuster applies.

The majority leader phones the minority leader and asks if a filibuster is in effect. With his feet up on his desk, the Republican replies that it is and the Democrat, despite his majority, does not even think about bringing up his bill for consideration unless he has a good shot at the 60 votes required to shut off debate. In the Senate, 51 votes determine who gets the corner office, but to pass legislation, one needs 60.

In the House of Representatives, with its 435 members, the Republican Party needed a simple majority — 218 — to rule. The Democrats need considerably more. The normal rules of a mathematical majority do not take into account the fractious nature of the Democratic Party.

Where the Republican majority best resembled the Prussian Army — disciplined, unified and determined — the Democratic majority in the upcoming Congress is disunited, dispersed and divided into myriad caucuses and special interest groups. One could purchase the Republican majority wholesale by making a deal with the speaker and the majority leader. But to get the Democratic majority in line, one has to buy it retail — caucus by caucus.

First, one has to go to check with the Black Caucus — hat in hand — to see if one's bill has enough liberal giveaways to round up its forty or so votes. Thence to the Hispanic Caucus for a similar screening. Then, with one's legislation weighted down with liberal provisions added by these two groups, one has to sell it to the Democratic Leadership Council moderates and, even worse, to the Blue Dog Democrats — the out and out conservatives.

If you are fortunate enough to pass these contradictory litmus tests, you then have to go to the environmentalists, the labor people, and even the gays to see that your bill passes muster. Only then can you begin to hope for House passage.

The result of this labyrinth is that the relatively moderate bill you first sought to pass ends up like a Christmas tree, laden with ornaments added to appease each of the caucuses. Unrecognizable in its final form, it heads to House passage.

This road map will be familiar to all veterans of the Clinton White House of 1993 and 1994. The most recent administration that had to deal with a Democratic House, the shopping from caucus to caucus and the festooning of moderate legislation with all manner of amendments will seem dejà vu to all of the early Clintonites. When Clinton proposed an anti-crime bill with a federal death penalty, he needed to add pork projects in the inner city like midnight basketball to get it past the Democrats in the House.

Nancy Pelosi will face the same obstacle. By the time her legislation emerges from the lower chamber, it will bear little resemblance to what she had in mind, liberal as that might have been. As Clinton said, after he watched the mangling of his legislative program by the various caucuses in the House, "I didn't even recognize myself."

Once the highly amended liberal legislation emerges from the House, it will make easy fodder for a Senate filibuster. So left leaning that it stands no chance of attracting 60 votes, it will be dead-on-arrival.

So forget the nightmares about an amended Patriot Act or restrictions on wiretapping for homeland security. Don't worry about House Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel's, D-N.Y., ravings about the draft or the rumors of a tax increase. It's not going to happen.

What is the Democratic majority good for? One thing and one thing only — to give their party control of the committees and the subpoena power that goes with it. The two House Democratic majority can only make noise and make trouble. It can't pass legislation. Eileen McGann co-authored this column.

Court: U.S. Money is Discriminatory

The U.S. government discriminates against blind people because American currency is not designed to be distinguishable to visually impaired people, a federal judge said on Tuesday.

U.S. District Judge James Robertson said the government needed to figure out a way to design and distribute currency that includes an element to help blind people tell the bills apart.

Breaking from NewsMax.com

Court: U.S. Money is Discriminatory

The U.S. government discriminates against blind people because American currency is not designed to be distinguishable to visually impaired people, a federal judge said on Tuesday.

U.S. District Judge James Robertson said the government needed to figure out a way to design and distribute currency that includes an element to help blind people tell the bills apart.

Story continues below...

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Robertson was ruling on a lawsuit filed by The American Council of the Blind against the U.S. Treasury Department. The council accused the department of violating the Rehabilitation Act, which was passed by Congress to ensure that people with disabilities can maximize their independence and "inclusion and integration into society."

"It can no longer be successfully argued that a blind person has 'meaningful access' to currency if she cannot accurately identify paper money without assistance," Robertson wrote in a 26-page order.

"Of the more than 180 countries that issue paper currency, only the United States prints bills that are identical in size and color in all their denominations," he wrote.

The American Council of the Blind had proposed several possible changes to U.S. currency including different size bills for different denominations, embossed dots and raised printing.

The U.S. government said such changes would be expensive, could render currency more vulnerable to counterfeiting and could undermine international acceptance of the U.S. dollars — an argument the judge dismissed as "fairly absurd."

Robertson rejected a government request to dismiss the case and ordered a hearing in about 30 days to discuss possible remedies.

Condi Rice Takes Up Golf

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice dominates the world stage, and she is consistently rated the most admired woman in America; yet little is known about her personal life.

Recently, Rice was at Camp David for a weekend when President Bush invited her and other friends to play golf. She wasn’t very good at it but continued to practice after everyone had left. Within a few weeks, Rice had signed up to take golf lessons from a pro. They hit the links at Andrews Air Force Base every Sunday when she’s in town.

That is typical of Rice, a driven perfectionist whose parents taught her in segregated Birmingham, Ala., that blacks had to be “twice as good” to pull even with whites.

Brushes With Racism

Most people don’t know that when she was 8, Rice was attending the service at Westminster Presbyterian Church, where her father was the minister, when she heard a deafening blast. Two miles away, at 10:22 a.m. on Sept. 15, 1963, the 16th Street Baptist church had been bombed. Not until the next day did she learn that Denise McNair, one of her friends and classmates, was one of the four girls who died.

Rice attended the funeral of her friend who loved her dolls and left mud pies in the mailboxes of her childhood crushes. Rice remembered how small the coffin was. She also remembered that she somehow knew the police would not investigate the crime. If they did, no one would be convicted. It was not until 40 years later that the FBI and local authorities finally developed enough evidence to bring about convictions of three Ku Klux Klan members responsible for the bombing.

Like other African-Americans in Birmingham back then, Rice had to sit at the back of buses. When more whites got on, the driver would move a “Colored” sign farther back in the bus, making more room for whites and less for blacks. Rice could not eat at the same restaurants as whites unless the restaurant had a separate room with a separate entrance for blacks. She was not allowed to use the same drinking fountains or public restrooms as whites. But Condi Rice, a descendant of slaves and white slave owners, had something else going for her: Her middle-class black neighborhood of Titusville had developed a culture separate from the rest of the city, one that shut out the racism all around and taught children they had to excel.

“My parents,” Rice says, “were very strategic. I was going to be so well prepared, and I was going to do all of these things that were revered in white society so well, so that I would be armored somehow from racism. I would be able to confront white society on its own terms.” Rice lived in a place where restaurants wouldn’t serve her a hamburger, she says, “But my parents were telling me I could be president.”

An Avid Music Fan

Rice started taking piano lessons at age 3. Her mother, also a pianist, based Condi’s first name on the Italian phrase con dolcezza, a variation of the musical direction con dolce, meaning “with sweetness.” As a teenager, Rice was a competitive ice skater and French speaker. She is also an excellent tennis player.

Having interviewed her twice, I’ve found Rice to be even prettier, more charming, and more composed than she appears on TV. Rice served on the board of Chevron and made more than $250,000 by investing in Chevron stock. She buys eight pairs of Ferragamo shoes at a time. Every Saturday, she has a manicure at the salon in her Watergate apartment.

Rice maintains constant eye contact, gesturing with her hands as she makes her points.

I asked Rice, who is single, if she dates.

“The one thing I don’t do is talk about my personal life, but let me tell you this: I’m not a workaholic; I have friends,” she says. “I do other things besides work, and I wish I had time to do more other things.”

In fact, Rice has a weakness for football players. When her father coached high school football, she became an aficionado. Rice was briefly engaged to a Denver Broncos player. At Stanford, she dated Gene A. Washington, a former four-time All-Pro receiver for the San Francisco 49ers who was then assistant athletics director at Stanford.

He became a TV sportscaster and now heads football operations for the National Football League in Washington. Rice has shown up at Washington parties and White House state dinners with him. A fellow Alabaman, Washington says they are just friends.

A Spiritual Side

Rice is a spiritual person. She told me she prays as many as 10 times a day.

“I’m a minister’s daughter,” she says. “It’s the most natural thing in the world. Sometimes I pray to myself and sometimes, when I’m alone, I pray out loud.”

About once or twice a month, at 5:30 p.m. on Sundays, Rice plays the piano with a chamber group at her apartment.

“I’m a great Brahms fan,” she told me.

Rice is good enough to have accompanied Yo-Yo Ma at Constitution Hall when President Bush honored the renowned cellist in April 2002. A Russian speaker, Rice occasionally reads a Russian language newspaper.

With her friend Mary Kate Bush, a former alternate executive director of the International Monetary Fund, Rice attends the symphony or the opera at the Kennedy Center.

“We love to shop,” said Bush, who serves on the boards of corporations and mutual funds. “We play tennis together. Every now and then we get to go to a movie. We watch TV — sports in particular — and spend relaxing, quiet evenings. We make dinner or order in and veg out.”

Democrats Vow Investigations

The incoming chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee is promising an array of oversight investigations that could provoke sharp disagreement with Republicans and the White House.

Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., pledged that Democrats, swept to power in the Nov. 7 elections, would govern "in the middle” next year. But the veteran lawmaker has a reputation as one who has never avoided a fight and he did not back away from that reputation on Sunday.

Among the investigations he said he wants the committee to undertake:

# The new Medicare drug benefit. "There are lots and lots and lots of scandals,” he said, without citing specifics.

# Spending on government contractors in Iraq, including Halliburton Co., the Texas-based oil services conglomerate once led by Vice President Dick Cheney.

# An energy task force overseen by Cheney. It "was carefully cooked to provide only participation by oil companies and energy companies,” Dingell said.

Meanwhile, the incoming chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee said his committee would not take on contentious issues, such as extending expiring tax cuts or overhauling Social Security, at the beginning of the year. Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., said Democrats do not want a fight with President Bush and want to prove they can govern.

"The first thing we’re going to do is try to work together on things we know we can accomplish,” Rangel said. "Rather than have the committee against the president, it’s not going to happen,” Rangel said.

Rep. Barney Frank, set to lead the House Financial Services Committee, said issues such as raising the minimum wage will be popular, even thought the idea has been identified with liberals.

"In my own committee, the biggest difference you’re going to see is we’re going to return to help deal with the housing crisis that bites so many parts of our country socially and economically,” said Frank, D-Mass.

Frank, who in 1987 became the first member of Congress to voluntarily make his homosexuality public, also said he wants to modify the military’s "don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. The current policy prohibits officials from inquiring about the sex lives of service members and requires discharges of those who openly acknowledge being gay.

"One of things I do want to address, yes, is discrimination based on sexual orientation,” Frank said.

"In fact, what we have is a shortfall in the military. I think when you have people being fired who can read Arabic and understand Arabic, because of what they do when they’re off duty, that that’s a grave error. But that’s not what we’re going to begin with.”

A report in 2005 by the investigative arm of Congress estimated it cost the Pentagon nearly $200 million to recruit and train replacements for the nearly 9,500 troops that had to leave the military because of the policy. The losses included hundreds of highly skilled troops, including translators, between 1994 through 2003.

The lawmakers appeared on "Fox News Sunday.”

Ward Connerly: Affirmative Action Over

The days of the much-criticized affirmative action policy are numbered, the program's biggest critic says.

"I think the end is at hand for affirmative action as we know it," former University of California regent Ward Connolly told the Los Angeles Times, noting that an "anti-affirmative action wave washing over America" will bring to an end the race-based preferences used for decades to help African-Americans, Latinos and other disadvantaged ethnic groups. No one in America, he said, should receive preference in education, jobs or government contracts because of their skin color or sex.

Encouraged by his victory in Michigan, where a ballot measure banning racial preferences in public education and hiring won handily, Connerly said he is considering sponsoring similar ballot measures in one or more states, including Oregon, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Missouri or South Dakota.

"We don't have to go to every state if we can get a critical mass of seven or eight states," he said, adding that the overwhelming victory in Michigan at the same time the state voted largely Democratic in other contests was a sign that anti-affirmative action measures could prevail anywhere in the country.

Connerly was appointed to the University of California Board of Regents by Republican Gov. Pete Wilson in 1993. According to the Times, he helped lead the campaign for Proposition 209 in California, which eliminated affirmative action in public education, hiring and contracts in 1996. He backed a similar ballot measure that was approved by voters in Washington state in 1998. Florida, facing the threat of a similar initiative, changed its college admissions policies in 2000.

After his 12-year term on the UC Board of Regents expired early last year, Connerly said he was tired and needed a break. But following knee-replacement and prostate cancer surgeries, Connerly, 67, came back as eager as ever to tackle what he sees as the inequity of affirmative action.

"I won't retire until my toes curl up," he told the Times.

In Michigan, the Times recalled, Connerly sponsored Proposal 2 with Jennifer Gratz, a former student who sued the University of Michigan in 1997 over its use of racial preferences in admission but lost when a narrowly divided U.S. Supreme Court sided with the school.

Faced with opposition from Democratic and Republican leaders, labor unions, the Catholic Church, major media outlets, the University of Michigan and former Secretary of State Colin Powell and U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., Connerly came out swinging.

"It was a battle royal," Connerly told the Times. "The opposition pulled out all the stops," but in the end Michigan voters easily approved Proposal 2 on Nov. 7 by a margin of 58 percent to 42 percent.

Some African-American leaders see Connerly as a sellout acting at the behest of his conservative sponsors, the Times reported, noting that they maintain that affirmative action, which began in the 1960s, is an essential step in helping blacks, Latinos and American Indians overcome generations of discrimination that have left them at a disadvantage in obtaining an education or a job.

He responds that that he is his own man and passionately argues that affirmative action is a misguided program that is fundamentally unfair and stigmatizes successful blacks who can succeed without it. And the role of public universities, he says, is not to provide opportunities for students but to produce a skilled workforce.

Connerly says he is optimistic that the U.S. Supreme Court, which in 2003 affirmed limited consideration of race in admissions, will ban affirmative action in the next five or six years.

According to the Times, two cases that could provide an opportunity for the court to rule on racial preferences are scheduled for a hearing in December.

"If I were a regent or a college administrator and I saw the anti-affirmative action wave washing over America, I would have to take notice and say, 'We better do something about our policies,'" he said. "More than I have ever felt, we are witnessing the end of an era."

New Report Refutes Global Warming

A recent report from Britain's Sir Nicholas Stern warned of the devastating economic effects global warming could have on the world in coming years.

But a British researcher has added his voice to those saying the "hysteria" over manmade global warming distorts the truth.

Stern — former chief economist at the World Bank — cautioned that if greenhouse gas emissions weren't significantly reduced, by 2050 the global economy would shrink by up to 20 percent, millions of people would be permanently displaced and droughts would plague the earth.

Now journalist Christopher Monckton, who was a policy adviser to Margaret Thatcher, has published a detailed report attacking the manmade global warming theory from various angles — including the so-called "medieval warm period."

The United Nations, which has issued a widely quoted report on global warming, "abolished the medieval warm period — the global warming at the end of the First Millennium A.D.," according to Monckton.

A U.N. report in 1996 "showed a 1,000-year graph demonstrating that temperature in the Middle Ages was warmer than today," Monckton writes in Britain's Sunday Telegraph.

"But the 2001 report contained a new graph showing no medieval warm period. It wrongly concluded that the 20th century was the warmest for 1,000 years . . .

"Scores of scientific papers show that the medieval warm period was real, global and up to [5 degrees Fahrenheit] warmer than now.

"Then, there were no glaciers in the tropical Andes; today they're there. There were Viking farms in Greenland; now they're under permafrost. There was little ice at the North Pole — a Chinese naval squadron sailed right around the Arctic in 1421 and found none."

Monckton also writes that Antarctica has cooled and gained ice-mass in the past 30 years, and the oceans have cooled sharply in the past two years.

He calculates that global temperatures will rise only .18 to 2.5 degrees in the coming century, "well within the medieval temperature range."

And he suggests that rather than point to greenhouse gases as the culprit behind any measurable global warming, we might blame the sun. He cites a scientist who maintains that in the past half-century the sun has been warmer, for longer, than at any time in at least the past 11,400 years.

Monckton's conclusion: "Politicians, scientists and bureaucrats contrived a threat of Biblical floods, droughts, plagues, and extinctions worthier of St. John the Divine than of science."

He also remarks: "Al Gore please note."

Bush Daughter Robbed in Argentina

U.S. and Argentine media reported that one of President Bush's 24-year-old twin daughters had her purse stolen while being guarded by the Secret Service during a visit here.

ABC News, citing unidentified law enforcement reports, reported on its Web site Tuesday that Barbara Bush's purse and cell phone were taken while she was dining in a Buenos Aires restaurant.

La Nacion newspaper, citing anonymous government sources, said in its online edition early Wednesday that one of Bush's daughters had her purse taken Sunday afternoon in the popular tourist district of San Telmo.

A pair of thieves removed the purse from under a table while Secret Service agents stood guard at a distance, La Nacion reported. La Nacion said its sources did not reveal which of the Bush daughters had her purse stolen.

Argentine police told The Associated Press they had no complaint of any such incident on file, and the U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires said it would have no comment. In Washington, the White House, Secret Service and State Department also declined comment.

CNN cited a law-enforcement source who was briefed on the incident as saying that "at no point were the protectees out of visual contact and at no point was there any risk of harm."

Argentina's largest-circulation daily, Clarin, ran an online report citing the government news agency Telam as saying that Barbara Bush had her purse taken along with a cell phone that was inside it. Telam cited an official source who did not wish to be identified by name and who provided no other details.

Barbara's twin, Jenna, visited neighboring Paraguay last month to take part in a UNICEF program for young professionals.

Gingrich Plans Massive Outreach

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is telling associates that he’s launching a major new grass-roots movement to recapture the soul of the Republican Party, and quite possibly the White House.

Gingrich says that the effort will be much larger than his founding of GOPAC and his creation of the Contract with America.

The Georgia Republican is spearheading a program called "American Solutions for Winning the Future” in an effort to revitalize the GOP with Ronald Reagan conservatism.

This is the third time Gingrich has led a drive to steer the Republican Party toward traditional conservative values. In 1986, Gingrich took the chair of the Republican political action committee GOPAC and transformed it into an effective tool for electing conservative candidates. The stated theme of GOPAC was "a conservative opportunity society replacing the liberal welfare state.”

GOPAC was a key element in Gingrich’s rise to the leadership of the Republican caucus in Congress.

Then in 1994, as House Minority Leader, Gingrich was a co-author of the Contract with America, a conservative political platform that helped the GOP gain 54 seats in the House and end 40 years of Democratic majorities there.

Gingrich’s new program echoes the title of his 2005 book, "Winning the Future: A 21st Century Contract with America.”

Sources close to the former speaker say Gingrich believes the Republican Party has once again lost its way, and needs to refocus its agenda with an eye toward regaining Congress in 2008.

Stepping back into the political spotlight could help Gingrich’s presidential aspirations as well.

He recently told an interviewer that he won’t decide whether to seek the White House in 2008 until September of 2007.

But insiders predict Gingrich could throw his hat into the ring if a true Reagan conservative doesn’t emerge as a likely GOP candidate.

For the time being, he’s playing his cards close to the vest. "I am not ‘running’ for president, I am seeking to create a movement to win the future by offering a series of solutions so compelling that if the American people say I have to be president, it will happen,” he tells Fortune magazine.

Gingrich said he plans to build grass-roots support for the health care, national security, and energy independence ideas he has been promoting for the past six years.

Mel Gibson Tops 'Frigid 50' List

Two decades after being chosen as People magazine's first sexiest man alive, Mel Gibson now tops a very different kind of list: Film Threat's annual "Frigid 50: The Coldest People in Hollywood."

The independent film Web site on Friday named Gibson No. 1 among the "least-powerful, least-inspiring, least-intriguing people in all of Tinseltown," following the anti-Semitic remarks he made during his arrest on suspicion of drunken driving.

"He apologized, he got sick of apologizing, he refused to apologize anymore, he didn't want to address the issue, he spoke on nationally broadcast news shows, he spoke at synagogues, he met with Jewish Officials," Film Threat's editors wrote. "But in the end, in all his `I'm really not anti-Semitic' posturing, he never bothered to address how irresponsible he was for driving under the influence in the first place. And now he's got a new movie opening, `Apocalypto,' and the question becomes: who cares?"

Rep. Charles Rangel Wants to Reinstate Draft

Americans would have to sign up for a new military draft after turning 18 under a bill the incoming chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee says he will introduce next year.

Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., said Sunday he sees his idea as a way to deter politicians from launching wars.

"There's no question in my mind that this president and this administration would never have invaded Iraq, especially on the flimsy evidence that was presented to the Congress, if indeed we had a draft and members of Congress and the administration thought that their kids from their communities would be placed in harm's way," Rangel said.

Rangel, a veteran of the Korean War who has unsuccessfully sponsored legislation on conscription in the past, has said the all-volunteer military disproportionately puts the burden of war on minorities and lower-income families.

Nancy Pelosi: Restoring Military Draft Not on Agenda

House Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi said Monday her new Democratic majority will extend a hand to Republicans in moving the agenda of relieving the "middle-class squeeze." She said restoring the military draft will not be part of that agenda when Democrats take over the House in January.

Pelosi, following a strategy meeting with the next House majority leader, Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said she will meet with incoming House Minority Leader John Boehner and "we'll find our common ground for the American people."

"The principle of civility and respect for minority participation in this House is something we promised the American people. It's the right thing to do," she said.

Pelosi and Hoyer repeated that in the first 100 legislative hours of the new Congress that convenes in January, they will try to pass bills that directly affect the pocketbooks of working-class and middle-class people, including raising the minimum wage, cutting interest rates for student loans and allowing the Medicare program to negotiate lower drug prices.

Other top priorities for January are lobbying reform, implementing the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission and rolling back subsidies to the oil industry.

Pelosi said restoring the draft will not be on that list and was not something she supported.

"The speaker and I discussed scheduling and it did not include that," Hoyer added.

Incoming Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., caused a stir by repeating a long-held position that a draft is the best way to ensure that all levels of society are represented in the military. Besides Rangel, there is almost no support in Congress for restoring the draft.

"It's not about a draft, it's about shared sacrifice in this country," Pelosi said. She said Rangel is "a strong voice for social justice in our country" and his support for the draft was "a way to make a point."

Fox News Satire Targets Left's 'Sacred Cows'

Fox News Channel is preparing a new Saturday night comedy show tailored to its largely right-leaning audience.

Fox will tape two episodes of the yet untitled show and air them in late January, with the possibility that the program could become a weekly feature.

The show would take aim at "the sacred cows of the left” that don’t get lampooned very much by other comedy shows, according to Joel Surnow, co-creator of "24” and one of the executive producers of the new Fox program.

"It’s a satirical news format that would play more to the Fox News audience than the Michael Moore channel,” he told the Hollywood reporter.

"It would tip more right as ‘The Daily Show’ tips left.”

But he added that "it’s not going to hit you over the head with partisan politics. It’ll hit anything that deserves to be hit.”

Plans are to tape the show before a studio audience in Los Angeles, with co-anchors Kurt Long and Susan Yeagley. The show will also feature man-on-the-street interviews and correspondent reports.

"Fox News is always looking for new cutting-edge programming ideas,” Bill Shine, senior vice president for programming at Fox News, told the Reporter.

"We look forward to working with Joel Surnow on this opportunity.”

Mary Matalin Calls Election ‘Last Gasp of Liberals’

By Ronald Kessler

The Democrats’ takeover of Congress is the “last gasp of liberals,” says Mary Matalin, the Republican strategist and former aide to Vice President Dick Cheney.

“I don’t even consider the election a setback,” Matalin told me, “because it’s not just the House Democrats that won as conservatives. Joe Lieberman won, and a number of Senate candidates won who are conservatives. So I see it as more of a last gasp for what we’ve come to call liberals. It is a necessary course correction.”

Matalin is currently traveling through most of the country.

“I haven’t been in any region where people who are conservatives or Republicans are dispirited,” Matalin says. “I get the gripes and righteous debate that’s going on, as it always has to, in the way that Republicans do so well, circling the wagons and shooting inward. But we will come out of our soul-searching faster because we know what we did wrong and can regroup more productively than the other side is going to be able to. That’s because they have no ground — they’re standing on smoke.”

Matalin notes that voters did not vote for candidates with a liberal agenda. In fact, according to a post-election survey by the National Taxpayers Union (NTU), GOP candidates who strayed from the principles of fiscal conservatism were more likely to alienate their base and be defeated.

Moreover, Americans for Tax Reform found that most Democrats won by dressing up as Republicans. Based on what they said on their Web sites, ATR determined that nearly all the Democrats who defeated Republicans in the House did so using a conservative message of lower taxes and accountability.

Democrats Have No Wiggle Room

Having run against Bush without a positive vision of their own, the Democrats now have “no wiggle room to do what they did in the last two cycles, which is to just not put anything seriously real on the table,” Matalin notes. “They have no agenda. So the election couldn’t possibly be a mandate for anything.”

Asked how she and her husband, Democratic strategist James Carville, interacted after the election, Matalin muses, “You know, we’re professional about it. I’m not a very good loser, but as I keep telling him, ‘show me a good loser, and I’ll show you a loser.’”

Carville, on the other hand, is a gracious loser, she says.

“That’s good, because he’s had many opportunities to do it, and he’s going to have more in the future.”

While polls have shown voters favoring Democrats, “I don’t care what the polls say about people identifying as Democrats,” She says emphatically. “That is not the same as people getting elected as liberals. So we go into 2008 with a growth in acceptance of center-right philosophy. It’s completely unchartered territory. We’ve never had this kind of election in this country in modern presidential politics. Not in the information age. You haven’t had one like this for what, 50 years? So it’s a thrilling time in history, and it’s a thrilling time in politics.”

Those conservatives who say the Bush White House has abandoned the conservative principles of Ronald Reagan forget that Republicans first have to get elected, Matalin feels. By giving seniors drug prescription coverage under Medicare, for example, Republicans won votes and fulfilled Bush’s compassionate conservative approach.

“One Reaganism was you’d rather get 80 percent of a loaf than no loaf,” she says.

“But I think the whole trajectory of compassionate conservatism was overrun by events. We’re at war, and that’s a big trajectory. The philosophy I think going forward has to be going back to basics and updating it.”

Credit Where Credit Is Due

The Bush administration has gotten “credit for nothing that goes right and blame for everything that goes wrong,” she states. “You know we have not been hit for five years. We have a booming economy. Somebody deserves credit for doing something right along the way. And I think our practice of just trashing everybody on every side, and the elite media particularly, but all of us share blame in just trashing public servants and trashing politicians and ascribing to the multitude the sins of the few.”

People in most parts of the country are “just sick of being down on everything,” Matalin feels. “It’s not in our nature; it’s not in our DNA. Some proportion of this country is chronically cynical, and they tend to live in blue epicenters, but most of the country is sort of relentlessly optimistic.”

She and her husband are in basic agreement about the election.

“It could’ve been worse if Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman hadn’t done what they did [to motivate potential Republican voters],” she says. “We would have lost 12 to 15 more seats. James agrees with that and respects what they did.”

Turning to the 2008 presidential election, “The guy or gal who comes out of the box the most hopeful and optimistic, not in a corny way, but in a realistic way, in the Reaganesque kind of way, in the happy warrior way, is going to predominate over this American hating-everything-that’s-wrong-with-us kind of way,” she says.

Mitt Romney Hangs Tough

Matalin calles Mitt Romney “a spectacular candidate.” He is “methodical, and he’s definitely got the happy warrior thing,” she says. “He’s substantive, and he’s got executive skills. And he’s 21st century, too.”

Romney’s Mormon religion will turn out to be a plus, she speculates.

“I think his religion has a value component to it that is deep and true. People don’t split hairs on what is your source of strength. They like that you have a source of strength, and you are anchored like that. You know this is not 1960, and religion didn’t even work as an issue in 1960 with John F. Kennedy.”

Rudy Giuliani presumably has people lined up who are going to overcome objections to his views on social issues like abortion, Matalin says.

“Look, we know when we don’t stand together we hang separately,” she says.

Matalin thinks Sen. John McCain believes what he says and is liked by many conservatives.

“He certainly has brought out a lot of seriously smart and good people,” Matalin says. “His challenge is to go from being the insurgent maverick to the establishment front-runner.”

Newt Gingrich has a “huge and serious following, and many are holding out for him,” she sys.

If Sen. Hillary Clinton runs for president, “She will galvanize the base, or a portion of the base, that’s for sure,” Matalin says. “But as we know, it’s not pure base all base all the time. It’s base plus. You can’t go anywhere until you’ve pinned down your base. But if you only turn out your base, it’s not enough on either side. You’ve got to grow your base. That’s what Karl did in 2000, and did significantly in 2004. And so, yes, she'll galvanize our base, but we have to get more than our base. Those voters that always make the difference, which we grew in 2004, are back in play — Hispanics, Jews, women. Just because they voted one time against Republicans does not mean for all time they are lost to conservatism. It just depends on how she goes at it and what we put up against it.”

Do Not Underestimate Hillary

At the same time, she says, “I just think conservatives should not underestimate her prowess, and they should not underestimate her ability to go to the middle the way she’s been doing. They should not underestimate how strategic that team is, and her husband is, or how hungry they are to get it. All these things add up. The Democrats might be having pre-buyer’s remorse, but she’s a very sturdy utilitarian SUV for them.”

To be sure, people may think they want a sports car in a candidate, Matalin says.

“But in the end, They gotta have somebody that’s got a record, and she does have some serious substantive stuff in there. She was so scorched by going to the liberal end. She’ll have to run in the middle, and she knows how to run a campaign.”

Bill Clinton: 'Whatever She Says, I'm For'

Ex-President Clinton has left no doubt about who wears the political pants in his marriage now – Senator and potential presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Speaking at a panel discussion in New York on Wednesday afternoon, Clinton responded to a question about America’s situation in Iraq:

"I have a wife in the Senate so whatever she says, I'm for." Clinton's quip drew loud laughter from the audience, the New York Sun reports.

But he did go on to say, about Iraq, that he doesn't favor providing timetables for an American military withdrawal there, as many of Clinton's fellow Democrats have demanded.

He also said he believed the Iraqi government needs to do more to secure its own future.

"The government needs to understand that there has to be some success in getting some people out of the killing business and back into the politics business," Clinton declared.

Since leaving office in 2000, Clinton has promoted efforts to deal with problems like poverty, conflict, and health crises.

"I made up my mind that I would not be someone who spent the rest of his life wishing I were still president," he said. "That seemed to be a stupid way to waste a day and also an arrogant thing."

T. Boone Pickens, Donors Back Giuliani

Republican Rudy Giuliani has assembled a group of high-powered business executives, including billionaire Texas oil mogul T. Boone Pickens, to raise money as the former New York City mayor weighs a full-blown presidential bid.

Giuliani headlined a meeting of the finance committee in New York on Wednesday. The group will be chaired by Roy Bailey, a former finance chairman for the Texas Republican Party and a founding member of Giuliani Partners, the former mayor's consulting firm.

"It's a group of very committed people who hope the mayor's exploratory committee leads to other things," Bailey said in an interview.

Among the most notable members of the group is Pickens, a longtime contributor to President Bush and other Republican candidates. In 2004, Pickens donated more than $4 million to GOP causes, including $3 million to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the group that made unsubstantiated allegations about Democratic Sen. John Kerry's military record.

Other members of Giuliani's finance committee include Barry Wynn, former chairman of the South Carolina Republican Party and the finance chair of Bush's re-election campaign. The South Carolina primary is a key early contest in the presidential nominating process.

Another committee member is Tom Hicks, a Dallas billionaire and owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team. Hicks organized the investment group that purchased the Rangers in 1998 from a partnership that included Bush.

Anne Dickerson, a veteran Bush fundraiser who has been attached to Giuliani's political action committee, Solutions America, will be the committee's national fundraising director.

Bailey refused to disclose the finance committee's fundraising goals, but said the group was putting together a schedule of events around the country to begin in the next 30 days.

Bailey described Giuliani as "very serious" about the presidential exploratory effort, and said the success of the fundraising campaign will be an important gauge of whether the former mayor can raise the money he needs to go forward.

"The purpose of testing the waters is testing whether there is financial support," Bailey said.

Giuliani, widely praised for his leadership after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, has emerged as a national Republican leader and prodigious fundraiser for GOP candidates nationwide. But his liberal views on social issues - he supports legal abortion, gay rights and gun control - not be well-received by Christian conservatives, who form a significant bloc of the Republican base.

National polls show Giuliani running strong among potential GOP presidential candidates, either topping the field or tied with Arizona Sen. John McCain. McCain filed papers on Thursday to form an exploratory committee.

Other potential GOP contenders include Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and New York Gov. George Pataki. Both decided against seeking another term with an eye toward 2008.

Giuliani's successor, Republican New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, has mused publicly about running as an independent.

James Carville: Democrats Should Fire Howard Dean

Democratic political strategist James Carville said Howard Dean should be fired as chairman of the Democratic Party, comparing him to former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in his level of incompetence.

Carville, meeting with political reporters Wednesday morning, said Democrats could have picked up as many as 50 House seats, instead of the nearly 30 they have so far.

But Dean’s Democratic National Committee did not spend some $6 million it could have used in so-called "third tier” House races against vulnerable Republicans, the Austin American-Statesman reports.

Carville said he tried to meet with Dean to push for additional spending for Democrats in the last days of the campaign, but Dean declined.

Asked by a reporter whether Dean should be fired, Carville replied, "In a word, do I think? Yes.

"I think he should be held accountable. I would describe his leadership as Rumsfeldian in its competence.”

There was no immediate response from Dean.

Hillary: 'Health Care Is Coming Back'

Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday outlined an ambitious agenda of legislative priorities while continuing to deflect questions about her presumed presidential ambitions.

"I will look at the possibilities, but I ... haven't really had the time to talk to people about it," Clinton told a breakfast gathering hosted by the Association for a Better New York. "It's been a busy election season that worked out well, so I will think about it. I'm open to thoughts."

Clinton was returning to Washington on Monday to participate in a lame-duck session of Congress in which lawmakers will tackle several pieces of unfinished business before ceding control of both the Senate and House to Democrats early next year.

But the New York senator was clearly looking ahead to the next Congress, which she, like other Democrats, has vowed will operate on a more bipartisan basis than it had under Republican control.

"We are ready to roll up our sleeves and work with our Republican counterparts. Our country works best when we govern from the vital, dynamic center," she said.

Since cruising to re-election last week against a weak Republican challenger, Clinton has parried repeated questions about her political future. While she hasn't disclosed her plans, polls show her the clear front-runner for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, with a national infrastructure of strategists and advisers and at least $10 million in her campaign account.

"Before, I didn't have time to think - I was too focused on what I was doing," she later told reporters. "I'm thrilled by the results, and now I'll have some time to think."

In her remarks, Clinton outlined a range of challenges she said Democrats would tackle in the coming months, such as trimming the federal deficit, reducing dependence on foreign oil, and improving the image of the United States abroad.

She also said Democrats would focus on improving the quality and affordability of health care - a touchy matter for the former first lady, who in 1993 led her husband's calamitous attempt to overhaul the nation's health care system. The failure of that effort helped Republicans win control of both the Senate and House the following year.

"Health care is coming back," Clinton warned, adding, "It may be a bad dream for some."

Rudy Giuliani Forms Panel for 2008 Run

The man once dubbed "America's mayor" has taken the first step toward becoming America's next president.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Republican moderate who achieved near-mythic popularity for his handling of the Sept. 11 attacks, filed papers Friday in New York to create the Rudy Giuliani Presidential Exploratory Committee Inc. A copy of the document was obtained by The Associated Press.

Creating an exploratory committee does not make Giuliani a declared candidate, but it does mean he intends to travel the country gauging support and preparing for a White House bid.

"Mayor Giuliani has not made a decision yet," Giuliani spokeswoman Sunny Mindel said in a statement Monday night. "With the filing of this document, we have taken the necessary legal steps so an organization can be put in place and money can be raised to explore a possible presidential run in 2008."

Michael Steele Open to Lead RNC

Maryland Republican Lt. Gov. Michael Steele, who lost his race for a Senate seat, expressed interest Sunday in becoming chairman of the Republican National Committee.

"I have not had any conversations directly with the White House yet on this," Steele told C-SPAN.

Ken Mehlman, the current chairman, is stepping down when his two-year term ends in January. Mehlman made a point of emphasizing outreach to black voters and helped recruit Steele for the Maryland race.

Steele, who lost to Democratic Rep. Benjamin Cardin by a margin of 55 percent to 44 percent of the vote, said he believed it was time for the GOP to rethink its views in wake of losing both chambers of Congress in last week's midterm elections, which he described as a "tsunami." Steele said the electorate "was very clear."

"They expected the administration and the party to step up and speak to particular issues and, failing that, there would be heck to pay -- and we paid," Steele said.

Steele said he wasn't sure when an announcement would be made on who will be the new committee chair.

Steele was head of the Maryland Republican Party before being elected lieutenant governor in 2002 as the first black candidate elected statewide in Maryland. His term as lieutenant governor will end in January.

Steele also explained why he largely avoided mentioning his party affiliation while campaigning. In a state where registered Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1, Steele said it was obvious what party he belonged to and there was no need to "rub it in your face."

"In a state like Maryland, there was an opportunity to move away from the labels and really try to dig beyond, you know, being a Republican or Democrat, red state or blue state," Steele said. "In fact, that's what people are sick of. I think we saw the results on Tuesday just how sick they are."

Pelosi Backs Murtha for Majority Leader

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, in line to become speaker of the House, stepped into a postelection power struggle among fellow Democrats on Sunday with a letter of support for Rep. Jack Murtha in the race to pick a majority leader.

"Your presence in the leadership of our party would add a knowledgeable and respected voice to our Democratic team," Pelosi, D-Calif., wrote Murtha. The Pennsylvania lawmaker is widely viewed as an underdog in a two-man race with Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer in this week's leadership elections.

Murtha issued a statement saying, "I am deeply gratified to receive the support of Speaker Pelosi, a tireless advocate for change and a true leader for our party and our country."

Hoyer has been second-ranking in the Democratic leadership behind Pelosi the past four years. He issued a statement saying he was confident he would win the race.

"Nancy told me some time ago that she would personally support Jack. I respect her decision as the two are very close," Hoyer's statement said.

Pelosi and Hoyer have long been rivals within the party caucus, while she and Murtha are allies of long standing.

Murtha, a former Marine who is respected for his knowledge of defense issues, gained national attention last year when he said U.S. troops should be withdrawn from Iraq.

Murtha announced last fall he intended to run for majority leader if Democrats won control of the House, a pre-election jab at Hoyer at a time the Marylander was pledging support for Pelosi.

Both Hoyer and Murtha traveled on behalf of Democratic candidates during the campaign. Hoyer's office said he visited 82 congressional districts and raised or contributed $8.2 million to the party's candidates in the months leading to the elections. No comparable figures were immediately available for Murtha's efforts.

Since the election, Hoyer has released letters of support in the leadership race from senior Democrats as well as from more than half of the incoming lawmakers who won their seats last week.

In her letter, Pelosi began by noting that Murtha had requested her support. Noting his opposition to the war, she added, "Your leadership gave so many Americans, including respected military leaders, the encouragement to voice their own disapproval at a failed policy that weakens our military and makes stability in that region even more difficult to achieve."

One of Hoyer's supporters, Rep.-elect Baron Hill of Indiana, depicted Pelosi's letter as good news for the Maryland lawmaker. Hill said the letter was a statement of personal intent, adding, "She's not asking other members to vote for Murtha."

Insider: Castro May Be Dead by Year’s End

Cuban Dictator Fidel Castro is still “gravely ill” three months after undergoing abdominal surgery for an undisclosed ailment — despite Cuban protestations to the contrary.

“He is well. He’s been resting a bit because of the operation he had,” Castro’s brother Ramon recently told The Associated Press.

But in a video released in late October, Fidel appeared slow and awkward, and his speech was shaky. He wore an oversized track suit and bathrobe, leaving open the possibility that he has been fitted with a colostomy bag.

“I have been saying it for a while — that the recovery would be prolonged and not exempt of risk,” Castro, who turned 80 in August, said on the tape.

In the video, Castro was shown doing walk-in-place exercises, “slowly swinging his elbows as his slippered feet, set wide, marked time but did not move forward,” the Miami Herald reported.

That is “exactly what you would have expected for somebody who has been ill for an extended period of time, who has not been active,” University of Miami gastroenterologist Dr. Jeffrey Raskin told the Herald. “You have a wide-based gait to steady yourself because you’re weak.”

Dr. Raskin and Dr. Charles Gerson, a gastroenterologist at Mount Sinai in New York, both said Fidel’s long “recovery” suggests a serious illness, such as cancer.

“Usually for a benign condition, if you have surgery, after a month or six weeks you are back to normal,” Dr. Gerson said.

“Three months after surgery, he should be better.”

U.S. intelligence insiders believe Castro is “gravely ill,” according to the Herald.

One former U.S. government official, who requested anonymity, said Washington has obtained “pretty reliable” information that indicates Castro is not recovering as well as Cuba claims.

“The latest I’ve heard was still pretty grave for Castro,” the official told the Herald.

“Castro may not make it through the New Year.”

Rush Limbaugh: Why Republicans Lost

Republicans took a beating on Election Day because they abandoned their conservative principles and in the end stood for nothing, Rush Limbaugh says.

In his Wednesday broadcast, America’s top talker said that until Republicans begin asking themselves what’s wrong with themselves they are never going to fix their problems.

When things go wrong, Rush said, "you must look inward and ask first, ‘What did we do wrong? What could we have done better? What mistakes did we make?”

Commenting that although Republicans lost, "Conservatism did not lose, Republicanism lost last night. Republicanism, being a political party first, rather than an ideological movement, is what lost last night.”


The Democrats, he said "beat something last night with nothing. They advanced no agenda other than their usual anti-war position. They had no contract — they really never did get specific. Their message was one of ‘vote for us; the other guys have been in power too long.’”

Rush further admonished, "There was no dominating conservative message that came from the [Republican] top and filtered down throughout in this campaign.”

He added that if there was conservatism in the campaign, it was on the Democratic side: "There were conservative Democrats running for office in the House of Representatives and in a couple of Senate races won by Democrats yesterday.” He cited James Webb as an example.

He also said it was conservatism that won fairly big when it was tried, but it was Democrats who ran as conservatives and not their GOP rivals. He added that the Democratic leadership had gone out and recruited conservative candidates because they knew liberals could not win running against Republicans in red states.

Rush quoted Thomas Sowell as explaining that the latest example of election fraud is actually what the Democrats did — they nominated a bunch of moderate and conservative candidates for the express purpose of electing a far-left Democratic leadership.

"The Democrats could not have won the House, being liberals,” Rush said. "Liberalism didn’t win anything yesterday; Republicanism lost. Conservatism was nowhere to be found except on the Democratic side.”

The root of the problem, Rush said, is that "our side hungers for ideological leadership and we’re not getting it from the top. Conservatism was nowhere to be found in this campaign from the top. The Democrats beat something with nothing. They didn’t have to take a stand on anything other than their usual anti-war positions. They had no clear agenda and they didn’t dare offer one. Liberalism will still lose every time it’s offered.”

Republicans, Rush said, allowed themselves to be defined. "Without elected conservative leadership from the top Republicans in the House and Senate republicans are free to freelance and say the hell with party unity.”

That leads, Rush said, to the emergence of RINOs — Republicans in name only.

Republicans in Congress, Rush explained, were held captive by the party’s leadership in the White House. They were put into a position of having to endorse policies with which as conservatives they disagreed.

"The Democratic Party,” Rush went on to say, "is the party of entitlements; but the Republicans come up with this Medicare prescription drug plan that the polls said that the public didn’t want and was not interested in. That is not conservatism. Conservatives do not grow the government and offer entitlements as a means of buying votes. But that’s what the Republicans in Congress had to support in order to stay in line with the Party from the top.

"It is silly to blame the media; it is silly to blame the Democrats; it is silly to go out and try to find all these excuses,” Rush said. "We have proved that we can beat them … we have proved that we can withstand whatever we get from the drive-by media. Conservatism does that — conservatism properly applied, proudly, eagerly, with vigor and honesty will triumph over that nine times out of 10 in this current political and social environment. It just wasn’t utilized in this campaign.”

Rush also blamed the failure to embrace conservatism on Republican’s fear of being criticized from those in the so-called establishment. Republicans, he charged, go out of their way to avoid being criticized, fearing they will be characterized as extremists and kooks.

As a result conservatism gets watered down, and the GOP loses the support of the nation’s conservative majority Rush stated.

Anything can beat nothing, Rush concluded, "and it happened yesterday.”

Rush also said that the elections liberated him.

"I feel liberated, and I'm going to tell you as plainly as I can why," Rush said. "I no longer am going to have to carry the water for people who I don't think deserve having their water carried. Now, you might say, 'Well, why have you been doing it?' Because the stakes are high. Even though the Republican Party let us down, to me they represent a far better future for my beliefs and therefore the country's than the Democrat Party and liberalism does."

Rush went on to explain that he believes his side is worthy of victory, and that he believes it's much easier "to reform things that are going wrong on my side from a position of strength. Now I'm liberated from having to constantly come in here every day and try to buck up a bunch of people who don't deserve it, to try to carry the water and make excuses for people who don't deserve it."

The nation's top talker confided "I did not want to sit here and participate, willingly, in the victory of the libs, in the victory of the Democrat Party by sabotaging my own. But now with what has happened yesterday and today, it is an entirely liberating thing. If those in our party who are going to carry the day in the future -- both in Congress and the administration -- are going to choose a different path than what most of us believe, then that's liberating. I don't say this with any animosity about anybody, and I don't mean to make this too personal."

Rush explained that it has not been easy for him to endorse some of the things backed by Republicans in Congress. "There have been a bunch of things going on in Congress, some of this legislation coming out of there that I have just cringed at, and it has been difficult coming in here, trying to make the case for it when the people who are supposedly in favor of it can't even make the case themselves -- and to have to come in here and try to do their jobs ...

John Bolton Likely to Depart U.N.

NewsMax has learned that U.S. ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton will likely leave his post next month.

After a rocky series of Senate confirmation hearings, Bolton was sent to the U.N. by President Bush in August 2005 under a recess appointment. That allowed the president to bypass Senate confirmation while it was in recess, but the appointee could only serve for the length of the current Congress which is set to expire at year's end.

There had been indications that Bolton might win Senate confirmation after the election when several key votes might be open to favoring Bolton. But the GOP's apparent loss of the Senate has doomed that hope.

"This nomination is dead and we have known it for several days," a source close to the U.S. mission to the U.N. tells NewsMax.

"We just don't know what the White House wants to do next," the source added.

Bolton has won high marks for his role at the U.N. as he has dealt with several crises, especially with North Korea, Iran, and the recent crisis between Israel and Lebanon.

President Bush has strongly supported Bolton and has repeatedly called upon the Senate committee to allow the nomination to go to the full Senate for an "up and down vote." Senate Democrats again blocked such a vote Wednesday evening.

Bolton has been one of the administration's few high-ranking conservatives. During Bush's first term, Bolton served as under secretary of state for arms control and international security.

At that post he aggressively pursued rogue state's like Iran who have been developing weapons of mass destruction. Bolton has been credited in getting Libya to agree to dismantle its WMD program.

Bolton's principled and sometimes confrontational approach has not won support from many congressional Democrats.

"The Bolton nomination will not get voted on," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., reportedly has told colleagues.

Another leading Democrat, Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., a long-time Bolton nemesis, seconded Reid's position on Wednesday. Biden is expected to become chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when the new Congress convenes in January.

While Bolton's office in New York has not commented on developments, NewsMax has learned that the White House is considering reappointing Bolton under the same recess appointment provision. There is a hiccup: Bolton would be forced to serve without pay, an unlikely alternative sources say.

Among those believed to be on a White House short list to replace Bolton is former Senate majority leader and prominent Maine Democrat George Mitchell.

Dems complete election sweep of Congress

Democrats completed an improbable double-barreled election sweep of Congress on Wednesday, taking control of the Senate with a victory in Virginia as they padded their day-old majority in the House.

"The days of the do-nothing Congress are over," declared Democratic Sen. Harry Reid (news, bio, voting record) of Nevada, in line to become majority leader. "In Iraq and here at home, Americans have made clear they are tired of the failures of the last six years."

Jim Webb's victory over Sen. George Allen (news, bio, voting record) in Virginia assured Democrats of 51 seats when the Senate convenes in January. That marked a gain of six in midterm elections in which the war in Iraq and President Bush were major issues.

Earlier, State Sen. Jon Tester triumphed over Republican Sen. Conrad Burns (news, bio, voting record) in a long, late count in Montana.

With a handful of House races too close to call, Democrats had gained 28 seats, enough to regain the majority after 12 years of Republican rule and place Rep. Nancy Pelosi (news, bio, voting record) of California in line to become the first female speaker in history.

"It was a thumping," Bush conceded at the White House. "It's clear the Democrat Party had a good night."

Allen's campaign issued a statement noting that state officials are conducting a canvass of the votes cast in Tuesday's balloting.

"At the conclusion of those efforts, Senator George Allen plans to make a statement regarding the outcome," it said.

The Senate had teetered at 50 Democrats, 49 Republicans for most of Wednesday, with Virginia hanging in the balance. Webb's victory ended Republican hopes of eking out a 50-50 split, with Vice President Dick Cheney wielding tie-breaking authority.

The Associated Press contacted election officials in all 134 localities in Virginia where voting occurred, obtaining updated numbers Wednesday. About half the localities said they had completed their postelection canvassing and nearly all had counted outstanding absentees. Most were expected to be finished by Friday.

The new AP count showed Webb with 1,172,538 votes and Allen with 1,165,302, a difference of 7,236. Virginia has had two statewide vote recounts in modern history, but both resulted in vote changes of no more than a few hundred votes.

It had been clear for weeks leading up to the election that Democrats were strongly positioned to challenge Republicans for House control.

But Democrats began the year with fewer seats than at any time since Herbert Hoover occupied the White House. Even Reid, the Senate's party leader, mused aloud at one point that it might take a miracle to capture Senate control.

"From changing course in Iraq to raising the minimum wage to fixing the health care crisis to making this country energy independent, we're ready to get to work," he said in a statement late Wednesday.

Earlier, Sen. Mitch McConnell (news, bio, voting record), R-Ky., all but certain to become the next minority leader, said: "In the Senate, the minority is never irrelevant unless it falls down into the very small numbers. I don't think, as a practical matter, it's going to make a whole lot of difference in the Senate, being at 49."

Webb's win capped a banner election year for Democrats, who benefited from the voters' desire to issue a searing rebuke of the status quo.

The president, who spoke of spending his political capital after his successful re-election two years ago, acknowledged, "As the head of the Republican Party, I share a large part of the responsibility."

With power on Capitol Hill tilting, Bush announced that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld would step down as Democrats have demanded.

The war in Iraq, scandals in Congress and declining support for Bush and Republicans on Capitol Hill defined the battle for House and Senate control, with the public embracing the Democrats' call for change to end a decade of one-party rule in Washington.

"This new Democratic majority has heard the voices of the American people," said Pelosi, adding that Americans placed their trust in Democrats. "We will honor that trust. We will not disappoint."

With the GOP booted from power, lame-duck Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., announced he will not run for leader of House Republicans when Democrats take control in January.

"Obviously I wish my party had won," Hastert said in a statement that added he intends to return to the "full-time task" of representing his Illinois constituents.

In the Senate, Democrats soundly defeated Republicans in Ohio, Missouri, Rhode Island, and Pennsylvania. The battle for Senate power came down to Virginia and Montana — and vote counts for those stretched into Wednesday.

By midday, Tester rode to victory over Burns, a three-term senator whose campaign was shadowed by a series of missteps and his ties to Jack Abramoff, the disgraced lobbyist at the center of an influence-peddling investigation.

"One hundred thousand miles and 15 hours later, here we did it," said Tester, an organic farmer with a flattop haircut who lost three fingers in a meat grinder.

In Virginia, Webb, a former Navy secretary under Ronald Reagan, declared victory, began to set a transition team in motion and called himself senator-elect. Allen, a swaggering cowboy boot-wearing former Virginia governor who favors football metaphors, refused to concede and waited to make a move until after the completion of the county-by-county canvassing.

Overall, Republicans lost ground with swing voters such as Catholics, independents, Hispanics and suburbanites, according to exit polls conducted for the AP and the television networks. The GOP held its conservative base, but Democrats made inroads with moderates.

"We came to Washington to change government and government changed us," lamented Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record), R-Ariz., his eye on the next election in 2008. "We departed rather tragically from our conservative principles."

In the House, Democrats won 230 seats and led in two races, while Republicans won 196 seats and led in seven races. If current trends hold, Democrats would have a 232-203 majority.

Without losing any seats of their own, Democrats captured 28 GOP-held seats. The party won in every region of the country and hoped to strengthen their majority by besting Republican incumbents in races that were too close to call.

Putting another notch in the Democratic column on Wednesday, Pennsylvania Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick, a freshman, lost his re-election bid to Democrat Patrick Murphy, a decorated Iraq war veteran, by about 1,500 votes.

In Ohio, Rep. Deborah Pryce (news, bio, voting record), the No. 4-ranking Republican in the House, struggled to fend off a fierce challenge from Democrat Mary Jo Kilroy in Columbus, and GOP Rep. Jean Schmidt, who famously suggested that a decorated Marine veteran of Vietnam named John Murtha was a coward, faced the possibility of defeat in her southern Ohio district. Both were leading but the final tallies were complicated by provisional and absentee ballots.

Republican incumbents also were slightly ahead in four other states but those margins were too tight to declare a winner. They were GOP Reps. Heather Wilson in New Mexico, Robin Hayes in North Carolina, Dave Reichart in Washington and Barbara Cubin in Wyoming.

In Connecticut, Democrat Joe Courtney sought to hang on to a minuscule 170-vote lead over Rep. Rob Simmons in a race that appeared headed for an automatic recount.

Elsewhere, Texas GOP Rep. Henry Bonilla (news, bio, voting record) was headed to a December runoff against Democrat Ciro Rodriguez because the congressman got only 48 percent of the vote in an eight-candidate field. He needed 50 percent to avoid a runoff.

Aside from gains in Congress, Democrats took 20 of 36 governors' races to give them a majority of top state jobs — 28 — for the first time in a dozen years. Arkansas, Colorado, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and Ohio went into the Democratic column.

Democrats also gained a decisive edge in state legislatures, taking control of several and solidifying their hold on others. With the wins, Democrats will be in a better position to shape state policy agendas and will play a key role in drawing congressional districts.

Dick Morris: Polls Show GOP Tilt

The latest polls show a tilt to the Republicans, noted political strategist Dick Morris tells NewsMax exclusively.

Morris made the following observations late Sunday:
The Republicans will lose the House.
The Republicans will likely keep the Senate.
The GOP now has a lock on Tennessee, and four other states remain in contention: Montana, Missouri, Virginia and Rhode Island. The Democrats have to win all four to get control of the Senate. Morris says that is highly unlikely.
The latest voter trends suggest the Republicans may not face disaster. The most recent Pew poll has the generic Democratic vote up just 4 points over the Republican vote. Morris says the GOP has been closing an 8 to 9 point gap in the past week.
But Morris says other developments may help the Republicans, including the verdict against Saddam Hussein.

Morris indicates polling over the weekend will show if the GOP may be rebounding even more just a day before Election Day.

Stay tuned . . .

Larry Sabato: Democrats Will Win Both Houses

Respected political pundit Larry Sabato has released his final "Crystal Ball” predictions for the Congressional elections – and he still foresees the Democrats winning enough seats to gain control of both the Senate and the House.

A net gain of six seats would give the Democrats a majority of 51 votes in the Senate – and the Democrats will indeed unseat six Republicans, according to a new release from Sabato and David Wasserman of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics.

Here is a breakdown of several key Senate races from Sabato’s Crystal Ball:

Arizona: Republican Sen. Jon Kyl will win re-election over Democrat Jim Pederson.

Connecticut: Sen. Joe Lieberman, who is running as an independent, will win re-election over Democrat Ned Lamont and will continue to vote along with the Democrats.

Maryland: Democrat Ben Cardin will defeat Republican Michael Steele in the race for an open seat.

Michigan: Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow will win re-election over Republican Mike Bouchard.

Minnesota: Democrat Amy Klobuchar will defeat Republican Mark Kennedy in the race for an open seat.

Missouri: Democrat Claire McCaskill will unseat Republican Sen. Jim Talent.

Montana: Democrat Jon Tester will unseat Republican Sen. Conrad Burns.

Nebraska: Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson will win re-election over Republican Pete Ricketts.

New Jersey: Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez will defeat Republican Tom Kean, Jr.

Ohio: Democrat Sherrod Brown will unseat Republican Sen. Mike DeWine.

Pennsylvania: Democrat Bob Casey will unseat Republican Sen. Rick Santorum.

Rhode Island: Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse will unseat Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee.

Tennessee: Republican Bob Corker will defeat Democrat Harold Ford, Jr. in the race for an open seat.

Virginia: Democrat Jim Webb will unseat Republican Sen. George Allen.

Washington: Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell will win re-election over Republican Mike McGavick.

In the House, Sabato’s final predictions have the Democrats picking up 29 seats, enough to give them a 232-203 majority – the same size majority the GOP currently holds.

The Republicans who will be unseated, according to Sabato, include Curt Weldon in Pennsylvania, Clay Shaw in Florida, Christopher Shays in Connecticut, Marilyn Musgrave in Colorado and Charlie Bass in New Hampshire.

Ken Mehlman: GOP Gains Momentum

The following is a memorandum from Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman to Republican leadership and interested parties regarding momentum heading toward Election Day:

New polls say our party is heading into Election Day with strong momentum. Specifically, three national polls this weekend show Republicans making major gains.

The Generic Ballot is Closing - The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press (Nov. 1-4) shows Republicans cutting the Democrat lead on the generic ballot from down 11 last month (39- 50) to down just four points today (43-47). The ABC News/Washington Post poll (Nov. 1-4) shows Republicans cutting the Democrat edge from -14 two weeks ago to only a six point margin today. In addition, Gallup (Nov. 2-5) has the Democrat margin dropping by half over the past two weeks, to a seven-point race.

By comparison, while Republicans held an average 1-point lead in these polls in 1994 and 2002, the current average Democrat lead-six points-is the same as it was in 1998, when there was minimal change in the balance of Congress.

Republican Enthusiasm is Growing - Democrat interest in the election has remained relatively static, while Republican interest (+14) and enthusiasm (+10) have increased significantly, according to Pew, which concludes "Republicans now register a greater likelihood of voting than do Democrats...

Republicans are Picking Up More Swing Votes - The ABC/ Washington Post poll showed a net 10-point gain for Republicans among independents from last month. Pew showed a similar gain among independents of 10 points since last month and a huge 17- point net gain among moderates.

The ABC/Washington Post poll shows the Republican edge in the generic ballot has increased 10 points among conservatives, from 68-29 (a month ago) to 73-24.

The final pre-election Pew poll shows a similar trend with Republicans now planning to support the GOP growing a net-3 points. It also shows a net-6 point increase among conservatives and net-18 points among white evangelical Christians.

72-Hour Program is Working - The GOP's 72-hour program has reached 27 million volunteer contacts through Saturday, hitting 3 million voters this Saturday alone. By and large, this effort will have its impact on Election Day and will not show up in most public opinion polls. However, some trends are starting to be seen in the data:

Republicans are casting a wider net: According to the ABC/Washington Post poll, among those who have been contacted by campaigns, 70 percent were contacted by Republicans while only 61 percent were contacted by Democrats.

And using better targeting: The Pew study says that we are not only contacting more voters, but contacting the right voters: 40 percent of our party was contacted by Republicans, while Democrats only connected with 34 percent of their own party.

The ABC/Washington Post poll shows Republicans gaining on handling of Iraq (+8) and Personal Values (+12).

The Kerry Factor - John Kerry's "stuck in Iraq" remark has attracted the attention of 84 percent of voters, and 19 percent - - including 18 percent of independents -- say it has raised serious doubts about voting for their local Democratic candidates.

Following recent gains in the Dow and low unemployment numbers, those who see the economy as excellent or good increased from 36 percent to 44 percent in the Pew poll.

On average, the President's job approval increased a net 4 points.

Voters' view of the direction of country has improved dramatically - a net 14-point gain among those that see things going in the right direction in the ABC poll and a 12-point gain in Gallup.

Senior Anglican bishop criticises Muslim 'victim mentality'

A Church of England senior cleric, whose father converted from Islam, has attacked the world view of some Muslims, accusing them of imcompatible double standards of "victimhood and domination".

"Their complaint often boils down to the position that it is always right to intervene when Muslims are victims, as in Bosnia or Kosovo, and always wrong when Muslims are the oppressors or terrorists, as with the Taliban or in Iraq," said the CoE's only Asian bishop, Michael Nazir-Ali.

Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester in southeast England, was quoted as saying that because of a "dual psychology" in which some Muslims want both "victimhood and domination", all their demands would never be satisfied.

"Given the world view that has given rise to such grievances, there can never be sufficient appeasement and new demands will continue to be made," he was quoted as saying in a Sunday Times interview.

As a result of not countering such beliefs, extremism had been allowed to spread in Britain by some Muslim clerics and the Internet, he said, accusing the government of backsliding on its commitment to stamp out mosque radicalism.

To combat the problem, more needs to be done to recover "characteristic British values" of personal and common good that developed from Christianity "to help us inculcate the virtues of generosity, loyalty, moderation and love".

The comments -- the most outspoken by a high-ranking Anglican cleric -- come at a time when religion, multiculturalism and ethnic minority integration are to the fore in Britain.

Much of the debate has centred on the right of Muslim women to wear the full-face veil or niqab, sparked by former British foreign secretary Jack Straw who said they hinder good communications and symbolised separateness.

The issue has extended to the right to wear overt religious symbols and also the extent and effectiveness of Britain's much-vaunted multi-cultural model against a background of efforts to curb Muslim extremism.

The Church of England's highest ranking cleric Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams waded into the debate last month, saying to ban veils, turbans, crosses or other pieces of clothing would be "politically dangerous".

On the veil, Nazir-Ali -- who was born in Pakistan and whose father converted to Roman Catholicism -- risked controversy: "I can see nothing in Islam that presribes the wearing of a full-face veil.

"In the supermarket those at the cash tills need to be recognised. Teaching is another context in which society requires recognition and identification."

Last month a Muslim teaching assistant in northern England lost a case for discrimination after being suspended for refusing to uncover her face in the classroom.

The 57-year-old bishop took a similar tack in the Mail on Sunday newspaper, arguing for the promotion of universal values among all sections of the community for the benefit of all.

"You need some sort of subscription to a common vision, to shared values, and that has been neglected, not so much because of other faiths, but because of the spiritual and moral vacuum that has come to be at the heart of British society," he said.